Ghost Authoring: How Professors Steal the Work of Their Students

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Ghost Authoring: How Professors Steal the Work of Their Students

Economist
343d

Ghost Authoring: How Professors Steal the Work of Their Students
https://newintrigue.com/2018/03/10/ghost-authoring-how-professors-steal-the-work-of-their-students/

“Ghost authoring, where academics take the credit for the work of their PhD students, is rife at most universities. Academics leverage their seniority to demand that students credit them in every single article they write, regardless of their actual contribution. Academics are the first to call foul when students plagiarize work, but there is a culture of silence regarding professors plagiarizing their students’ work, or “reverse plagiarism”.”

1 year ago # QUOTE 25 Volod 3 Vlad !
Economist
343d

If the advisor turns her/his role into a paper mill, co-authoring more than what is reasonable to account for a substantial contribution, it’s unethical.

Look, for instance, the case of Mark Griffths from Nottingham Trent University in the UK, who publishes a paper every two days on the back of his PhD students. Far fewer papers will still make you a fraudster.

Paper mill: what is it and why is it wrong?
https://www.econjobrumors.com/topic/paper-mill-what-is-it-and-why-is-it-wrong

1 year ago # QUOTE 9 Volod 1 Vlad !
Economist
4bee

I’m so tired of this dismal profession. My biggest mistake in life: working in academia.

1 year ago # QUOTE 12 Volod 0 Vlad !
Economist
76eb

The professors at my university also wanted to build a paper mill with the PhD students' work. But the only profiting from it would be them (Like: I write you on the paper of my PhD student, and in return, I will be a co-author on your PhD student's paper; we talk about papers that were nearly completed). PhD students get nothing, except for more co-authors on their hard work.

Well, NOT WITH MY WORK. That should be forbidden. I hope that one day journals will have an upper limit of three contributors for each paper. Otherwise, the contribution of each gets too marginal.

1 year ago # QUOTE 10 Volod 1 Vlad !
Economist
b448

I think it is very unfair. First, let the student work on a paper, get it ready for submission.

Then, make an offer they cannot refuse.

- Pasquale

1 year ago # QUOTE 8 Volod 0 Vlad !
Economist
7b8e

Do not confuse the work of an RA with that of a scholar.

1 year ago # QUOTE 8 Volod 8 Vlad !
Economist
bedb

Exactly. While it operates differently in Econ, in many fields the professor is the one who comes up with the research agenda, one compelling enough to support a whole lab through their PhD. That takes enormous effort and insight—in a way that is difficult to comprehend as a student.

Do not confuse the work of an RA with that of a scholar.

1 year ago # QUOTE 5 Volod 7 Vlad !
Economist
bedb

^I'll just add that I think this is a terrible model for Econ, simply because deep work is not compatible with this lab model. The incremental advances work well in many sciences, but in Econ result in mostly the shallow reg monkey stuff.

1 year ago # QUOTE 5 Volod 3 Vlad !
Economist
0c6c

My RAs are my employees. Their job is to produce work I can publish. That’s what they’re paid to do. It’s their job. There is no “stealing”. If they don’t like the set-up, they should give me my money back.

1 year ago # QUOTE 5 Volod 14 Vlad !
Economist
ac78

What are you paid to do?

My RAs are my employees. Their job is to produce work I can publish. That’s what they’re paid to do. It’s their job. There is no “stealing”. If they don’t like the set-up, they should give me my money back.

1 year ago # QUOTE 17 Volod 3 Vlad !
Economist
ac78

Also, they are not your employees, they are employees by the university. I make that point to be clear that the money they get is also not your money, it is either the university’s or the taxpayers money.

My RAs are my employees. Their job is to produce work I can publish. That’s what they’re paid to do. It’s their job. There is no “stealing”. If they don’t like the set-up, they should give me my money back.

1 year ago # QUOTE 13 Volod 4 Vlad !
Economist
0c6c

Also, they are not your employees, they are employees by the university. I make that point to be clear that the money they get is also not your money, it is either the university’s or the taxpayers money.

My RAs are my employees. Their job is to produce work I can publish. That’s what they’re paid to do. It’s their job. There is no “stealing”. If they don’t like the set-up, they should give me my money back.

No, it is my money. I brought it in. Regardless of where the money comes from, I am the boss; they work for me. Their output is mine because I paid for it.

1 year ago # QUOTE 4 Volod 13 Vlad !
Economist
cbf4

My RAs are my employees. Their job is to produce work I can publish. That’s what they’re paid to do. It’s their job. There is no “stealing”. If they don’t like the set-up, they should give me my money back.

There is no consortium publishing in econ or the social sciences.

In science consortia, co-authoring is based on membership. You can be a lab assistant cleaning the mice’s cages and get into an article because your assistance made an experiment possible.

In the social sciences there is no such a thing, unless there is predatory authorship behind. You either make a substantial contribution or you should stay out of a publication, no matter how famous you are.

1 year ago # QUOTE 4 Volod 1 Vlad !
Economist
0c6c

My RAs are my employees. Their job is to produce work I can publish. That’s what they’re paid to do. It’s their job. There is no “stealing”. If they don’t like the set-up, they should give me my money back.

There is no consortium publishing in econ or the social sciences.
In science consortia, co-authoring is based on membership. You can be a lab assistant cleaning the mice’s cages and get into an article because your assistance made an experiment possible.
In the social sciences there is no such a thing, unless there is predatory authorship behind. You either make a substantial contribution or you should stay out of a publication, no matter how famous you are.

The world doesn’t operate the way you think it should in your dreams. I pay my RAs to produce publishable work. I supervise everything they do, which is usually more work for me than it’s worth. My name goes on the paper because of my contributions.

1 year ago # QUOTE 6 Volod 2 Vlad !
Economist
b905

Also, they are not your employees, they are employees by the university. I make that point to be clear that the money they get is also not your money, it is either the university’s or the taxpayers money.

My RAs are my employees. Their job is to produce work I can publish. That’s what they’re paid to do. It’s their job. There is no “stealing”. If they don’t like the set-up, they should give me my money back.

No, it is my money. I brought it in. Regardless of where the money comes from, I am the boss; they work for me. Their output is mine because I paid for it.

Really? You brought in enough grants to establish your own soft money center with your own grant-funded employees?

1 year ago # QUOTE 7 Volod 2 Vlad !
Economist
7094

Koch - $uc•kers do that regularly. Free market people are very much like this.

1 year ago # QUOTE 0 Volod 3 Vlad !
Economist
97fe

Also, they are not your employees, they are employees by the university. I make that point to be clear that the money they get is also not your money, it is either the university’s or the taxpayers money.

My RAs are my employees. Their job is to produce work I can publish. That’s what they’re paid to do. It’s their job. There is no “stealing”. If they don’t like the set-up, they should give me my money back.

No, it is my money. I brought it in. Regardless of where the money comes from, I am the boss; they work for me. Their output is mine because I paid for it.

Really? You brought in enough grants to establish your own soft money center with your own grant-funded employees?

I'm a different poster than above, but in my case, "Yes!"

I bring in enough external support to cover my entire salary plus a fairly large lab of post-docs and PhDs. I don't stick my name on everything but if I wanted to it's my prerogative as I generate all the ideas in this portfolio and spend more time on quality control than individual "bespoke" researchers likely spend on their papers, since almost all of my research time is looking for my team's mistakes, identification problems, and coding errors.

1 year ago # QUOTE 6 Volod 4 Vlad !
Economist
c525

I'm a different poster than above, but in my case, "Yes!"
I bring in enough external support to cover my entire salary plus a fairly large lab of post-docs and PhDs. I don't stick my name on everything but if I wanted to it's my prerogative as I generate all the ideas in this portfolio and spend more time on quality control than individual "bespoke" researchers likely spend on their papers, since almost all of my research time is looking for my team's mistakes, identification problems, and coding errors.

Good for you then. But "bringing in enough external support to cover my entire salary plus a fairly large lab of post-docs and PhDs" is not the norm in econ.

1 year ago # QUOTE 4 Volod 0 Vlad !
Economist
7094

Probably Australia

I'm a different poster than above, but in my case, "Yes!"
I bring in enough external support to cover my entire salary plus a fairly large lab of post-docs and PhDs. I don't stick my name on everything but if I wanted to it's my prerogative as I generate all the ideas in this portfolio and spend more time on quality control than individual "bespoke" researchers likely spend on their papers, since almost all of my research time is looking for my team's mistakes, identification problems, and coding errors.

Good for you then. But "bringing in enough external support to cover my entire salary plus a fairly large lab of post-docs and PhDs" is not the norm in econ.

1 year ago # QUOTE 1 Volod 0 Vlad !
Economist
d365

My RAs are my employees. Their job is to produce work I can publish. That’s what they’re paid to do. It’s their job. There is no “stealing”. If they don’t like the set-up, they should give me my money back.

There is no consortium publishing in econ or the social sciences.
In science consortia, co-authoring is based on membership. You can be a lab assistant cleaning the mice’s cages and get into an article because your assistance made an experiment possible.
In the social sciences there is no such a thing, unless there is predatory authorship behind. You either make a substantial contribution or you should stay out of a publication, no matter how famous you are.

There are people in social sciences who have no idea how social sciences work. It’s our job to tell them why they’re wrong. If they refuse to listen, it should be university’s or professional association’s job to make them listen.

1 year ago # QUOTE 2 Volod 0 Vlad !

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