PhD/PsyD Ghosted by collaborators; Now what?

[R. Matey]

I was going to start a new thread, but this one auto-populated and seems relevant. I promise SDN that's its not spam.

This has happened twice now where I get pretty deep with people in a project and then I get ghosted. In both cases, they owned the data so I can't really move forward with a paper. I'm curious if other posters have had this problem and how they've dealt with it. For one thing, it makes me very wary to accept collaborations from people I don't really know that well.

TL: DR: Is collaborating like dating? If so, what are the warning signs?

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[szymk1sm]

I was going to start a new thread, but this one auto-populated and seems relevant. I promise SDN that's its not spam.

This has happened twice now where I get pretty deep with people in a project and then I get ghosted. In both cases, they owned the data so I can't really move forward with a paper. I'm curious if other posters have had this problem and how they've dealt with it. For one thing, it makes me very wary to accept collaborations from people I don't really know that well.

TL: DR: Is collaborating like dating? If so, what are the warning signs?

I empathize but don't have any good suggestions....

I had this happen with someone my mentor suggested I work with (I was in grad school, they were on postdoc at a different institution) -- paper was written and at least 1 round of edits completed -- then nothing -- I reached out to this person 1 year ago to see if they wanted to continue moving forward with the paper (which they enthusiastically said yes) - but then silence....

At this point, I've considered it a loss. We started the paper 5 years ago - it's an area I'm interested in getting a publication in, but it's not the focus of my current research trajectory. I google this person every so often to see if the paper was published without my name on it -- if it is, I'm not sure what the course of action would be ...

 

[R. Matey]

Looks like it was started as a new thread anyways, aw'well.

I had this happen with someone my mentor suggested I work with (I was in grad school, they were on postdoc at a different institution) -- paper was written and at least 1 round of edits completed -- then nothing -- I reached out to this person 1 year ago to see if they wanted to continue moving forward with the paper (which they enthusiastically said yes) - but then silence....

Thanks. Yeah, this is pretty similar to both situations that I've been in, but these people are pretty senior in their careers so I sort've think that they just don't care any more. I talked with some colleagues about it and they basically told me to just drop it.

 

[Freud’sMommy]

What you need to do is set-up a work contract and data sharing agreement (your university should have a pro to handle this) prior to engaging in the collaboration, especially if they're at a different university. This should mitigate much of the ghosting. If they decline, then you dodged a bullet/time-waster. It's like a pre-nup!

 

[R. Matey]

What you need to do is set-up a work contract and data sharing agreement (your university should have a pro to handle this) prior to engaging in the collaboration, especially if they're at a different university. This should mitigate much of the ghosting. If they decline, then you dodged a bullet/time-waster. It's like a pre-nup!

Good suggestion, thanks. In one case, we had a joint IRB and it didn't seem to matter. In the second case, we did have an agreement, but people bailed once the paper was written.