Google Scholar: Wrong author(s)

Publish or Perish tutorial

Anne-Wil Harzing - Sat 6 Feb 2016 16:10 (updated Thu 2 Jun 2022 11:06)

Note: This tutorial was originally written for Publish or Perish v4 and all screenshots come from this version. However, the information as such is also applicable for later versions of Publish or Perish.

Author missing on co-authored paper

Sometimes Google Scholar does not seem to parse the author field correctly and the publication cannot be found under the name of the author, or one of the authors, even though it can be found by searching by title in Publish or Perish. For instance, Isabel Metz and I published a paper in Management International Review on geographical diversity in editorial boards.

• Harzing, A.W.; Metz, I. (2013) Practicing what we preach: The geographic diversity of editorial boards, Management International Review, vol. 53, no. 2, pp. 169-187.

Publication shows up for co-author and title search

The publication shows up fine when searching for my name or when searching for the title (see screenshots).

Second author's name is missing in master record

However, as Isabel Metz is not listed as an author, it does not show up when searching for her name. The reason for this is that Google Scholar has not parsed Isabel’s name in the record that it has chosen as a master record (see screenshot).

In spite of linking to a correct publisher's version

This is a little puzzling as the master record links to a correct presentation of the article on the publisher’s website (see screenshot) that does include Isabel's name.

Second and third version of the record have problems too

Interestingly, the name is correctly parsed in the second version of the record, but here the year is missing instead. The third version of the record provides all the correct details, but doesn’t link to actual article itself. Sometimes you just can’t win!

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