If you generate a main text figure in a publication, does that deserve coauthorship?

Question

[O.rka]

A colleague reached out to me asking to generate a figure of gene neighborhood plots. I used a package for this but it took a considerable amount of time to work out all of the kinks. That colleague ended up using it (possibly 2 of the figures I generated) as main text figures.

Does this warrant authorship? I did not create a package for this and used a preexisting one but I would be willing to open source my code to reproduce the figures exactly.

[Pierre Lindenbaum]

I'd say it's unrelated to bioinformatics. Ask: https://academia.stackexchange.com

[JC]

That desition is up to the main author, but I would say no, this is similar to a Graphic Designer working to make pretty images for the cover. At much, you can be at the "acknowledgment" section or ask for a payment for your time effort.

Answer 1

[Mensur Dlakic]

Does this warrant authorship?

Based on what you described, in my opinion that would not be enough for authorship unless your contribution involved some kind of data manipulation that was more than cosmetic. At the same time I would never ask someone who was not involved with the project to make a figure. That said, I know that in some cases authorship has been given for less than what you have done, just like I know cases where people have done a lot more than you and still did not end up getting authorship.

I hope your colleague told you beforehand that your figure(s) may end up in a paper, or at least that the paper was not submitted without your approval to use the figure(s). You certainly have a right to ask for acknowledgement or authorship, and not give consent to use the figure if you get neither. I think in this case at the minimum you should expect acknowledgement and I would give it to you, but people are different. Finally, you can ask to be paid for your effort, in which case the monetary reward would take place of acknowledgement/authorship.

[Michael]

That said, I know that in some cases authorship has been given for less than what you have done, just like I know cases where people have done a lot more than you and still did not end up getting authorship.

I guess in that first category belong some of the senior/group-leader authorships who have given the money (though it wasn't their own) ;)

[Mensur Dlakic]

Providing money for research is a significant contribution and not necessarily a bad way to earn authorship in my opinion, provided a modicum of involvement. But I do know cases where authorship was given for less effort than what it takes to make a complicated figure. I would never be on a paper like that, and in several instances I have been in the second category described above. Do anything long enough, or just be alive long enough, and you will see all kinds of things happen :-)