Publications are an important indicator for transparency and performance comparison both nationally and internationally. This applies not only to the individual scholarorscientist, but also to the institution as a whole.
Every year, however, numerous publications are not attributed to the University of Cologne dueto incorrect affiliation details. At the beginning of 2018, for example, more than 400 affiliations on the commercial Web of Science publication database had to be retroactively assigned to the University of Cologne. In addition to this time-consuming and resourceintensive task, incorrect affiliation information also leads to an incomplete picture of the University’s achievements in external evaluations or rankings.
The overwhelming majority of faulty attributions is due to incorrect spelling of the University’s name, e.g. ‘Univ Cologne’, ‘Univ Koln’ or ‘Uni Colonia’. Sometimes, however, only the institute or research institution is mentioned in the context of a publication, but not the university. In both cases, there is a risk that the research achievement may become invisible because the connection between the publication and the University of Cologne does not become apparent.
That is why the Rectorate has formulated the attached Publication Guidelines. These Guidelines define a uniform spelling of the University’s name in German and English, offer orientation regarding further affiliations (e.g. Faculty orinstitute) and provide information on how to deal with double or multiple affiliations.
Please take a moment to read these Guidelines carefully and to pass the information on to colleagues and staff. This includes international guest scholars and scientists as well as early-career researchers at your institution. In the future the Publication Guidelines will be part of the recruitment process respectively the Welcome Package for international researchers.
Axel Freimuth
Rector of the University of Cologne
Download Publication Guidelines:
