Academiafilter: assertiveness without loss of friendship
February 22, 2016 3:54 PM Subscribe
Co-wrote an academic paper and did the bulk of the research and writing. Now my coauthor/friend wants first name credit. How to argue about this without ruining the working relationship and the friendship?
Asking for a friend.
A and B are two profs who are in the final stages of readying an academic essay for publication. They are both tenure-track faculty at two different small liberal arts colleges in the Midwest. A originally conceived the idea of their topic and collected a few articles. B read the articles, wrote a presentation, continued the research with primary sources, a great deal of articles and books, and came up with the themes and specific argument for the essay. B also wrote the bulk of the finished essay. B sent the article to A several times, and A made small edits.
The question of author order came up recently. A asked B that A should be first author credited. B is upset by this, because despite having the idea for their paper topic, A has contributed only small amounts to the actual finished essay. (This is borne out by comparing drafts B sent to A and vice versa.) But how does B respond to the question? B is having a difficult time coming up with a polite way to say, Oh HAYell no, I did the bulk of the work.
I realize this probably seems like minutia to anyone outside the ivory tower of academia, but author order is important for advancement/tenure. Also, burning bridges in this smallish field would be foolish. B and A are friends. B also wants fair credit for the work B did. B is kind of pissed that A (being present throughout the process) would suggest B take second author credit.
Is there a way to say this politely? B is okay if the cowriting relationship doesn't survive. But B would like to preserve the friendship. Is it possible?
(A note: B has five current publications, A has two.)
Asking for a friend.
A and B are two profs who are in the final stages of readying an academic essay for publication. They are both tenure-track faculty at two different small liberal arts colleges in the Midwest. A originally conceived the idea of their topic and collected a few articles. B read the articles, wrote a presentation, continued the research with primary sources, a great deal of articles and books, and came up with the themes and specific argument for the essay. B also wrote the bulk of the finished essay. B sent the article to A several times, and A made small edits.
The question of author order came up recently. A asked B that A should be first author credited. B is upset by this, because despite having the idea for their paper topic, A has contributed only small amounts to the actual finished essay. (This is borne out by comparing drafts B sent to A and vice versa.) But how does B respond to the question? B is having a difficult time coming up with a polite way to say, Oh HAYell no, I did the bulk of the work.
I realize this probably seems like minutia to anyone outside the ivory tower of academia, but author order is important for advancement/tenure. Also, burning bridges in this smallish field would be foolish. B and A are friends. B also wants fair credit for the work B did. B is kind of pissed that A (being present throughout the process) would suggest B take second author credit.
Is there a way to say this politely? B is okay if the cowriting relationship doesn't survive. But B would like to preserve the friendship. Is it possible?
(A note: B has five current publications, A has two.)
From what I hear in conversations from the faculty I work for about publishing, the person who actually writes the article or does the bulk of the actual writing is the one to receive first authorship. In this case, it would decidedly be B to receive first author if this were my faculty.
Also, from what little I know about our tenure process, first vs second author matters little to the tenure committee compared to the number of publications one has one's name to and the journals in which those publications appeared. YMMV, of course.
posted by zizzle at 4:05 PM on February 22, 2016 [3 favorites]
Also, from what little I know about our tenure process, first vs second author matters little to the tenure committee compared to the number of publications one has one's name to and the journals in which those publications appeared. YMMV, of course.
posted by zizzle at 4:05 PM on February 22, 2016 [3 favorites]
Unfortunately, B might have to decide whether they would rather be friends or get appropriate credit. Every time I have tried to argue about author order with someone, things became awkward and we kind of... never worked with each other again. (Even in the really egregious case when my "co-author" never even read my drafts, let alone contributed to them, and I thought I was being generous by leaving their name on at all, but then they wanted first authorship because it had been "their idea", my god.)
B could try proposing a compromise: alphabetical order is one option. Or a footnote which explains who did what. That is pretty common in the sciences and becoming more so in the humanities thanks to things like this.
posted by lollusc at 4:08 PM on February 22, 2016 [14 favorites]
B could try proposing a compromise: alphabetical order is one option. Or a footnote which explains who did what. That is pretty common in the sciences and becoming more so in the humanities thanks to things like this.
posted by lollusc at 4:08 PM on February 22, 2016 [14 favorites]
Back when I was an academic, if the authors didn't specify order beforehand and there was a dispute about it, we would go to the Dean. He would convene a faculty committee. The members of which were not known to us and would sometimes include people from other institutions, if specialty content knowledge was required.
The committee would receive anonymized documents from the faculty members, including drafts, emails, etc. The anonymization was necessary to prevent halo or friendship effects. The committee would review the documents and make the determination.
Taking the matter out of the faculty's hands might help preserve friendships, as might being a good winner/loser. But this stuff can be pretty high stakes so it's entirely possible the friendship might not survive.
posted by jasper411 at 4:09 PM on February 22, 2016 [11 favorites]
The committee would receive anonymized documents from the faculty members, including drafts, emails, etc. The anonymization was necessary to prevent halo or friendship effects. The committee would review the documents and make the determination.
Taking the matter out of the faculty's hands might help preserve friendships, as might being a good winner/loser. But this stuff can be pretty high stakes so it's entirely possible the friendship might not survive.
posted by jasper411 at 4:09 PM on February 22, 2016 [11 favorites]
Response by poster: (A note from B: alphabetical order puts A first. OK, dropping out again. Thanks for the answers so far.)
posted by pepper bird at 4:09 PM on February 22, 2016
posted by pepper bird at 4:09 PM on February 22, 2016
Has B asked A why they think they should be first author?
posted by the agents of KAOS at 4:15 PM on February 22, 2016 [3 favorites]
posted by the agents of KAOS at 4:15 PM on February 22, 2016 [3 favorites]
Best answer: The most strategic thing to say might be:
"My experience with this is that the order of listed authors can either be straight alphabetical or can reflect the relative amount of work done by the authors. Is there a reason you think we should go with alphabetical?"
posted by DarlingBri at 4:27 PM on February 22, 2016 [24 favorites]
"My experience with this is that the order of listed authors can either be straight alphabetical or can reflect the relative amount of work done by the authors. Is there a reason you think we should go with alphabetical?"
posted by DarlingBri at 4:27 PM on February 22, 2016 [24 favorites]
A originally conceived the idea of their topic
It's concept versus work. It's not clear cut. Is either opposed to "co-first"? Is it common in liberal arts?
posted by supercres at 4:34 PM on February 22, 2016
It's concept versus work. It's not clear cut. Is either opposed to "co-first"? Is it common in liberal arts?
posted by supercres at 4:34 PM on February 22, 2016
Who put in "the majority of the intellectual effort/labour"? It sounds like B, and B ought to say so, in those terms. What are B's options? Claim appropriate credit and annoy A? Or give in to A, and then feel annoyed at A, possibly for a long time (in which case the relationship is spoiled anyway).
A big rule for me is not to work for other people for free (and also not to get people to work for you for free). This includes writing papers for them.
posted by carter at 4:36 PM on February 22, 2016 [1 favorite]
A big rule for me is not to work for other people for free (and also not to get people to work for you for free). This includes writing papers for them.
posted by carter at 4:36 PM on February 22, 2016 [1 favorite]
This is very field-specific. In economics, it would be strange to do a non-alphabetical order. Norms will differ in your friend's field.
Don't underestimate the importance of coming up with the idea and methodology; an arrangement where one person supplies the idea, the other writes, and both edit does not sound particularly unequal to me.
posted by deadweightloss at 4:57 PM on February 22, 2016 [5 favorites]
Don't underestimate the importance of coming up with the idea and methodology; an arrangement where one person supplies the idea, the other writes, and both edit does not sound particularly unequal to me.
posted by deadweightloss at 4:57 PM on February 22, 2016 [5 favorites]
So did A and B decide on a division of labor at the beginning? Or A propose the idea and collaboration and then B just kind of... ran with it, and worked alone without checking in for collaboration or communicating about the direction they were going, essentially freezing A out of the process, and maybe indirectly communicating that A's contributions weren't desired (and thus receiving only small edits)? Because I've been A, proposing ideas, asking for and expecting feedback, only to discover that B just... took our ball and wouldn't let me play with it anymore. And it royally pissed me off, because I got cut out of the loop on my own ideas and work. And I've seen a lot of male academics do this to their female peers, and act like they deserve credit for, honestly, taking majority credit for other people's ideas, and being shitty collaborators, and then acting like they're doing the original idea-haver a favor for giving them any credit at all. I've seen soooo many dudes build their careers this way, and I'm not saying that's what happened here of course, but it's something B should take a real hard look at in terms of their own communication skills.
posted by amelioration at 5:30 PM on February 22, 2016 [25 favorites]
posted by amelioration at 5:30 PM on February 22, 2016 [25 favorites]
"My experience with this is that the order of listed authors can either be straight alphabetical or can reflect the relative amount of work done by the authors. Is there a reason you think we should go with alphabetical?"
Oh hell no. Unless A has specifically said it's because they want alphabetical, they'll go nuclear because this is dismissive of the work they did. A & B need to talk about what each of them contributed. We're only hearing B's view, A probably sees it differently. A "who did what" note seems like a possible compromise.
posted by momus_window at 5:36 PM on February 22, 2016 [1 favorite]
Oh hell no. Unless A has specifically said it's because they want alphabetical, they'll go nuclear because this is dismissive of the work they did. A & B need to talk about what each of them contributed. We're only hearing B's view, A probably sees it differently. A "who did what" note seems like a possible compromise.
posted by momus_window at 5:36 PM on February 22, 2016 [1 favorite]
Best answer: "Thanks for bringing up the issue. I think that between book a, presentation b, task x, task y, work z and the writing, my contributions would put my name first. I'm open to discussion, though, what do you think about how the work went?"
posted by Dashy at 5:58 PM on February 22, 2016 [7 favorites]
posted by Dashy at 5:58 PM on February 22, 2016 [7 favorites]
This is so discipline specific. In my field, if I were more worried about maintaining the friendship over definitely being first author, I'd suggest putting an * stating that the two authors contributed equally to the work and that order was decided by a coin flip. But, in my field, while author order is typically really important on multi-author papers, order on two person is less significant. If it becomes really really famous it'll always be known as "Author A and B" not "Author A et al.".
posted by one_bean at 7:21 PM on February 22, 2016 [3 favorites]
posted by one_bean at 7:21 PM on February 22, 2016 [3 favorites]
Best answer: This is why I no longer collaborate with friends. I also figure out author order before I do any collaborative research, in our first or second meeting, so that this kind of thing doesn't happen. I do this now because I learned the hard way. Oh, did I learn the hard way!
This question is discipline specific, but author order clearly matters in your discipline. B should be first author.
You might want to search for some peer-reviewed articles on the topic to boost your case. Try search strings like ["author order" collaboration ethics conflict {discipline}]. I see a few articles in different disciplines that outline the problem and even present some guidelines on how to handle it. I don't have time for a comprehensive search, but here are a few at first glance:
Only if I'm First Author (Management science)
Who's on First? (Political science)
On the Ethics of Collaborative Authorship: The Challenge of Authorship Order and the Risk of Textploitation (Criminology)
Another thing to do is to have A take first (sigh), B takes the "corresponding author" role, and then you use a footnote to say "Author A did [list contributions]; Author B did [list contributions]." I'm starting to see this creep into some of the journals in my discipline, and I think it's good practice generally, so even if B does get the first-author slot (which it sounds to me like they deserve), this might be a good thing to suggest.
Best of luck to B.
posted by sockermom at 7:52 PM on February 22, 2016 [6 favorites]
This question is discipline specific, but author order clearly matters in your discipline. B should be first author.
You might want to search for some peer-reviewed articles on the topic to boost your case. Try search strings like ["author order" collaboration ethics conflict {discipline}]. I see a few articles in different disciplines that outline the problem and even present some guidelines on how to handle it. I don't have time for a comprehensive search, but here are a few at first glance:
Only if I'm First Author (Management science)
Who's on First? (Political science)
On the Ethics of Collaborative Authorship: The Challenge of Authorship Order and the Risk of Textploitation (Criminology)
Another thing to do is to have A take first (sigh), B takes the "corresponding author" role, and then you use a footnote to say "Author A did [list contributions]; Author B did [list contributions]." I'm starting to see this creep into some of the journals in my discipline, and I think it's good practice generally, so even if B does get the first-author slot (which it sounds to me like they deserve), this might be a good thing to suggest.
Best of luck to B.
posted by sockermom at 7:52 PM on February 22, 2016 [6 favorites]
A and B should flip a coin and not write together again.
Co-authorship is like dating. Do something small together before committing. I've written with friends and decided to no longer write with them. Others it works great! But you need to test it out with a conference paper before doing a whole journal article togethed. A and B should also remember that there will be many more papers in their future.
Some tips:
- always discuss authorship before starting a project, both what the expected contributions will be for first versus other authorship, and what each individual's expected contribution and authorship will be. Also everyone should be honest with how busy they are.
- It sounds to me, someone who frequently coauthors with 1-5 others, like they has wildly different expectations. But to me the one who did the bulk of the writing and research is first author.
- If they are regular collaborators it is normal to swap around. And in this swapping around sometimes there is a discussion of who "needs it" the most. Like someone might have been told that they need an article in a niche journal.
- Occasionaly I see a footnote that the authors contributed equally to the work but that is rare.
posted by k8t at 8:12 PM on February 22, 2016 [2 favorites]
Co-authorship is like dating. Do something small together before committing. I've written with friends and decided to no longer write with them. Others it works great! But you need to test it out with a conference paper before doing a whole journal article togethed. A and B should also remember that there will be many more papers in their future.
Some tips:
- always discuss authorship before starting a project, both what the expected contributions will be for first versus other authorship, and what each individual's expected contribution and authorship will be. Also everyone should be honest with how busy they are.
- It sounds to me, someone who frequently coauthors with 1-5 others, like they has wildly different expectations. But to me the one who did the bulk of the writing and research is first author.
- If they are regular collaborators it is normal to swap around. And in this swapping around sometimes there is a discussion of who "needs it" the most. Like someone might have been told that they need an article in a niche journal.
- Occasionaly I see a footnote that the authors contributed equally to the work but that is rare.
posted by k8t at 8:12 PM on February 22, 2016 [2 favorites]
Well, B, how much do you need to be first author on this? Does A need it more? What would have happened if B hadn't done so much work? Would A have done it eventually?
I think B needs to step back and take second author credit if he wants to maintain the professional and personal relationship. A needs this more. B should chalk this up to a lesson learned: author order should ALWAYS be discussed explicitly at the outset of a collaboration. Did B run with this in part to try to get first author credit, or did he just have more time at the right time?
Given that this wasn't discussed earlier and that A had the idea, I'd say let A be first author. Don't bad mouth A, either. Be the big person here, B. Being right -- rather than gracious and generous -- will come at too high a cost.
posted by bluedaisy at 9:41 PM on February 22, 2016 [1 favorite]
I think B needs to step back and take second author credit if he wants to maintain the professional and personal relationship. A needs this more. B should chalk this up to a lesson learned: author order should ALWAYS be discussed explicitly at the outset of a collaboration. Did B run with this in part to try to get first author credit, or did he just have more time at the right time?
Given that this wasn't discussed earlier and that A had the idea, I'd say let A be first author. Don't bad mouth A, either. Be the big person here, B. Being right -- rather than gracious and generous -- will come at too high a cost.
posted by bluedaisy at 9:41 PM on February 22, 2016 [1 favorite]
Response by poster: Thanks to all for the answers and insights, but particularly DarlingBri and Dashy for the script ideas and sockermom for the research links.
posted by pepper bird at 6:57 AM on February 23, 2016
posted by pepper bird at 6:57 AM on February 23, 2016
"Another thing to do is to have A take first (sigh), B takes the "corresponding author" role, and then you use a footnote to say "Author A did [list contributions]; Author B did [list contributions]." I'm starting to see this creep into some of the journals in my discipline, and I think it's good practice generally, so even if B does get the first-author slot (which it sounds to me like they deserve), this might be a good thing to suggest."
Bear in mind that academic journals have rules about what they allow. A journal I worked for did not permit listing individual contributions for years, but then started requiring them. Some journals allow a footnote identifying the authors as "co-senior authors" or "co-first authors."
posted by FencingGal at 8:30 AM on February 23, 2016 [1 favorite]
Bear in mind that academic journals have rules about what they allow. A journal I worked for did not permit listing individual contributions for years, but then started requiring them. Some journals allow a footnote identifying the authors as "co-senior authors" or "co-first authors."
posted by FencingGal at 8:30 AM on February 23, 2016 [1 favorite]
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