Authorship Policy
I. Why Authorship Matters?
Authorship confers credit and has important academic, social, and financial implications. Authorship also implies responsibility and accountability for published work. The following recommendations are intended to ensure that contributors who have made substantive intellectual contributions to an article are given credit as authors, but also that contributors credited as authors understand their role in taking responsibility and being accountable for what is published.
Because authorship does not communicate what contributions qualified an individual to be an author, some journals now request and publish information about the contributions of each person named as having participated in a submitted study, at least for original research. Editors are strongly encouraged to develop and implement a contributorship policy. Such policies remove much of the ambiguity surrounding contributions, but leave unresolved the question of the quantity and quality of contribution that qualify an individual for authorship. The Journal has thus developed criteria for authorship, including those that distinguish authors from other contributors.
Authors are required to give an honest account of authorship, where each listed author meets the authorship criteria, in order to provide transparency and credit to those who have substantially contributed to the work.
However, where authors deliberately do not comply, this is considered to be a form of misconduct. Of particular concern are:
Ghost authorship – where an author(s) has substantially contributed to the work but has not been given credit. This also impacts transparency, as any competing interests pertaining to a ‘ghost author’ will not be declared.
Gift authorship – where a listed author(s) has not contributed substantially, or at all to the published work.
Authorship for sale – where authors have ‘sold’ an author spot on a paper, or where a researcher has ‘bought’ an authorship spot on a paper.
II. Who Is An Author?
All authors are expected to have made substantial contributions to the submitted work and to be accountable for the work both before and after publication. The Journal recommends that authorship be based on the following 4 criteria:
1. Substantial contributions to the conception or design of the work; or the acquisition, analysis, or interpretation of data for the work, creation of new software used in the work; AND
2. Drafting the work or revising it critically for important intellectual content; AND
3. Final approval of the version to be published; AND
4. Agrees to be personally accountable for the author’s own contributions and to ensure that questions related to the accuracy or integrity of any part of the work are appropriately investigated, resolved, and the resolution documented in the literature.
In addition to being accountable for the parts of the work he or she has done, an author should be able to identify which co-authors are responsible for specific other parts of the work. In addition, authors should have confidence in the integrity of the contributions of their co-authors.
All those designated as authors should meet all four criteria for authorship, and all who meet the four criteria should be identified as authors. Those who do not meet all four criteria should be acknowledged (see below Non-Author Contributors). These authorship criteria are intended to preserve the status of authorship for those who deserve credit and can take responsibility for the work.
The submitting author is responsible for providing the contributions of all authors at submission. We expect that all authors will have reviewed, discussed, and agreed to their individual contributions ahead of this time. Contributions will be published with the final article, and they should accurately reflect contributions to the work.
The criteria are not intended for use as a means to disqualify colleagues from authorship who otherwise meet authorship criteria by denying them the opportunity to meet criterion 2 or 3. Therefore, all individuals who meet the first criterion should have the opportunity to participate in the review, drafting, and final approval of the manuscript.
The individuals who conduct the work are responsible for identifying who meets these criteria and ideally should do so when planning the work, making modifications as appropriate as the work progresses. We encourage collaboration and co-authorship with colleagues in the locations where the research is conducted. It is the collective responsibility of the authors, not the Journal to which the work is submitted, to determine that all people named as authors meet all four criteria; it is not the role of the Journal's editors to determine who qualifies or does not qualify for authorship or to arbitrate authorship conflicts.
If agreement cannot be reached about who qualifies for authorship, the institution(s) where the work was performed, not the journal editor, should be asked to investigate. The criteria used to determine the order in which authors are listed on the byline may vary, and are to be decided collectively by the author group and not by editors. If authors request removal or addition of an author after manuscript submission or publication, journal editors should seek an explanation and signed statement of agreement for the requested change from all listed authors and from the author to be removed or added.
Corresponding Author
The corresponding author takes responsibility for and speaks on behalf of all authors.
Pre-publication
1. Ensure that the manuscript is in full adherence with all Journal's publication policies and Author Guidelines.
2. Ensure that all authors have access to the final version of the manuscript that is submitted to the journal, and agree to the author list and author contributions.
3. Ensure that all authors have seen the final draft of the manuscript before it is published.
4. Provide to the journal written confirmation that all authors consent to any requested changes in the manuscript’s authorship.
Post-publication
1. Continue to be the point of contact for queries about the published paper.
2. Inform all coauthors of any matters arising and ensure such matters are dealt with promptly.
Multi-Author Group
When a large multi-author group has conducted the work, the group ideally should decide who will be an author before the work is started and confirm who is an author before submitting the manuscript for publication. All members of the group named as authors should meet all four criteria for authorship, including approval of the final manuscript, and they should be able to take public responsibility for the work and should have full confidence in the accuracy and integrity of the work of other group authors. They will also be expected as individuals to complete disclosure forms.
Some large multi-author groups designate authorship by a group name, with or without the names of individuals. When submitting a manuscript authored by a group, the corresponding author should specify the group name if one exists, and clearly identify the group members who can take credit and responsibility for the work as authors. The byline of the article identifies who is directly responsible for the manuscript.
Author Identification
We endorse ORCID and requires that all corresponding authors provide an ORCID iD when submitting a manuscript. We encourage coauthors to register and use their ORCID as well.
We publish the corresponding author's ORCID iD as well as any ORCIDs provided by coauthors if the manuscript is accepted. We participate in the auto-update feature implemented by Crossref such that when a paper is published, the authors’ ORCIDs are deposited and subsequently used to update each author’s ORCID record.
III. Non Author Contributors
Contributors who meet fewer than all 4 of the above criteria for authorship should not be listed as authors, but they should be acknowledged. Examples of activities that alone (without other contributions) do not qualify a contributor for authorship are acquisition of funding; general supervision of a research group or general administrative support; and writing assistance, technical editing, language editing, and proofreading. Those whose contributions do not justify authorship may be acknowledged individually or together as a group under a single heading (e.g. “Clinical Investigators” or “Participating Investigators”), and their contributions should be specified (e.g., “served as scientific advisors,” “critically reviewed the study proposal,” “collected data,” “provided and cared for study patients,” “participated in writing or technical editing of the manuscript”).
Because acknowledgment may imply endorsement by acknowledged individuals of a study’s data and conclusions, editors are advised to require that the corresponding author obtain written permission to be acknowledged from all acknowledged individuals.
IV. Artificial Intelligence (AI)-Assisted Technology
At submission, the Journal requires authors to disclose whether they used artificial intelligence (AI)-assisted technologies (such as Large Language Models [LLMs], chatbots, or image creators) in the production of submitted work. Authors who use such technology should describe, in both the cover letter and the submitted work in the appropriate section if applicable, how they used it. For example, if AI was used for writing assistance, describe this in the acknowledgment section.
If AI was used for data collection, analysis, or figure generation, authors should describe this use in the methods. Chatbots (such as ChatGPT) should not be listed as authors because they cannot be responsible for the accuracy, integrity, and originality of the work, and these responsibilities are required for authorship.
Therefore, humans are responsible for any submitted material that included the use of AI-assisted technologies. Authors should carefully review and edit the result because AI can generate authoritative-sounding output that can be incorrect, incomplete, or biased. Authors should not list AI and AI-assisted technologies as an author or co-author, nor cite AI as an author. Authors should be able to assert that there is no plagiarism in their paper, including in text and images produced by the AI. Humans must ensure there is appropriate attribution of all quoted material, including full citations.
