I went to PhD forum today (gathering of PhD student with a couple of staff) and there was a discussion about REF which said we shoudl always put our supervisors as co-authors on any publications. A colleague at work said you should only put people on as co-author if they did a meaningful amount of work (she was goignt o chair some focus groups for me and i offered her second author but she said she wouldn't dream of taking it). When I rasied this I was told that a supervisor might have spent 10 hours looking at drafts and so should go on as they are neglecting their own research to do that (I thought that that was part of their workload). I would have thought that reading drafts was more akin to an acknowledgement. Certainly the "guidance" I have had so far is more akin to that (I have had no suggestiosn on what to do just "fix this" "change that" "Take this out" "I don't' like this" and even "yuk" - they haven't helped me develop methodology or select locations. I understand that people want PhD students so they can up their research output but I would have thought that to claim authorship involved more than just reading through drafts.

It is Hard to live in Rome & Fight with Pope!

Hmmm, this is a tricky one and policies seem to very from uni to uni. On my first 3 papers I have gone on as first author and my primary sup as second author. On the first paper she did make a lot of suggestions etc, although it was all written by me. On the second and third papers she has read through several drafts and made comments, but again I did all the writing and put the ideas together. But I am more than happy to have her as second author- I appreciate her expertise and guidance and she has spent a lot of time giving me detailed feedback. And she is a really big name in the field, so it is actually rather nice to have her name next to mine and to be associated with her! My second sup hasn't gone on any of the papers- I did ask my primary sup if I should put my second sup down as third author, and her response was 'well, has he had any input whatsoever? No, so he doesn't go on'. She did say that he could go on the results papers I am working on as he has helped out with recruitment. Having said that, there is some strange rivalry thing going on between my sups, so my primary probably doesn't want to contribute to my second sup's list of publications anyway! To be honest, as long as you are first author, I wouldn't stress too much about having your sup's name down after yours. One of my pals wrote a paper and the sup insisted on being first author, which I did think was unfair, but there we go! Best, KB

Kinda always assumed that your supervisor would go on as second or last author. Someone once told me that there was a ratio of work of typically Primary Author = 75% of work, Second Author = 15-20% and third author = 5%. I know it sounds unfair but I suppose there are a few considerations. While you have undoubtedly done most of the work, the very fact that your supervisor makes the work journal ready is justification enough for including them on the author list.

Its when it gets to >3 authors that there is a clear case of taking the pi$$. What you must remember is that if your name is on the paper, you MUST know what the paper actually says so that would explain a lot of peoples reluctance to be included unless they actually know the work, as you could receive an email from the other side of the world asking how the hell you could have concluded that Lost was actually just a re-run of Fr. Ted on acid!

Stuck in a bit of a quandry myself - have a paper waiting to be sent and supervisor is just sitting on it. Would like to just send it in , leaving my supervisor off it and see what happens (don't worry - would ask him first).

So I guess first supervisor will get to go on and the other two will be an either / or (failry straight forward as one is qual and one quant). What happens when you collaborate with someone you met at a conference?

What happens about affiliation? I am doign my PhD at university A (which has an international reputation for my subject) but work at university B (a new teachign university) (which is paying my fees). At a conference I put Lecturer in x at University B with PhD student at university A underneath but for articles you can't do that. I know uni B will think they should be on but I would rather put uni A.

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Dear Jepson! The Academic Politics is a big Hurdle in PhD studies. Sometime it does not help students at all. Every body sort of tries to pull in different directions sometimes. The real collaborators could be people who work on similar topics and are in similar circumstances. I am not a Behavioural Expert but Writing the Names of your Supervisors on your Publications will satisfy their egos. If someone else(a student collaborator or another expert from Industry) is involved then you are not required to write your supervisor names in my view.

I think Uni B will be more interested in the results you are producing rather than to play an active part in research publications. If they have requested you to work in a specific area to be applicable in uni B and are closely monitoring it in collaboration with A then they must be included in all articles.

I think it varies by discipline though. Single authored papers are very common in the humanities. My first journal paper was written by me alone, I gave a copy to my supervisor to read, but he didn't suggest any changes, and it pretty much went in as I'd originally written it. I've certainly never felt under any pressure that I "must" include my supervisor as a co-author. Nor has he included me, even where I did a substantial part of the work, for example as a research assistant digging out virtually all the referenced source material.