Co-authorship in Scopus is one of the most significant trends in modern scientometrics. According to the SciVal resource, last year, the number of scientific publications of scientists from Kazakhstan, written by one author, amounted to 6.5%. Whereas, the share of international co-authorship is 52.3%, national co-authorship accounts for 18.7% and co-authorship within the same scientific organization amounts to 22.5%. Why is the cooperation between scientists more and more often used when writing a scientific article? Let us consider the advantages and disadvantages of this type of cooperation, how to search for co-authors and distribute roles in the research team.
What are the benefits of co-authorship in a scientific article?
Co-authorship in a scientific article opens up many opportunities for a scientist. The main positive aspects of this type of cooperation are as follows:
- The cooperation of scientists with different specializations will allow studying the topic from different angles and present more in-depth scientific research.
- A scientist needs to make a lot of effort and time to publish in the Scopus rating publication, while co-authorship minimizes these costs, since all authors take responsibility for the research.
- In addition, one of the main advantages of co-authorship is that researchers can share the cost of the publication fee among themselves (remember that this is not the same as buying co-authorship in a paper).
In addition to the positive aspects, of course, there are a number of negative ones that may arise in the process of cooperation between researchers:
- Irrational distribution of roles in the team.
- The scientific hypotheses presented in the article contradict each other.
- Despite experience and teamwork, researchers may produce an article that does not meet the requirements of the Scopus journal.
- Co-authorship is more difficult to evaluate than single-author publication in the context of each individual's personal contribution.
How many co-authors can there be?
A research team may include from two to several tens or hundreds of co-authors. It is worth taking into account that editorial boards at the journal level are not always ready to consider articles with a large number of authors.
Therefore, the Scientific Publications company recommends to form a research team with no more than 5 authors. This option is the most optimal in the context of the consideration of scientific material. In this case, publication is counted for all co-authors.
Who cannot be a co-author?
There are no strict restrictions regarding the involvement of co-authors in the research team, but it is worth remembering several important rules in terms of compliance with publication ethics:
- It is important to avoid conflicts of interest. For example, it is forbidden to involve as a co-author a research sponsor or a member of the editorial board, or a reviewer of the journal, in which publication is planned.
- If scientists involved assistants to complete the technical tasks, they do not need to be indicated as co-authors, but it is worth mentioning them in acknowledgements.
Searching for co-authors for publication: popular methods for attracting researchers
In order to interest other scientists to work with the author, to conduct more productive work and publish the article in Scopus, researchers turn to different ways to find co-authors. The most popular of them are as follows:
- Cooperation with colleagues. As a result of this type of cooperation, scientific supervisors or teachers from the same department or university often act as co-authors.
- Participation in national and international programs, conferences, discussions.
- Active use of social networks and profiles of the researcher, so the scientist gains popularity in the scientific world and is more often attracted as a co-author.
- Search using scientometric databases and special platforms. A scientist can identify those who specializes in his thematic area, and then contact these researchers and offer them an Scopus international co-authorship.
- Use the services of a consulting company. The Scientific Publications company provides researchers with the service of searching for co-authors and publishing research on a turnkey basis.
If you need to publish a Scopus scientific article in co-authorship, please contact the specialists of the Scientific Publications company. We will provide comprehensive support for your work and, as a result, its publication and indexing in the Scopus rating publication. Leave a request on the website and we will contact you today!
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