All authors should see the final version of the paper, before it is submitted, so that they agree with being included.

The practice of 'honorary authorship' is academic misconduct, where people are falsely included as authors. Sometimes supervisors pressurise their students to include their name, to enhance their own record. Also, people add on well-respected researchers to make it more likely a paper will get published. Universities can take disciplinary action on this.

Hope this helps,

Paul

Authors should have made a non-trivial contribution to the content of the paper.

Just being someone’s instructor is not a reason for inclusion. Providing data needs acknowledgement, but you are not an author unless you did something with it. Giving trivial advice, e.g. pointing out spelling mistakes, does not qualify for inclusion.

You are an author if you wrote all or part of the paper, unless you are just being dictated it. Also, if you contributed substantial ideas, e.g. suggested the experimental methodology and its application. Alternatively, you may have played a significant part in the research that the paper is about, e.g. did the experiments.

My topic is computer science, and interfaces are not totally peripheral to it since it is CASE-funded and is a real application that has to be used by non-technical people.

I think you are right, it is a balancing act; if you are a "yes man"/"yes woman" then you are unlikely to be a good PhD student in my opinion. However, if you upset your supervisor then you risk damanging a valuable relationship.

Have you looked at http://www.ems.bbk.ac.uk/courses/graddip_programmes/graddip_econ ?

If this is no good, try http://www.findamasters.co.uk

http://extras.timesonline.co.uk/tol_gug/gooduniversityguide.php?AC_sub=Business+Studies&sub=11&x=24&y=12

For 'business studies', research quality:
Aston 5B
Portsmouth 4C
Napier 3bE

I am at Aston so I am bound to be biassed

I am at Aston so I am bound to be biassed

I am trying to get a paper published but it is joint with my supervisor, so I have to do it her way. At the moment I don't feel confident that I have the skills to submit a paper on my own.


I hope that your supervisor respects your differences, in an ideal world I think they should be able to see the value in something that is good but has a different approach to theirs, but it is a very personal thing.

I was advised that publishing during your PhD is a GOOD thing. My associate supervisor says that the examiners can "sometimes get confused between something that is bad and something they don't like", and that one or two publications in quality journals helps to clear it up.

Best of luck

I am nearing the end of my first year of a full-time PhD. My supervisor is a really nice person and I have always got on with them. However, recently I find myself arguing with them over little things, e.g. the layout of user interfaces.

Do other people argue with their supervisor, or do they just do as they are told?