Dual authorship of academic paper raises controversy

A girl receives her father's encouragement before she takes the independent college recruitment exams on Feb 19, 2011, in Beijing.

A recent online exposure that some academic papers were reportedly "co-written" by an 18-year-old high school student and her mother in Wuhan, Central China's Hubei province, has sparked a controversy. The papers published on cnki.net, China's largest database of research papers, show that the mother, who is a professor of Marxism at Zhongnan University of Economics and Law in Wuhan, mostly served as secondary author. On the strength of the two papers, the student qualified for independent recruitment in two local universities. Comments:

My daughter was born and bred in a well-educated family and is surely capable of publishing her own academic papers. Like other students who are qualified for independent recruitment in universities, she still has to take the exams that follow and pass them to finally get admitted. The so-called exposure has a lot to do with some scholars who are jealous of her academic achievements.

Wu Ning, a professor with the School of Marxism, Zhongnan University of Economics and Law, and the mother of the aforementioned high school student

One is not supposed to deny the possibility of an 18-year-old being academically inclined to prepare academic papers on Marxism. But the papers will unavoidably raise controversies and doubts about academic ethics if the student's professor mother happens to be the sole co-author. Thus the two universities, which have enrolled the student in preliminary recruitment, should deal with her case objectively and fairly in the follow-up process in order to remove doubts among the public.

Beijing News, June 4

Admittedly, the two local universities basically accepted the students' academic work before they decided to enlist her as a potential candidate for independent recruitment. Yet they are also obliged to get the young student's real research capability validated and respond to the online challenges in a positive manner. Otherwise, the credibility of similar recruitments will be further questioned.

cjn.cn, June 4