Time-based changes in authorship trend in research-intensive universities in Malaysia
Document Type
Article
Publication Date
1-2-2024
Abstract
Considering the fact that publications serve as an important criterion to evaluate the scientific accomplishments of an individual within respective fields in academia, there has been an increasing trend to publish scientific articles whereby multiple authors are defined as primary, co-, or corresponding authors according to the roles performed. This article analyzes the authorship pattern in 4,561 papers (including 60 single-authored papers) from 1990 till 2020 of 94 academics who hold a position as professors and are affiliated with the Faculty of Medicine at three different research universities in Malaysia. Only 708 papers (15.5% of 4,561 papers) were authored by less than three authors. In 3,080 papers (67.5% of 4,561 papers), those academics appeared as coauthors. Using different years as cutoff periods, it was observed that the appearance as coauthor in the papers had steeply risen around the years: 2006, 2007, 2008 and onwards. The increased number of authors in the multi-author papers and the appearance of the selected academics as coauthors reflect the extent of boosting of collaborative research in that period which corresponds to the adoption of the ``publish or perish policy'' by the Ministry of Higher Education in Malaysia.
Keywords
Authorship, corresponding or principal author, primary or first author, coauthor, university ranking, publish or perish
Divisions
Dentistry
Funders
None
Publication Title
Accountability in Research-Ethics Integrity and Policy
Volume
31
Issue
1
Publisher
Taylor & Francis Inc
Publisher Location
530 WALNUT STREET, STE 850, PHILADELPHIA, PA 19106 USA