Standard way to specify roles in authorship This question is not really about who can be considered a coauthor of a given journal paper —or maybe it is, after all— but rather about how to specify the different roles, levels of implication or contributions of each of the coauthors, in case this would mean to be done.

My question is: Is there any standard about how to specify the different roles or contributions of the coauthors of a given journal paper? I do not mean the importance of coauthors that can maybe deduced from their order in the author list (see What does first authorship really mean?, Authorship allocation - is it common to grant equal credit to two last authors?, for instance), but a way to explicitly specify the implication of each of the coauthors, in a sort of standard way.

I remember someone saying this could be added at the end of each article, as a way to make the contribution of each coauthor clearer.

Actually, my question is highly related to this previous one: Revamping Paper Authorship, *or* Should Papers Roll Credits, which has only received one answer and is still open at the moment of writing.

I have found some interesting webpages and articles dealing with this subject:


Defining the Role of Authors and Contributors (International Committee of Medical Journal Editors)
The ICMJE's definition of authorship is illogical and unethical (David Shaw)
Is it time for a new approach to authorship? (Leash E.)
A New Standard for Authorship (Paul J. Friedman)


So, maybe my question is actually about the state of the art of this subject: how to credit authorship in a standard way or standard authorship crediting.



Other related questions in this site:


What are the minimum contributions required for co-authorship
Is it ethical for advisors to automatically coauthor papers?
If you make a substantial contribution should you be given the opportunity to satisfy the other requirements for authorship?
Should undergraduate students be included on papers containing data they collected?
Indicating co-PI status on a paper
Can I claim authorship on work I wasn&#39;t personally involved in, that uses a framework I developed for my research?
There is no standard way, not even in the same field or sometimes even the same journal.

But when people put contributions at the end, it typically looks something like this:


  Author Contributions
  AB conceived the project. CD and EF designed the experiments. AB and GH performed the experiments. CD and EF analyzed the data. AB wrote the article with input from all the other authors.