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A survey of using multiple affiliations by scholars in scientific articles

Authors:
Mohammad Reza Safaei
Mohammad Reza Safaei
Marjan Goodarzi
Marjan Goodarzi
Mahidzal Dahari at University of Malaya
Mahidzal Dahari
Omid Mahian at Ningbo University
Omid Mahian
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A survey of using multiple affiliations by scholars
in scientific articles
Mohammad Reza Safaei
1
•Marjan Goodarzi
2
•
Omid Mahian
2
•Mahidzal Dahari
1
•Somchai Wongwises
3
Received: 13 January 2016 / Published online: 2 February 2016
ÓAkade
´miai Kiado
´, Budapest, Hungary 2016
In recent years, some scholars use multiple affiliations in their papers due to financial
supports from different institutes and universities that are beyond common collaborations.
The organizations are interested in employing highly cited professors to climb their rank in
the world.
Regarding this important issue, a survey prepared and shared among 300 scholars to ask
their opinion about addressing several universities or institutes as affiliation in scientific
papers. The researchers with at least an M.Sc. degree were from 54 different countries
while 77 % of them have published at least 1 ISI paper. Finally, 6 % of the scholars from
11 countries including Italy, Iran, Malaysia, Oman, UAE, Pakistan, Portugal, Brazil, India,
Algeria, and Australia returned the filled forms. All of the selected scientists had, at least,
three ISI papers. The results of the survey were analyzed using SPSS software.
The survey demonstrated that the proposed topic is a controversial issue. As all of the
respondents believed that financial support is one of the most important parts of the
research as scientists need it to develop their ideas and continue their research. Further-
more, they had an optimistic attitude about everything that helps the researchers to develop
their ideas. However, just 16.67 % of the respondents believe that adding the other institute
affiliations due to financial support is ethical. In contrast, others pointed out that if there is
only funding from other institutes, the ‘‘Acknowledgment’’ section would be well adequate
to appreciate the financial resource.
&Omid Mahian
omid.mahian@gmail.com
1
Department of Mechanical Engineering, Faculty of Engineering, University of Malaya,
50603 Kuala Lumpur, Malaysia
2
Young Researchers and Elite Club, Mashhad Branch, Islamic Azad University, Mashhad, Iran
3
Fluid Mechanics, Thermal Engineering and Multiphase Flow Research Laboratory (FUTURE),
Department of Mechanical Engineering, Faculty of Engineering, King Mongkut’s University of
Technology Thonburi, Bangmod, Bangkok 10140, Thailand
123
Scientometrics (2016) 107:317–318
DOI 10.1007/s11192-016-1875-8
To summarize it, we can conclude that it is not moral to apply various affiliations in the
papers by the scholars only due to financial support and without a real contribution.
However, acknowledging of different institutes is highly recommended.
Acknowledgments The authors gratefully acknowledge High Impact Research Grant UM.C/HIR/MOHE/
ENG/23 and Faculty of Engineering, University of Malaya, Malaysia for support in conducting this research
work. Also, Somchai Wongwises would like to thank the ‘‘Research Chair Grant’’ National Science and
Technology Development Agency (NSTDA), the Thailand Research fund and the National Research
University Project for the support.
318 Scientometrics (2016) 107:317–318
123
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