Authorship and Contributions
Authorship and Contribution Guidelines
Applies to: all 6 EP Journals Group journals.
Effective: 1 May 2026, version 1.0.
Who counts as an author
An author of an article published in Journal of Management Research and Review is someone who:
- made a substantive intellectual contribution to the work (designed the study, generated or analyzed the data, wrote substantial portions of the manuscript, or made a comparable contribution),
- participated in drafting or critically revising the manuscript,
- approves the final submitted version,
- accepts public responsibility for the content of the article and for any subsequent corrections or retractions.
People who provided assistance — funding administration, technical support, language editing, lab management, equipment access — but who did not meet all four criteria above are credited in the Acknowledgements rather than listed as authors.
This is consistent with the ICMJE recommendations on authorship.
CRediT taxonomy
For articles with more than one author, we ask submitting authors to provide a CRediT (Contributor Roles Taxonomy) statement at the end of the manuscript. CRediT is a standardized vocabulary for describing author contributions, maintained by NISO and used by an increasing number of major publishers. The 14 CRediT roles are: Conceptualization, Methodology, Software, Validation, Formal Analysis, Investigation, Resources, Data Curation, Writing — Original Draft, Writing — Review and Editing, Visualization, Supervision, Project Administration, Funding Acquisition. See credit.niso.org for definitions.
A typical CRediT statement reads:
Author A: Conceptualization, Methodology, Writing — Original Draft. Author B: Investigation, Formal Analysis, Visualization. Author C: Writing — Review and Editing, Supervision. All authors approved the final manuscript.
Single-author papers do not require a CRediT statement.
Author order
The order of authors should reflect the agreement of the contributing team, not journal convention. Some disciplines use first-author-and-last-author conventions (life sciences); others use alphabetical order (economics, mathematics); others negotiate the order during manuscript preparation. We do not impose a specific convention.
The corresponding author is the author who handles communication with the journal during review and after publication. The corresponding author does not need to be the first author.
Changes to authorship after submission
Adding, removing, or re-ordering authors after a manuscript has been submitted requires:
- a written request to editor@jmrr.ep-journals.org describing the proposed change and the reason,
- written confirmation from each existing author and from any added author that they agree to the change,
- editor approval before the manuscript proceeds.
After acceptance, authorship changes require the same steps, plus a clear explanation of why the change wasn't requested earlier. After publication, authorship changes are exceptional — they are handled as a published correction notice and may require institutional involvement.
Disputes about authorship
We take authorship disputes seriously. Where a dispute arises during review, we may pause the review until it is resolved. Where a dispute arises after publication, we follow COPE guidance and refer the parties to their institution(s) for adjudication if we cannot resolve the matter through correspondence. Any resolved dispute is recorded on the article record.
We do not adjudicate disputes about contribution levels in our own right; that is the institution's responsibility. We do publish corrections that record the institution's findings.
"Honorary," "guest," and "ghost" authorship
We do not accept the following:
- Honorary or guest authorship. Listing someone as an author who did not meaningfully contribute to the work — for example, the head of a lab who was not involved in the project, or a senior scholar added to enhance the manuscript's perceived prestige — is misconduct. Where we detect this during review, we ask for clarification. Confirmed cases lead to rejection.
- Ghost authorship. Failing to list someone who did meaningfully contribute — for example, a professional medical writer or statistical consultant whose work shaped the manuscript — is also misconduct. Substantial contributions must be credited as authorship; lesser contributions in the Acknowledgements.
AI tools and authorship
Generative AI tools cannot be listed as authors. AI tools cannot meet the requirement to take responsibility for the work, to defend it under criticism, or to participate in correction or retraction processes. This applies to ChatGPT, Claude, Gemini, and any other current or future AI system.
Use of AI tools by human authors must be disclosed in line with our AI Policy.
Corresponding author obligations
The corresponding author:
- is the primary contact for the editorial office during review and after publication,
- confirms on submission that all listed authors have approved the manuscript and the author order,
- is responsible for ensuring co-authors receive editorial decisions, reviewer comments, and proofs,
- is responsible for any corrections or retractions of the published article.
We send all correspondence to the corresponding author and assume the corresponding author distributes it to co-authors as appropriate.
Effective: 1 May 2026 (v1.0).
Editorial contact: editor@jmrr.ep-journals.org
External references: CRediT taxonomy · ICMJE authorship recommendations · COPE Authorship Disputes flowchart
