Acknowledging Acknowledgments
Greetings again. I hope you’re doing well.
Recently this blog included a series titled IMRAD Info. The series consisted of posts about the main parts of a scientific paper. This series is now available as a single item in the AuthorAID Resource Library.
The series focused on the introduction, methods, results, and discussion. However, scientific papers also have important shorter sections. One such section is the acknowledgments (to use the US spelling) or acknowledgements (British spelling).
The acknowledgments section is the place to thank people who helped with the work but do not merit authorship. Examples include people who
- provided general advice on the research
- collected data but did not otherwise participate
- let you use some equipment in the research
- performed routine data analysis
- provided feedback on a draft of the paper
In many journals, the acknowledgments section is also the place to list funding sources that supported the research.
Journals usually don't allow acknowledgments to include, for example, thanks to their family members for their encouragement. However, acknowledgments in books and theses sometimes include such thanks. In the acknowledgments in her thesis, one of my graduate students thanked her dog!
Different journals prefer different wordings for acknowledgments. For suitable models, read some acknowledgments in your target journal. Of course, also see whether the instructions to authors discuss acknowledgments.
In general, ask people for permission to be acknowledged. Also, ask those being acknowledged how they want their names to appear.
Speaking of acknowledgments, I thank Wilfred Kokas Aupal for posting a comment suggesting that the IMRAD Info series be repackaged as a single item. I hope others also will post such suggestions.
Until the next post—
Barbara