Joint Authorship of a Paper
Jan and Keith, both engineers, are faculty members at a
major university. Both are seeking tenure from the university,
and as part of the requirement, they are required to publish
original articles in scholarly and technical journals.
As a graduate student, Jan developed a paper that he had
never published, but now feels would be an excellent topic to
publish in a journal. Jan discusses this idea with Keith, and
they agree to work together on revising the paper.
Jan does most of the work of revising the paper to bring it
up to date. Keith's contributions are minimal, but Jan agrees
to include Keith's name as co-author, so as to enhance Keith's
chances of obtaining tenure. The article is accepted and later
published in a scientific journal.
Is it ethically acceptable for Jan go back to his graduate
work for an article to publish? Should Jan's thesis supervisor
be credited in some way, and if so, how? Should Jan acknowledge
the source of the funding for his thesis research in the paper?
Is it responsible for Jan to ask Keith to help revise the
article? How much could (or should) Jan and Keith have agreed
upon at the start of their collaboration? Was it either
unethical or unwise for Jan to include Keith's name as
co-author?
--adapted from NSPE Case No. 85-1
--photograph by Anila Jahangiri
20066 NSPE Code of Ethics
This is the version of the code archived in the OEC. An earlier
version may have been used in this case.
Original Case and BER Judgement