Research Acknowledgment even though listed as an author in the manuscript draft?

[Abraxas305]

So I recently was emailed about research that I did back in summer 2012 as part of a SURF/SURP program. The paper was submitted to a journal was accepted for publication. I was given the initial manuscript last year that had my name listed as a 5th "middle" Author (explicit statement said the first 3 authors contributed equally) back over the summer. However, upon looking at the completed paper that was published last month, I was only listed as an acknowledgment.
My duties were listed in both the acknowledgement and author contribution as "conducted experiments and data analysis" which was alongside all the other authors. Listed also was the use of a software to create 3D EM reconstructions, which I did alongside one other author(who is listed as the first of one of the three primary authors). I worked more alongside the primary author moreso than the corresponding author and I actually did all of the reconstructions that were published in the paper. I also helped a great deal in preliminary data analysis and tissue microsectioning.

Granted, this was a research project with ideas/data/contributions etc that spanned since 2011 and just got published in 2016. I am however, pretty bummed that I wasn't able to get my name on the paper, especially since the undergraduate research I did in college did not get published and the data/ideas etc is being used for another project (same professor, but is going to along give me acknowledgement since I graduated and didn't specifically work in the new project).

Anyone else dealt with a problem like this? I was reading a bit about "acknowledgement in research" as a pre-med and while it is not looked down upon, it carries a lot less weight than an authorship, even if its a middle authorship. In this case, I don't even know if it's worth mentioning beyond my experience as a summer research student (which was an absolutely fantastic experience and will be in my top 3 most meaningful). I certainly had a great experience and I can a lot about in interviews, but I don't know how much weight that would carry since I didn't end up with my name on the paper.

Not sour at all, just a bit bummed out.

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[Ochemphd]

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[LizzyM]

In 2013, the International Committee of Medical Journal Editors issued "Recommendations for the Conduct, Reporting, Editing, and Publication of Scholarly Work in Medical Journals"

You can read more here:
http://www.bmj.com/about-bmj/resources-authors/article-submission/authorship-contributorship

This may not apply to some basic science papers but I have the idea that authorship rules are being tightened up all around.

On the other hand, keep in mind that authorship now means that you stand by ALL the work presented in the paper and if it later turns out that a co-author committed fraud in the conduct or reporting of the research, then it is on YOUR CV as a withdrawn paper and it is egg on your face.

 

[Goro]

Acknowledgements don't count for any CV. "Expert technical assistance" or "helpful discussions"is as good as it gets there,

 

[Abraxas305]

Yeah, I was thinking that they probably just had to limit the amount of authors that they could list in the published paper since it was submitted to one of Nature's specialized journals. It was in the beginning phases of the project and while I did do a good amount of data analysis and had 3 of my figures included in the paper, the project spanned 3 years and there were 2 more summer students that participated alongside (which both got their names in the paper).
My query is to whether my experience would be able to hold itself even though I didn't end up with a publication, despite doing more than usual acknowledgments do, based from what I searched on the forums. I feel that I might be questioned for discrepancies in the amount of work I had done if I list the acknowledgment vs just stating that I did research over the summer. Either way, I can talk a lot about my experiences and the research itself if I were to be questioned on it in an interview.

Also, per LizzyM's comment, I do not believe I committed any errors on the research on my part since the data analysis, figures, images (although color-changed) were published "as is" when I left the program.

 

[Abraxas305]

Acknowledgements don't count for any CV. "Expert technical assistance" or "helpful discussions"is as good as it gets there,

So would it be better to have the "acknowledgment" part left out of my application and just list my summer research as an experience? I did create 2 poster presentations and did an oral presentation while in the summer program about the research, so I am able to talk about it with confidence. I understand the acknowledgments carry little weight, I was just unsure if I should keep that part off entirely and just focus on talking about the experience in general.

 

[Goro]

Leave it out because it's so superficial.

So would it be better to have the "acknowledgment" part left out of my application and just list my summer research as an experience? I did create 2 poster presentations and did an oral presentation while in the summer program about the research, so I am able to talk about it with confidence. I understand the acknowledgments carry little weight, I was just unsure if I should keep that part off entirely and just focus on talking about the experience in general.

 

[Ochemphd]

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[Goro]

I suppose it can't hurt to state, for example:
"Dr Goro lab, 2000 hrs, one poster and one MS acknowledgement."

You would agree that they should include it as a line in the description of the research activity, right? Not all acknowledgements (or authorships) are made the same.

 

[Abraxas305]

Yeah, something like that was what I was going to state, but leaving out the "acknowledgment" part. I just wondered whether an acknowledgement carried some sort of weight, given what I did over at the summer research program. Seems like it's better to just state it as a research experience, and if brought up on an interview, talk about the contributions I did to the project. It's still full-fledged research, just got an "acknowledgement" out of it. I'd agree, experience more than anything helped me a lot in undergrad so I'm not really making it a big deal. Thanks for all the responses!