Author contributions

[JGilbert-eLife]

Description

Contributions will be included as text captured using role elements - pre-set options + optional free text options (see https://trello.com/c/xDiPXFXm/22-author-contributions-no-free-form-text-anymore-just-credit-taxonomy)

User stories

Author

• As an author, I want to be able to clearly see the contributions that will be listed for each author so that I can check that the details are correct.
• As an author, I want to be able to edit the contributions so that I can correct any mistakes.

Production staff

But what if . . . ?

Consideration

• eLife follows the Contributor Roles Taxonomy (CRediT) for the pre-set contribution options. The idea is to try and standardise contributions, making it clear and transparent what authors have contributed to the work.
  • Conceptualization
  • Resources
  • Data curation
  • Software
  • Formal analysis
  • Supervision
  • Funding acquisition
  • Validation
  • Investigation
  • Visualization
  • Methodology
  • Writing—original draft
  • Project administration
  • Writing—review and editing
• In our submission system, these options are presented as tick boxes. As some authors want/need other options, we also allow an additional free-text option to allow them to include more specific details, ideally in addition to pre-set options but occasionally replacing them entirely.
• Other publishers do not use a controlled vocabulary for contributions e.g. just accommodate the free-text approach. Érudit, for example, don't have a controlled vocabulary and therefore don't need the related attributes on the <role> elements.
• The <role> element is going to be used to capture roles as well - see https://github.com/substance/texture/issues/1271, https://github.com/substance/texture/issues/1263.
• SciELO capture author contributions as a single footnote rather than including them individually per author. This would perhaps be a specific use of author footnotes (https://github.com/substance/texture/issues/1258).

XML requirements

Each contribution, based on the CRediT taxonomy is captured as a <role> element, which is a direct child of the contrib. This role element must carry the following attributes: @vocab, must always carry the value "credit". @vocab-identifier, must point to the URL for the general CRediT taxonomy @vocab-term, must identify the particular CRediT term. @vocab-term-identifier, must point to the URL of the specific CRediT term.

<contrib>
     <name>
          <surname>Gilbert</surname>
          <given-names>James F</given-names>
     </name>
     <role vocab="credit" vocab-identifier="http://dictionary.casrai.org/Contributor_Roles" vocab-term="Conceptualization" 
vocab-term-identifier="http://dictionary.casrai.org/Contributor_Roles/Conceptualization">Conceptualization</role>
     <role vocab="credit" vocab-identifier="http://dictionary.casrai.org/Contributor_Roles" vocab-term="Writing_original_draft" 
vocab-term-identifier="http://dictionary.casrai.org/Contributor_Roles/Writing_original_draft">Writing – original draft</role>
</contrib>
<contrib>
     <name>
          <surname>Atherden</surname>
          <given-names>Frederick P</given-names>
     </name>
     <role vocab="credit" vocab-identifier="http://dictionary.casrai.org/Contributor_Roles" 
vocab-term="Data_curation" vocab-term-identifier="http://dictionary.casrai.org/Contributor_Roles/Data_curation">Data curation</role>
     <role vocab="credit" vocab-identifier="http://dictionary.casrai.org/Contributor_Roles" vocab-term="Writing_original_draft" 
vocab-term-identifier="http://dictionary.casrai.org/Contributor_Roles/Conceptualization"> Writing – original draft</role>
</contrib>
…

[ Requirement for free text needs to be added - could be @content-type attribute with value of "contribution", but is currently being discussed by JATS4R and publishers using both pre-set and controlled list]

Mock ups

Proposal