Authorship Not Taught and Not Caught in Undergraduate Research Experiences at a Research University
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Authorship Not Taught and Not Caught in Undergraduate Research Experiences at a Research University Lauren E. Abbott1 · Amy Andes1 · Aneri C. Pattani1 · Patricia Ann Mabrouk1 Received: 22 January 2019 / Accepted: 26 April 2020 © Springer Nature B.V. 2020
Abstract This grounded study investigated the negotiation of authorship by faculty members, graduate student mentors, and their undergraduate protégés in undergraduate research experiences at a private research university in the northeastern United States. Semi-structured interviews using complementary scripts were conducted separately with 42 participants over a 3 year period to probe their knowledge and understanding of responsible authorship and publication practices and learn how faculty and students entered into authorship decision-making intended to lead to the publication of peer-reviewed technical papers. Herein the theoretical model for the negotiation of authorship developed through the analysis of these interviews is reported. The model identifies critical causal and intervening conditions responsible for the coping strategies faculty and students employ, which, in our study, appear to often produce unfortunate consequences for all involved. The undergraduate student researchers and their graduate student mentors interviewed in this study exhibited a limited understanding of authorship and the requirements for authorship in their research groups. The power differential between faculty and students, the students’ limited epistemic development, the busy-ness of the faculty, and the faculty’s failure to prioritize authorship have been identified as key factors inhibiting both undergraduate and graduate students from developing a deeper understanding of responsible authorship and publication practices. Implications for graduate education and undergraduate research are discussed, and strategies for helping all students to develop a deeper understanding of authorship are identified. Keywords Authorship · Undergraduate research experience · Research ethics · Responsible conduct of research
* Patricia Ann Mabrouk [email protected] Extended author information available on the last page of the article
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Introduction Authorship is perhaps one of the most fundamental and professionally-relevant activities and concepts in the global science, technology, engineering, and mathematics (STEM) research enterprise (Biagioli and Galison 2003; Mabrouk and Currano 2018). Assignment of authorship to the proper individuals is crucial to the integrity and credibility of research, as authorship identifies those who participated in and are therefore accountable for the study’s conception, conduct, analysis, and archival report. As such, authorship also identifies those who deserve credit and recognition for the work. This acknowledgment is important because authorship is frequently used as a measure of a researcher’s impact (Wilcox 1998; Biagioli 2003). A researcher’s publication record is used as one criterion in t
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