Hi Rod, Do take the second authorship. Otherwise the presentation is not authentic as to how it came to be. The reader would be mislead.
The student is certainly correct that an authored paper is the highest ranked advantage (after grades and GRE scores) according to a couple of studies (one of them being mine). However, it is very unusual for an undergraduate to be the sole author, so unusual that some evaluators are suspicious. It's not that undergrads are not smart enough. They just don't have those years of experience of reading scholarly articles to get the hang of how to write them, let alone the experience of designing and conducting research. In fact, of course, you would deserve the senior authorship if strict criteria were being applied. Yet many undergraduate and graduate professors give of themselves in this way to enhance their students' professional development. My only (minor) concern is that the student does not have the basics of research design and analysis behind her, but she can learn if you are willing to teach her. This will add to your role. Patricia Keith-Spiegel Children's Hospital Harvard Medical School on 1/17/03 11:48 AM, Hetzel, Rod at [EMAIL PROTECTED] wrote: > TIPSters: > > I have a question about authorship on papers. One of my students has > elected to do a research study for her project in my Abnormal Psychology > class. She wants to go on to graduate school in psychology and is > interested in research, but has never had any research experience or > even a research methods class (she will take that course in the fall). > I agreed to help her conduct an independent research project because she > is a very hard-worker and has tremendous potential. She has selected a > general area that is of interest to her, but my role will be to mentor > her through the process of narrowing down her ideas, developing > hypotheses, planning methodology, analyzing and interpreting data, and > writing up the results. She will take the lead role on all of these > steps, but I will be there to help provide guidance and direction. My > goal in working with her is to provide mentorship so that she can learn > how to conduct research from the beginning to the end. In this type of > situation, should I take second-authorship? Or should the student > assume sole authorship? The APA Ethics Code suggests that intellectual > contribution should be the criterion one considers when making this type > of decision. I certainly will make an intellectual contribution, but I > want this to be her research and not my research. In some ways, taking > second authorship helps to teach her about how authorship decisions are > made (which is a very important part of graduate education in research), > but I also want to be sensitive to the power differential that exists > and not abuse my position as her instructor. I would welcome your > thoughts as I think through this issue. > > Rod > ______________________________________________ > Roderick D. Hetzel, Ph.D. > Department of Psychology > LeTourneau University > Post Office Box 7001 > 2100 South Mobberly Avenue > Longview, Texas 75607-7001 > > Office: Education Center 218 > Phone: 903-233-3893 > Fax: 903-233-3851 > Email: [EMAIL PROTECTED] > Homepage: http://www.letu.edu/people/rodhetzel > > --- > You are currently subscribed to tips as: [EMAIL PROTECTED] > To unsubscribe send a blank email to [EMAIL PROTECTED] --- You are currently subscribed to tips as: [EMAIL PROTECTED] To unsubscribe send a blank email to [EMAIL PROTECTED]
