Ok, so I'm working with this other researcher on a paper where we agreed that the person will be the first author and I'll be the second.

In my view, a second author has a lesser contribution than the first author but I don't really mind since the paper itself is not within my field. Also, since I'm a secondary author, the paper doesn't have much value to me (professionally compared to a first authored paper).

However, this person seems to want me to do more work than them. I've done the draft of the paper, the setups for the experiments, extract information from other papers, editing and now I've to do some of the analysis, as well as some discussions so that I can pave the way for the person to do the work.

The person said they are busy with other works and they are married, and I'm single, implying that I've more time. The last part made me so annoyed. Come one... throw that in my face? So... I'm single I've to do more work and I wouldn't even be recognized as the main contributor?

Am I in the right to be annoyed here? : (

The first author should be the person who contributed most to the research, including drafting of the manuscript. The sequence of authors should be determined by the relative contributions to the manuscript.

The attempt by “senior researchers” to force their way onto the publications of junior investigators in the absence of appropriate intellectual contribution, is sometimes known as the “White Bull effect”; in a sense, such behavior is a form of fraud and scientific misconduct.

My supervisor has difficulty understanding my paper, but recently she requests to be the corresponding author… sigh…but this is still acceptable as a supervisor.

Lastly, single should need even more time to look for true love in today’s world, right?

One way of setting the dispute is to divide research investigations into five parts: conception of original idea, design of experiment, data collection, data analysis, and manuscript preparation (Dickson et al. 1978). The order of authorship could be determined by ranking the number of areas in which significant contributions were made. However, the problem is preassigned roles can be changed when responsibilities are transferred during the project...

For these 5 parts of the research investigations, the relative contribution of each researcher can be assessed. For each part, total contributions should equal 100 percent. When all contributions have been assigned, the percentage values could be added, resulting in a score between 1 to 500. The relative contribution of all participants can then be assessed.

Alternatively, individual contribution in this research investigation can be specified in the manuscript.