CRediT for authors

When to write one

Major publishers (PLOS, eLife, Cell Press, Elsevier, Wiley, Springer Nature, MDPI, Frontiers, T&F, SAGE, OUP, CUP) collect CRediT statements at submission. Many now require structured CRediT metadata rather than just a narrative paragraph.

Step-by-step

List authors in your submission system as you would normally.
For each author, pick one or more of the 14 roles that describe their contribution. You do not need to use all 14.
Optionally add a degree qualifier per role: lead, equal, or supporting.
Include acknowledged contributors (medical writers, technical staff, postdocs who contributed below the authorship bar) in the acknowledgements section with their CRediT roles, even if the publisher's structured form only captures author CRediT.

Example statement

For a 5-author medical-research paper, an exemplary CRediT statement reads:

Zhang San: Conceptualization (lead), Methodology, Writing — original draft. Priya Patel: Data curation (lead), Investigation, Writing — review & editing. Erin Wright: Visualization, Investigation. Adam Lloyd: Supervision, Software (lead), Validation. Maria García-López: Writing — review & editing, Funding acquisition.

CRediT vs ICMJE authorship criteria

The International Committee of Medical Journal Editors' (ICMJE) Vancouver criteria define who qualifies as an author. CRediT defines what each author did. The two are complementary, not competing — and major medical journals (NEJM, Lancet, JAMA, BMJ) collect both.

Disclosing AI use

Generative AI tools (ChatGPT, Claude, Gemini, etc.) cannot be listed as CRediT contributors. They are not contributors — they are tools. Disclose AI use as a separate statement; see our AI-disclosure guidance.

Sample machine-readable encoding

JATS XML — author with CRediT roles

xml

<contrib contrib-type="author">
  <name><surname>Zhang</surname><given-names>San</given-names></name>
  <contrib-id contrib-id-type="orcid">0000-0001-2345-6789</contrib-id>
  <role vocab="credit" vocab-identifier="https://casrai.org/credit"
        vocab-term="Conceptualization"
        vocab-term-identifier="https://casrai.org/credit/roles/conceptualization"
        specific-use="lead"/>
  <role vocab="credit" vocab-identifier="https://casrai.org/credit"
        vocab-term="Methodology"
        vocab-term-identifier="https://casrai.org/credit/roles/methodology"/>
  <role vocab="credit" vocab-identifier="https://casrai.org/credit"
        vocab-term="Writing - original draft"
        vocab-term-identifier="https://casrai.org/credit/roles/writing-original-draft"/>
</contrib>

Writing a CRediT contributor statement