Richard,
Many years ago, as manager of a research centre I was requested to create accurate time and motion studies for a high-achieving university department in Management Information Systems.
The Head of School wanted to be able to make better decisions about workload distributions. In other words, if she allocated someone to rewrite a course, how much would it cost in terms of publications not written, funding not applied for etc. Alternatively, she wanted to know what the actual costs were for getting a successful ARC grant outcome (the highest status national research grant in Australia for this area).
Staff were enthusiastic to participate as everyone (~50 people plus 30 Phd candidates and around 100 Master candidates) was wishing to produce best outcomes.
The figures that emerged were:
Refereed conference paper(3000 words): 30-40 hours (1 week)
Refereed good-quality journal paper (8000 words): 120-150 hours (3 weeks)
Successful ARC grant application: 250 hours (spread over 1 year)
PhD thesis 1500 words written or edited - 4.5 hours (1 day)
PhD thesis (70,000 words): - 3-4 months
These figures assume the research activity generating the information for the writing is under a separate time and motion count.
Mostly, publications of that group were single author. My observation is multiple authorship often takes much more time.
The highest publishing researcher in that department was Dr Peter Love (a distant relative) who undertakes high quality research in design and manufacturing processes very efficiently and writes unbelievably fast. He was producing around 20 journal papers per year 20 years ago and has continued to work at that pace. He is possibly the highest producing high-quality design researcher worldwide - see https://curtin.academia.edu/PeterEDLove.
Finally, fast paper production seems to be a consequence of high rates of quality research and high-level thinking (meta-thinking and abstraction). When theseare in place, authoring and editing seems to happen faster - in part because there is something else authors want to write next!
Best regards,
Terence
==
Dr Terence Love,
School of Design and Built Environment, Curtin University, Western Australia
CEO, Design Out Crime and CPTED Centre
PO Box 226, Quinns Rocks, Western Australia 6030
[log in to unmask]
[log in to unmask]
+61 (0)4 3497 5848
ORCID 0000-0002-2436-7566
==
-----Original Message-----
From: PhD-Design - This list is for discussion of PhD studies and related research in <[log in to unmask]> On Behalf Of Richard Herriott
Sent: Thursday, 24 October 2019 4:46 AM
To: [log in to unmask]
Subject: Re: Who Should Sign an Article? Who Shouldn't?
This subject makes me wonder about researchers with more than a hundred articles to their name. I am sure you can think of examples. Writing on my own it takes about three months to produce an article or large paper. At a push I can do three articles a year. I find it hard to believe that a senior researcher can exceed this rate consistently so much of what bears their name is not theirs. I am reminded of a joke about a contractor (CAD contractor in the version I heard) who dies suddenly at a relatively young age. He ascends to Heaven and meets St Peter. The contractor is incredulous. "How can I die so young? I am only 48?". St Peter looks as his notes. "Well, Stuart, according to the number of hours you billed your clients we reckoned you were 67." Something similar applies to the 100 years-old senior academics whose names dangle from their 100-plus papers. I don’t suppose these people are reading this.
Secondarily, the phenomenon of appended credits is related to the sometimes absurd quotas made up by civil servants at the behest of politicians who imagine quality and quantity are synonymous. Consistently publishing nothing is not to be desired, of course. On the other hand, having insitutions required to produce papers at a certain rate is potentially harmful. So is the idea that everyone at a conference has to be presenting something. You end up with paper carousels: 15 minutes a paper, 3 minutes for "discussion" and on with the next bit of typing, please.
-----Original Message-----
From: PhD-Design - This list is for discussion of PhD studies and related research in [mailto:[log in to unmask]] On Behalf Of Ken Friedman
Sent: Wednesday, October 23, 2019 10:06 PM
To: [log in to unmask]
Subject: Re: Who Should Sign an Article? Who Shouldn't?
Dear Nigel,
Thanks for your comment. There may be a grey zone with respect to articles based on thesis research. That would depend on the article. But the role of supervision is a bit tricky — a proper doctoral thesis requires an original contribution, and one presumes that it is the original work on which most articles are based.
The permissible grey zone involves articles where the doctoral student works on part of a larger project that the supervisor conceives.
I’d argue that the contribution of a PhD supervisor with respect to Vancouver Protocol requirements differs from that of an author. As a supervisor, I make a substantial contribution to conception and design in an advisory capacity, not an authorial capacity. The same is true of analyzing, and interpreting data — supervisors are generally not involved in acquiring data. I work through key drafts and revisions of every thesis I supervise — my thesis students receive carefully marked-up drafts with extensive commentary and inquiry, but that’s not the same as writing. While I approve the final draft prior to submission, this is a different case than the meaning of final approval in the Vancouver Protocol. That means final approval of the version submitted as an author or co-author. While a supervisor takes responsibility for accuracy, he or she is required to be *aware* of the author's integrity. The author is responsible in the sense of the Vancouver Protocol.
If a PhD student develops an article from her or his thesis work, it is generally the student’s work and not the supervisor’s work. In terms of the Vancouver Protocol, context is significant. The words mean something different with respect to article authorship and supervision of the thesis on which an article may be based.
The case that came to my attention and prompted my post, however, was something entirely different.
There are universities where PhD supervisors, laboratory directors, program directors, and others insist on sharing signature credit for articles that are not based on work in which they are in any way involved. Rather, they use positional power to demand authorial credit that they do not deserve.
While I agree that the Vancouver Protocol conditions sometimes apply to PhD supervisors, those are specific cases where the words refer to authorship when PhD supervisors genuinely write with PhD students rather than supervising their work.
You are quite right on the problem of weak articles — I agree fully. If the supervisor is a genuine co-author, this represents a different problem. If the student signs alone, the supervisor is not responsible for a poor article, but responsible rather for a poorly educated PhD candidate.
The situation these days is somewhat tricky, as many universities now push PhD students to publish articles before they are ready to do so. In universities that build publications on forced gift signatures, there is also the practice of requiring students to publish as a condition of graduation so that supervisors and other professors will have something to sign.
All these issues require consideration in our field and in other fields.
Yours,
Ken
Ken Friedman, Ph.D., D.Sc. (hc), FDRS | Editor-in-Chief | 设计 She Ji. The Journal of Design, Economics, and Innovation | Published by Tongji University in Cooperation with Elsevier | URL: http://www.journals.elsevier.com/she-ji-the-journal-of-design-economics-and-innovation/
Chair Professor of Design Innovation Studies | College of Design and Innovation | Tongji University | Shanghai, China ||| Eminent Scholar | College of Design, Art, Architecture, and Planning | University of Cincinnati ||| Email [log in to unmask] | Academia https://tongji.academia.edu/KenFriedman | D&I http://tjdi.tongji.edu.cn
—
Nigel Cross wrote:
“Of course adding 'gift signatures' to articles that the signee has had no part in the work or its presentation is reprehensible. However the role of the research supervisor especially in PhD studies should not be just to stand aside and let the student conduct and present their own work. The supervisor should certainly have 1) made a substantial contribution to the conception or design of the project or had a sensitive involvement in acquiring, analyzing, or interpreting data AND 2) been involved in writing one or more drafts or making major critical revisions of the key conceptual and intellectual content AND 3) given final approval of the version submitted for publication AND 4) agreed to take responsibility for all aspects of the work with respect to accuracy and integrity - the four conditions prescribed in the Vancouver Protocol as set out by Ken.For PhD work points 1) and 2) should be taken for granted as supervisory requirements. Regarding points 3) and 4) there is a quality control aspect to the supervisior's role that unfortunately sometimes seem to be overlooked. As an editor I have sometimes received weak submissions where the corresponding author is a PhD student but there were one or more other authors are listed who presumably were the supervisors and who should not have 'gifted' their signature to such poor work. They should have 'given final approval' and 'taken responsibility' for the work and their overall contribution to the study should merit the recognition of co-authorship."
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