Authorship

[Thor2211]

Does the order of author matter if you have several authors (e.g., 5 or more) on a manuscript? Is is better to be the second author on an article with just two authors as opposed being second author with 5 authors?

---

Members don't see this ad.

 

[Therapist4Chnge]

I'd think so....but I'd rather be 2nd of 5 in a major publication/study, than 2 of 2 in a small study in a lower-tiered journal.

-t

 

[psychanon]

It does dilute your contribution slightly when you add authors, but not all that much. There's also the flip side-- if you have more authors, more people help the paper move along and get done more quickly (and hopefully be better), leaving more time for other papers. Ultimately, you'll still be able to put it in the same place on your vita. And the bigger thing is whether or not you're first author-- that typically means that you spearheaded and wrote the paper, and as such they're the ones that most count towards getting a job and later tenure. But every thing helps. And T4C is definitely right about big name journals!

 

[Ollie123]

As I don't have a publication yet (though a few are in the works) not sure its my place to comment though I will pass on one other thing for consideration.

This is actually a really complicated question because in addition to everything they have said. I'd guess (I can't really say for sure) that it would matter WHO the other authors are. Collaborative work being all the rage these days, I imagine if you have additional authors who are big names in addition to your advisor it might be one way to show that you are "well-connected" in the academic world. After all, if you've published something with that big-name person at another school once, perhaps they will seek you out for one of their projects, or you'll submit a large multi-site grant sometime in the future.

Not sure if that's true or not, but food for thought.

 

[JockNerd]

Since you asked about 5 or more authors, this is important to keep in mind:

At six authors, the in-text citation shortens to ONLY the first author, et al. (Barring situations where that would make the in-text citation the same as another citation, in which instance the number of authors for both citations would be expanded until there was a difference.)

At seven authors, the reference section listing is truncated and only the first seven authors are listed, followed by et al.

I'm not sure much greater than 5 authors you were thinking, but this is important to keep in mind. Doesn't seem that being eighth is worth much.