Additive Scholarship and Divisive Credits: The Case of Multiple Authors in Marketing Papers

Abstract

One major element of faculty assessment across universities and across disciplines is the number of publications. In most universities, faculty members publishing collaborative research papers attract lesser credits than those who publish alone. However, the general trend in academic publications is a shift towards multiple authorship. In this paper, we examine the authorship patterns in top ranked marketing journals from 2000 to 2012. We found that the number of single-authored papers is declining and collaborative research is increasing. Business school deans and research administrators could device faculty reward plans and research grant schemes based on the findings, so that collaborative research and multiple authored papers are not valued lesser than single authored papers.