Authorship misconduct: professional misconduct in editorial handling of authorship.

Abstract

Authorship provides academic recognition for substantial intellectual contributions to scholarly articles. Beyond recognition, authorship has become a form of currency within the academic community, acting as an indicator of academic output and thus influencing standing within an institution and the general medical community. It might further impact salary as well as job and research grant funding opportunities. Unfortunately, this emphasis on authorship has also been linked to instances of misconduct. We discuss our personal experience with editorial misconduct hoping to highlight the issue and thereby increase awareness and peer-to-peer control to reduce future authorship misconduct and to encourage others to speak up.