The School of Basic Health Sciences at Virginia Commonwealth University adopted such a policy in August in response to national concern and because administrators felt faculty had not been given sufficient guidance, according to the dean, S. Gaylen Bradley. It includes criteria on how to determine if co-authorship is warranted (see sidebar)…
The editor of Annals of Internal Medicine, Edward Huth, last year adapted guidelines approved in 1985 by the International Committee of Medical Journal Editors. Its criteria define authors as scientists who have "conceived and planned the work that led to the paper, or interpreted the evidence it presents, or both; wrote the paper or reviewed successive versions and took part in revising them; and approved the final version."
Other universities have taken small steps. At Stanford University, a speech on academic authorship by President Donald Kennedy in September 1985 prompted a survey of nearly 1,000 graduate students, research ...
