Who gets credit for research – and how should those decisions be made? These questions were at the heart of the recent webinar that my colleague Lucia Loffreda and I led, exploring contributor roles, recognition and research integrity through the lens of the CRediT (Contributor Roles Taxonomy) framework. Bringing together perspectives from publishing, research integrity, funding and institutional practice, the discussion highlighted both the growing importance of transparency around contributors and the practical challenges of recognising the many people whose work makes research possible.
Moving beyond authorship alone
The webinar opened with an overview from Liz Allen, Co-Chair of CRediT, who traced the taxonomy’s origins and the challenges it was designed to address. Traditional authorship conventions rarely capture the full diversity of contributions to a research project: author order varies by discipline, says nothing about who did what, and becomes increasingly inadequate as research grows more collaborative. CRediT was developed to provide a standardised vocabulary for describing contributions such as data curation, software development, methodology design and supervision alongside writing and conceptualisation roles. Adoption has grown significantly since 2019, and Liz shared the news that CRediT is set to be integrated into Crossref’s metadata schema imminently – a major step forward for the initiative.
The ethics of attribution
Mohammad Hosseini, Assistant Professor at Northwestern University explored the ethical dimensions of recognition, arguing that contributor transparency can help surface the work of individuals whose roles have historically been hidden in acknowledgements or overlooked entirely. He was candid about CRediT’s limitations: no taxonomy can resolve authorship disputes or eliminate power imbalances, and misuse is always possible. His recent work (in collaboration with Liz and others) developing practical examples for each of CRediT’s 14 roles aims to reduce the misunderstandings in how the taxonomy is applied, even by experienced researchers.
Contributor roles in funding assessment
Sandra Bendiscioli, Senior Policy Officer at EMBO examined how contributor information might support funding assessment. Many organisations have moved away from blunt metrics like journal impact factors, but authorship position remains a common proxy for contribution and independence. CRediT offers the possibility of recognising a wider range of roles, though, as several speakers noted, it works best alongside narrative approaches rather than as a standalone tool: funders and grant peer reviewers comparing multiple proposal need context that contributor roles alone cannot provide.
Recognising technical contributions
Holly Ranger, Head of Open Research at the University of Sheffield, shared insights from work to improve recognition of technical and professional services staff. Workshops with technicians and academics confirmed broad agreement that many technical contributions involve significant intellectual input, but that most attribution conversations often happen too late, after the work is done and ready to be submitted for publication. Her key message was to treat contributor recognition as an ongoing conversation throughout the research process, not a retrospective exercise.
Looking ahead
The discussion ended on an optimistic note. Speakers agreed that greater transparency has real potential to improve fairness, strengthen research integrity and provide a more accurate picture of how research happens. As one speaker put it, the goal is not to replace existing systems but to give them a richer, more honest foundation.
Watch the webinar recording
If you were unable to join the live session, or would like to revisit the discussion, you can register to access the webinar recording on demand.
With thanks to Liz Allen, Mohammad Hosseini, Sandra Bendiscioli and Holly Ranger for a rich and generous discussion.
