Publication authorship?

This forum made possible through the generous support of SDN members, donors, and sponsors. Thank you.
O

ojy77511

Full Member
7+ Year Member
Joined
Sep 14, 2014
Messages
262
Reaction score
120
Members don't see this ad.
From medical school admissions perspective, does it matter (besides first author) whether the authorship is second, third, fourth, seventh, etc? Is there a difference? And does it matter whether the publication has a high impact?


Sent from my iPhone using SDN mobile
 
First author is better by several orders of magnitude. Everything else, less so. But still, the closer to the front you are the better (nominally).

IMHO high impact matters if it's Science Nature Cell PNAS or JAMA. Everything else much less so.
 
md-2020 said:
First author is better by several orders of magnitude. Everything else, less so. But still, the closer to the front you are the better (nominally).

IMHO high impact matters if it's Science Nature Cell PNAS or JAMA. Everything else much less so.
Click to expand...

Seconded.

But note, a publication isn't necessary for admission into any medical program including MD/PhD programs - so if it won't be possible to get a publication no need to overstress yourself trying to do so. Though if you can it will certainly be looked at positively.
 
Thoughts on a 1st author mid IF journal vs a 2nd author C/N/S/J paper?

Edit: I'd argue a 1st author beats out a 2nd author in a prestigious journal simply due to the variability of what 2nd author entails.
 
Last edited:
Any authorship at this point in your career will be impressive. As mentioned, obviously a first author paper is significantly more impressive than anything else. For most people, though, that kind of opportunity and/or amount of work doesn't develop over the course of college unless you're trying to get into an MD/PhD program. And even then it's difficult.

So, any publication with your name on it is a huge plus. Back it up with being able to talk about your research experience intelligently and people will likely be convinced that you understand what research, the pursuit of knowledge, etc. is about. Most people do not have any publications to their name. A publication in a high-impact journal is even more rare.
 
I have a question about impact factor of journals. The ones you listed are mostly for medicinal related research. Do adcoms pay attention to the top journals in other areas of research? For example, would a JACS publication stand out if your research was chemistry related, or would it not really matter what journal the research is in.
 
Hushman said:
I have a question about impact factor of journals. The ones you listed are mostly for medicinal related research. Do adcoms pay attention to the top journals in other areas of research? For example, would a JACS publication stand out if your research was chemistry related, or would it not really matter what journal the research is in.
Click to expand...
The likes of Nature/JAMA/Lancet etc are titles that are "universally recognised" somewhat like the names of top schools whether you're in the medical/research field or not. Since adcoms are a heterogeneous bunch with a range of different fields both in and out of healthcare and research, they may not know that JACS is a great journal in the chemistry field.
 
For adcoms who are not MDs and rather PhDs, they will realize that a combination of impact factor and author order matters. First authorship looks the best but any PhD worth their salt will look at the author contributions section if there is one and oftentimes, there are qualifiers marked by asterisks, etc. in the author line that say "MD and DO contributed equally" or something along those lines. This recognizes that only one person can be first author even though multiple people may have made similar contributions to the work - the first author usually just ends up being the guy or gal who writes it up.

In terms of journal impact factor, I would say it's safe to assume that adcoms will be familiar with top biology and medical journals so they may be able to judge the relative strength of a paper in Cell vs. PNAS but they wouldn't be too familiar with physical science journals and so wouldn't be able to tell the difference between JACS and Angewandt.
 
ojy77511 said:
So if it is not first, being one of the lower author helps?


Sent from my iPhone using SDN mobile
Click to expand...
Having any type of publication helps provided that you can discuss the project intelligently. If you have a pub and can't talk about the project in detail or explain it to a lay audience, then it could actually hurt you more than help.
 
No. Any publication is a meritorious accomplishment for an undergrad.


ojy77511 said:
From medical school admissions perspective, does it matter (besides first author) whether the authorship is second, third, fourth, seventh, etc? Is there a difference? And does it matter whether the publication has a high impact?


Sent from my iPhone using SDN mobile
Click to expand...
 
ojy77511 said:
When I mean lower I mean if there are 10 being like 8ish
Click to expand...

If you're 8ish, you probably didn't contribute that much to the project but it will help if you can speak about the project and your contribution intelligently. It's immediately obvious if you just washed the glassware and was put on the author list out of sympathy, etc. You must be able to talk intelligently about what you did and why you did it as well as the overall direction/significance of the project.
 
First author > mid author in higher impact, IMO.
 
aldol16 said:
If you're 8ish, you probably didn't contribute that much to the project but it will help if you can speak about the project and your contribution intelligently. It's immediately obvious if you just washed the glassware and was put on the author list out of sympathy, etc. You must be able to talk intelligently about what you did and why you did it as well as the overall direction/significance of the project.
Click to expand...

My data is part of a figure. Just gotta be able to talk about what I did? If my data made into a figure is that good enough contribution? (Im one of the lower author because the research is basic bio that takes a long time and there has been many full time ppl working on it)


Sent from my iPhone using SDN mobile
 
ojy77511 said:
My data is part of a figure. Just gotta be able to talk about what I did? If my data made into a figure is that good enough contribution? (Im one of the lower author because the research is basic bio that takes a long time and there has been many full time ppl working on it)
Click to expand...

That's fine but just be ready to talk about what you did and the impact of your contribution. Don't overstate your contribution because that will be obvious to anybody who asks you about the project too. Be honest and know what you did and the theory behind it (i.e. why you did it). Many undergrads walk into labs and end up becoming robotic monkeys for their grad students - don't do this and if you did, now is the time to become informed about your role in the project.

You should also have an idea of what the overall project's significance is. If you just did one small part, they likely aren't going to ask you detailed questions about experiments you never did but they might ask about why the overall project was done in the first place and for you to place that project into the bigger picture.
 
How about publications after graduation? Is gap year publication viewed as favorably as undergrad pub?

For research that was completed during undergrad but didn't publish the manuscript until after graduation, how does one make that clear in the application to stand out? From the LOR? or from the experience description?
 
If my PI wrote in my LOR that I will be a first author on the upcoming paper being published (not in time before I submit) since I collected all of the data over the past year, does that hold any worth? I know its not actually published yet I'm just curious if an adcom would acknowledge it
 
You must log in or register to reply here.

Similar threads

S
Forgot to indicate authorship in w/a?
Replies
2
Views
468
shrooberry
S
B
Update about Publication
Replies
2
Views
653
breez
B
B
Update Letter with Publication?
Replies
2
Views
878
ballooncycledeck
B
B
Publication chosen for CME Credit -- Worth mentioning?
Replies
3
Views
593
runzayumza
runzayumza
P
Research assistant no publications after 2 years; PI says managing the lab has more weight than first authorships, publications
Replies
17
Views
3K
pauliyah
P
Top