Domain expert advisor

A subject-matter expert (clinical, technical, policy, lived-experience) who advises a research project on questions within their expertise — typically through formal advisory boards, steering committees, or focused consultations — distinct from co-authorship or formal investigator roles.

ByCASRAI Editorial Board

· Last updated 5 Sept 2026

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A domain expert advisor is a subject-matter specialist — clinical, technical, regulatory, statistical, or lived-experience — consulted on questions within their expertise, typically through a formal advisory board, steering committee, or a bounded, one-off consultation. The relationship is advisory rather than operational: the advisor is not usually a named investigator on the study and does not carry day-to-day responsibility for its conduct.

How it differs from related terms: A methodology consultant advises specifically on study design and analytic strategy, and a statistical consultant narrower still, on quantitative methods; a domain expert advisor’s brief can be substantive but non-methodological, such as clinical plausibility, regulatory feasibility, or community acceptability. Where advisory input materially shapes study design or interpretation — enough to satisfy CRediT’s Conceptualization or Methodology roles and all four ICMJE criteria — authorship, not acknowledgement, is the appropriate credit.

Standing advisory boards on funded studies are also frequently named in the funder’s own project reporting, independent of how the study’s resulting papers credit them.

References

NIHR Guidance on Trial Steering Committees (2018)
ICMJE Recommendations (2024)

Use in your systems

JATS XML <role> element

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      vocab-term="Domain expert advisor"
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Schema.org DefinedTerm (JSON-LD)

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