Dr. Pete Quick temporarily joined a research group while seeking employment. The group's mentor, Prof. Smart, assigned him to investigate a very complex set of observational data. After two months, Dr Pete Quick claimed to have discovered a pattern of behaviour by employing an analytical approach that he had independently developed. Unfortunately, Quick did not have enough evidence to back up his claim. By that point, Quick had found employment and left the group.
Jenni Dee, an experienced PhD student, continued the investigation of the behaviour. Jenni Dee had access to Quick's notebook and data. She found that Quick's analytical approach were poorly documented, and it was not possible to duplicate his work. Furthermore, his data were inconsistent and no valid conclusions could be drawn from the work. Unfortunately, Quick's procedures were never evaluated since he had been with the group such a short time. Jenni Dee experimented with the analytical approach developed by Pete Quick and found that the approach did indeed work as long as different parameters were used than described by his results. Six months after this discovery, Prof. Smart and Jenni Dee submitted their results to a journal for publication without consulting Dr Pete Quick.

A fourth party familiar with Quick's original work and the work submitted by the group happened to see him and described how the group had solved the problem. Upon learning that he was not acknowledged for his contribution, Dr Quick became angry and returned to confront Prof. Smart and her PhD student Jenni Dee. They pointed out to Dr Quick that their procedure differed from that of his original work and that his work contained no data that could confirm a successful result. Dr Quick could not deny their claim, but he argued that his idea led to a solution and that he should be acknowledged. 

Prof. Smart and Jenni Dee later privately discussed the best way to handle the situation. Dee felt that acknowledging Dr Quick's contribution in the publication would resolve the conflict and require only a minor adjustment. Jenni Dee thought Pete Quick could be included as a third author. However, Prof. Smart was concerned that listing Dr Pete Quick as a co-author was not justified based on his work. Prof. Smart stated, "Even if Dr Quick made some contribution, he deceived us into thinking that he was doing careful work, then took our salary, and we could not even use his results.” However, Dr Pete Quick was now working in a group Prof. Smart had a close collaborative history and plans for future funding applications. Dr Quick indicated that if they could not sort this authorship issue amicably, he would find it hard to trust Prof. Smart in the future collaborative efforts. 

Questions:

  • Consider the authorship rules and guidelines you are aware of. 
  • What are the facts of this case in relation to authorship. If you apply them directly to the rules and guidelines, do you think Quick’s authorship could be defended?
  • Do you think the social and collaborative ties in this case should affect the decision? Why?
  • If you were advising Jenni Dee, what would you suggest she should do before Prof. Smart makes her decision?
  • Would there be an option that would benefit all stakeholders and respect core research ethical guidelines?

This case study was modified from an original written by Brian Schrag: The Temporary Post-Doc, found on Online Ethics Center website onlineethics.org


Last modified: Tuesday, 12 March 2019, 2:06 PM