Toward collaborator selection and determination of data ownership and publication authorship in research collaborations

•Researchers rated their intrinsic motivations the highest followed by their extrinsic motivations.•Researchers who had a greater number of projects valued the deep-level characteristics of a collaborator more highly.•Researcher who had served as a project PI or co-PI valued the deep-level characteristics of a collaborator more highly.•Younger researchers were more concerned with a collaborator's reputation and the cost of a collaboration decision.•Younger researchers did not know more often whether their project teams followed any authorship rules or norms.

This study examined factors that might affect researchers' willingness to collaborate with a specific researcher and the priorities given to those factors. In addition, it investigated how researchers determined the ownership of collaborative project data and how they determined the order of authorship on collaborative publications in condensed matter physics. In general, researchers rated their intrinsic motivations the highest, such as the quality of ideas a potential collaborator might have and their satisfaction with a past collaboration, followed by their extrinsic motivations, such as the complementary knowledge, skills, or resources the collaborator could provide. In addition, researchers who had a greater number of collaborative projects and researchers who had served as a project PI or co-PI valued the deep-level, personality-related characteristics of a collaborator higher than did those who had not. Younger researchers were more risk averse and more concerned with a collaborator's reputation and the possible cost of a collaboration decision. Additionally, younger researchers indicated more often than older researchers that they did not know whether their project teams followed any rules or norms or engaged in negotiation to determine the order of authorship on collaborative publications.