NIH Director Statement on Transparency in Scientific Contributions

Transparency is the cornerstone of public trust and is essential to advancing rigorous, gold-standard science. Since I began leading NIH, I have been committed to strengthening public trust through greater transparency across all NIH-supported research, with the goal of improving health for all Americans. One important pillar to support this vision is that contributors to scientific publications must be recognized for their work. 

Transparency matters not only because data, methods, and findings should be available and accessible, but also because the individuals who contribute to science bring to the table their own expertise, judgment, and perspective. As biomedical research becomes increasingly interdisciplinary, and research teams grow in scale and complexity, accurately representing scientific contributions is critical to upholding the principles of transparency, accountability, and fairness. 

Scientific contributions take many forms. In addition to gathering data, validating studies, and drafting manuscripts, intellectual contributions play a central role in shaping the scientific story. Authorship and acknowledgment in scientific publications must accurately and ethically reflect all substantive input. This is imperative not only for ensuring appropriate credit is given, but also to enable researchers to manage potential conflicts among contributors. This has long been an area of focus for the scientific and publishing communities, as well as for NIH, and there are several existing models for ensuring appropriate credit for these contributions. 

The International Committee of Medical Journal Editors (ICMJE) recommends that authorship be based on four criteria, all of which should be met: substantial contributions to the conception or design of the work, or to the acquisition, analysis, or interpretation of data; drafting the work or revising it critically for important intellectual content; final approval of the version to be published; and agreement to be accountable for all aspects of the work. Contributors who do not meet all four criteria should not be listed as authors, but their contributions should be appropriately acknowledged. 

The NIH Intramural Research Program (IRP) generally follows the ICMJE recommendations and developed a framework that outlines specific circumstances in which authorship is appropriate. The framework covers authorship contributions including intellectual contribution (yes), project supervision (yes), mentoring (no, unless substantive contribution made to the study) and more. The NIH IRP Authorship Conflict Resolution Policy states that individuals who do not meet these authorship criteria, but who assisted with the research in some manner, should be acknowledged in the article but not named as authors. These resources promote integrity in authorship and scientific publication by articulating when credit and responsibility is given. 

Moving forward, NIH expects all intellectual contributions to NIH-supported research publications to be appropriately cited, including through formal authorship and acknowledgements. Institutions and researchers are encouraged to adopt the frameworks above, or similar ones, to help build and maintain transparency in scientific communications. Trust in NIH-supported research is vital to ensuring confidence in scientifically informed decisions that benefit all Americans. 

Jay Bhattacharya, M.D., Ph.D.  
Director, National Institutes of Health