Equal contributions and credit: an emerging trend in the characterization of authorship in major anaesthesia journals during a 10-yr period
Authors: Li-Qun Yang
Fei-Xiang Wu
Wei-Feng Yu
Zhi-Jie Lu
Zhi Li
Yu-Ming Sun
Journal: PLoS ONE (2013)
Discipline: Multidisciplinary
Keywords: equal credit; authors; original research; anaesthesia journals; prevalence
Affiliations: Department of Anaesthesiology, Eastern Hepatobiliary Surgery Hospital, Second Military Medical University, Shanghai, China.

Abstract:  Background: The practice of giving certain authors equal credit in original research publications was increasingly common in some specialty. This study aimed to investigate the prevalence and characteristics of designating some authors with equally credited authors (ECAs) in major anaesthesia journals. Methodology/principal findings: The practice of giving authors equal credit was searched and identified in the three major anaesthesia journals between January 1, 2002 and December 31, 2011. Papers with ECAs had a higher proportion of the total number of articles in 2011 versus published in 2002 (Anesthesiology, 8.8% vs. 0.9%; British Journal of Anaesthesia, 8.8% vs. 0%; Anesthesia &amp; Analgesia, 3.4% vs. 0.3%; totally, 6.4% vs. 0.4%). A significant increasing trend in annual proportion of articles with ECA was found in the three journals. The first two authors listed in the byline had equal credit in most cases. Conclusions/significance: The practice of giving authors equal credit in original research papers is increasingly common in major anaesthesia journals. It may be warranted for the journals to guide the authors how to regard this practice. 

Retracted: No

PubPeer comments:
 Two papers were published with very similar analyses, but with completely different authors. They both originate from Second Military Medical University, in Shanghai, but from different Departments of Anaesthesiology. They both assess a 10-year period (2000 to 2010 in Tao et al.; 2001 to 2011 in Li et al.) from three identical journals: Anesthesiology, British Journal of Anaesthesia, and Anesthesia Analgesia. The Tao et al. paper, however, also analyzed papers in the journal, Pain. The Li et al. 2013 paper does not cite the Tao et al. 2012 paper. Table 1 in both papers, with an identical label u201cTable 1 Number of original research articles with authors given equal credit and annual prevalenceu201d, shows data for the 3 4 journals over the 10-year periods. However, the data does not match. For example, in 2002, for Anesthesiology, 5 329 in Tao et al. but 4 429 in Li et al. The values in overlapping years for most numerators and denominators do not match. There are also vast discrepancies in data in Table 2 for the same parameters, even though one value matches (red arrows). Table 3 (Li et al.) versus Table 4 (Tao et al.) also represent some odd geographic discrepancies and or descriptions. For example, North America in Tao et al. (implying Canada, as well), but only USA in Li et al., or Western Europe in Li et al. vs Europe in Tao et al. Given that the overlapping years and journals used by both sets of authors are identical, perhaps the authors could explain why both data sets are so different. Perhaps both groups could share the original data sets for comparison and a post-publication replication trial. The Tao et al. paper has no author contribution statement. Li, Z., Sun, Y-M., Wu, F-X., Yang, L-Q., Lu, Z-J., Yu, W-F. (2013) Equal contributions and credit: an emerging trend in the characterization of authorship in major anaesthesia journals during a 10-yr period. PLoS ONE, 8(8), e71430. https: doi.org 10.1371 journal.pone.0071430 Tao, T., Bo, L., Wang, F., Li, J., Deng, X. (2012). Equal contributions and credit given to authors in anesthesiology journals during a 10-year period. Scientometrics, 91(3), 1005-1010. https: doi.org 10.1007 s11192-011-0558-8 https: imgur.com a nxJnVJw https: imgur.com a Y2EheSc https: imgur.com a g1W3lub ,