Evaluating Authorship Variation Patterns in English-Medium Astrophysic Research PapersAn Across Journal and Diachronic Study (1998-2012)
- David I. Méndez
- M. Ángeles Alcaraz
- Françoise Salager-Meyer
ISSN: 0211-5913
Year of publication: 2014
Issue Title: Current issues in Research Communication in English
Issue: 69
Pages: 51-63
Type: Article
More publications in: Revista Canaria de Estudios Ingleses
Abstract
This paper explores authorship practices from a diachronic perspective in a corpus of 300 randomly selected research papers published in the most prestigious Astrophysics Englishmedium journals. Our main results show that 21 variants were recorded in the number of authors in the whole sample and that multi-authored research papers far outnumber single-authored ones. They also reveal a growth not only in the number of authors, but also in the number of multi-authored research papers over time, mainly in those contributed by more than seven authors. From a specific diachronic perspective, each journal has its own authorship variation patterns and variants, which are analysed and explained in relation to their specific scope and to the socio-economic and political situation in each geographic context (European countries and the USA).