Your author note should not read like a junk drawer with a DOI sticker on it. When funding, conflicts, author contributions, ORCID iDs, acknowledgments, and contact details all seem to bump elbows, the APA 7 author note can feel oddly high-stakes. Today, this guide will help you decide what belongs where, how to phrase sensitive disclosures, and how to keep the note clear without sounding defensive. In about 15 minutes, you can turn a messy draft into a clean, journal-ready author note that serves readers, editors, and your future self.
Quick Answer: What Goes in an APA 7 Author Note?
In APA 7, an author note is usually used in professional papers, especially manuscripts intended for journal submission. It sits on the title page and gives readers key background about the authors and the paper.
The practical answer is simple: include only information that helps identify authors, clarify changes in affiliation, disclose support, acknowledge help, reveal possible bias, or tell readers whom to contact.
Here is the clean order many APA-style professional papers use:
- Author identification: ORCID iDs for authors who have them.
- Author changes: affiliation changes or author notes about current institutional location.
- Acknowledgments and disclosures: funding, grants, conflicts of interest, data sharing notes, author contributions, prior presentation, and thanks.
- Correspondence: name, mailing address or institutional address, and email for the corresponding author.
The third paragraph is where most writers spill coffee on the keyboard. Funding can overlap with conflicts. Contributions can overlap with acknowledgments. A student assistant can be thanked, but a coauthor contribution should not be hidden in a thank-you sentence. That is where the note needs careful sorting.
- Put author identity and affiliation details first.
- Put funding, conflicts, contributions, and acknowledgments together but clearly separated.
- End with the corresponding author’s contact information.
Apply in 60 seconds: Label each sentence in your draft as identity, affiliation, funding, conflict, contribution, thanks, or contact.
What “overlap” usually means
Overlap happens when one fact belongs to more than one disclosure bucket. A grant may have paid for the study and come from an organization with a stake in the findings. A sponsor may have funded data collection and reviewed a draft. A statistician may have analyzed data but not met authorship criteria. A lab director may have supervised the project, obtained funding, and approved the manuscript.
I once reviewed a manuscript where the author note said, “This project was supported by X Foundation. We thank X Foundation for feedback.” Tiny sentence. Large thundercloud. The funding note was fine, but “feedback” needed clarification. Did the funder edit language? Shape the research question? Approve publication? The author note had opened a door and left a raccoon wearing reading glasses inside.
Author note versus abstract versus acknowledgments
The abstract summarizes the study. The author note contextualizes the paper. The acknowledgments can live inside the author note for many APA-style manuscripts, but journal submission systems sometimes ask for disclosures in separate fields.
Do not fight the submission portal. If the journal asks for funding, conflicts, data availability, and author contributions in separate boxes, follow those instructions. Your title page author note can still remain consistent, but the journal’s rules win the final round.
Why Author Notes Get Messy When Disclosures Overlap
Author notes become messy because academic work is rarely as tidy as the final PDF pretends. People move institutions. Grants travel through departments. Sponsors want recognition. Journals ask for declarations. Coauthors remember one more assistant at 11:47 p.m. the night before submission.
The real problem is not that you have too much information. The problem is that each item answers a different reader question.
| Reader question | Author note item | Why it matters |
|---|---|---|
| Who wrote this? | ORCID iDs and author identity details | Prevents author confusion, especially with common names. |
| Where were they based? | Affiliations and affiliation changes | Clarifies institutional responsibility and author location. |
| Who paid for it? | Funding and grant numbers | Helps readers understand financial support. |
| Could anything bias it? | Conflict of interest statement | Protects transparency and trust. |
| Who did what? | Author contribution statement | Prevents credit fog and responsibility fog. |
| Who can answer questions? | Correspondence information | Gives readers a practical contact path. |
The “same fact, different duty” problem
Suppose a private education company funded a study on tutoring outcomes. That company also gave one author consulting income. The funding statement answers, “Who supported the project?” The conflict statement answers, “What relationship could appear to influence judgment?”
Do not merge them into one soft sentence. A marshmallow sentence may feel polite, but it can make editors nervous. Write one sentence for the funding. Write another sentence for the conflict. Small fence. Calm pasture.
How author contributions complicate the note
Author contributions matter because authorship is about credit and responsibility. The International Committee of Medical Journal Editors, often called ICMJE, is widely used in biomedical publishing for authorship and conflict guidance. Many journals also use CRediT taxonomy terms such as conceptualization, data curation, formal analysis, investigation, methodology, supervision, writing, and review.
APA 7 formatting tells you how to present the paper. It does not erase journal-specific ethics policies. If your target journal asks for a CRediT author statement, give it exactly where requested.
For related planning, you may also find this internal guide useful: Credit Author Statement: 7 Crucial Lessons. It pairs well with an author note because contribution clarity is the quiet hinge on the submission door.
The APA 7 Author Note Map: Four Paragraphs, One Clean Logic
The easiest way to write an APA 7 author note is to think in paragraphs rather than categories. Each paragraph has a job. When the job is clear, the note stops wandering around the page like a graduate student looking for a working stapler.
Visual Guide: The APA 7 Author Note Flow
Add ORCID iDs for authors who use them.
Explain current affiliations or changes since the work began.
State funding, conflicts, contributions, data notes, prior presentation, and thanks.
Give correspondence details for the author handling questions.
Paragraph 1: ORCID iDs
If authors have ORCID iDs, include them in the author note. ORCID helps distinguish researchers with similar names and connects publications across institutional moves.
A simple format is enough:
Example: Maria L. Chen https://orcid.org/0000-0002-0000-0000; Jordan P. Rivera https://orcid.org/0000-0003-0000-0000
If an author does not have an ORCID iD, do not invent one, do not use a lab profile, and do not paste a faculty webpage as a substitute. That is how formatting becomes folklore.
Paragraph 2: Changes in affiliation
Use this paragraph when an author moved after the work was conducted or when the current affiliation differs from the affiliation on the title page.
For example:
Example: Jordan P. Rivera is now at the Department of Psychology, Western Plains University.
This is especially useful for students who graduated, postdocs who moved, or researchers whose grant work happened at one institution but publication happened after a move. I have seen readers email the wrong department for months because nobody updated the author note. A tiny affiliation sentence can save everyone a slow-motion inbox opera.
Paragraph 3: Acknowledgments, funding, conflicts, and contributions
This is the paragraph with the most traffic. Treat it like a well-marked station, not a crowded hallway. Use distinct sentences for each disclosure type.
Possible order:
- Prior presentation or posting, if relevant.
- Funding and grant numbers.
- Role of funder, if the funder had any role.
- Conflict of interest statement.
- Author contribution statement, if needed or requested.
- Acknowledgments for nonauthor help.
- Data, materials, or code availability note, if journal policy allows it here.
This order keeps the money and influence questions close together. It also keeps genuine thanks from becoming a hiding place for authorship-level work.
Paragraph 4: Correspondence
End with the corresponding author’s contact information. Include the name and email, and include a mailing or institutional address if required by the journal.
Example: Correspondence concerning this article should be addressed to Maria L. Chen, Department of Psychology, Northlake University, 100 College Avenue, Madison, WI 53706. Email: mchen@example.edu
Show me the nerdy details
APA 7 author notes in professional papers often follow a structured order because each paragraph serves a separate metadata function. ORCID information improves author disambiguation. Affiliation notes document changes after the work. Disclosure sentences address transparency, funding, and perceived bias. Correspondence details support post-publication communication. The cleanest notes avoid stacking multiple duties into one sentence. If one sentence answers two accountability questions, split it.
Who This Is For / Not For
This guide is for writers who need a practical, publication-safe way to prepare an APA 7 author note when more than one disclosure issue is present.
This is for you if...
- You are preparing a professional paper in APA 7 style.
- You have funding to disclose and are unsure where to put it.
- You need to state conflicts of interest without sounding dramatic.
- Your target journal asks for author contributions, CRediT roles, or acknowledgments.
- You are a graduate student, postdoc, faculty author, research coordinator, or lab manager cleaning the title page before submission.
- You are trying to avoid awkward emails from editors asking for missing disclosures.
This is not for you if...
- Your instructor told you not to include an author note in a student paper.
- Your journal requires all disclosures only in a separate online submission form.
- You need legal advice about contracts, patents, employment disputes, or research misconduct claims.
- You are trying to hide a sponsor relationship. The paper may survive peer review, but your reputation may not enjoy the weather.
APA notes are partly formatting and partly academic hygiene. If the manuscript has serious authorship disagreement, undisclosed sponsor control, or institutional review problems, formatting is not the cure. It is only the envelope.
- Student papers often do not need author notes unless instructed.
- Professional manuscripts usually do need author notes.
- Journal instructions can add requirements beyond APA format.
Apply in 60 seconds: Open your target journal’s author instructions and search the page for “funding,” “conflict,” “contribution,” and “acknowledgment.”
Overlap Decision Table: Funding, Conflicts, Contributions, and Thanks
When details overlap, the safest move is to ask what each sentence is doing. Funding is not the same as conflict. Contribution is not the same as gratitude. Acknowledgment is not the same as authorship.
Use this decision table as a sorting tray.
| Situation | Put it under | Plain-English rule |
|---|---|---|
| A grant paid for participant recruitment. | Funding | Name the funder and grant number if available. |
| A funder helped design the study. | Funding role disclosure | Say what the funder did, not just that money existed. |
| An author receives consulting fees from the sponsor. | Conflict of interest | Disclose the relationship separately from the grant. |
| A research assistant collected data but did not qualify as an author. | Acknowledgment | Thank the person only with permission. |
| A coauthor analyzed data and wrote the methods. | Author contribution | Use contribution language, not a thank-you. |
| The paper was presented at a conference. | Prior presentation note | Name the meeting and date if relevant. |
| Data are available in a repository. | Data availability note | Follow the journal’s location and wording rules. |
Eligibility checklist: Does it belong in the author note?
Use this quick checklist before adding a sentence. If the item does not pass at least one line, it may belong elsewhere or nowhere.
Author Note Eligibility Checklist
- Does it identify an author or author identifier?
- Does it explain a current affiliation or change in affiliation?
- Does it disclose funding, grants, sponsor roles, or material support?
- Does it disclose a relationship that readers could reasonably see as a conflict?
- Does it clarify author contributions requested by the journal?
- Does it thank someone who helped but is not an author?
- Does it provide correspondence information?
- Does the journal specifically ask for it in the title page or author note?
Short Story: The Grant Sentence That Saved the Revision
A doctoral student once brought me a draft author note that looked innocent: “This work was supported by the ClearPath Learning Fund.” The paper studied school tutoring software. ClearPath, it turned out, had also provided discounted software access and had asked to review the manuscript for factual accuracy before submission. Nobody was trying to hide anything. The note was just too small for the truth it carried. We split it into three sentences: one for funding, one for donated access, and one stating the sponsor had no role in data analysis or publication decisions. The editor later asked only one minor clarification instead of sending a chilly disclosure query. The lesson was beautifully unglamorous: when a funding fact has three jobs, give it three sentences. Transparency rarely needs a trumpet. It needs clean shelves.
For related authorship planning, see Authorship Order Negotiation Scripts and The Contributor Agreement Checklist. Good author notes often begin long before the title page is formatted.
Sample Language Bank You Can Adapt
Good disclosure language is plain, specific, and unemotional. It should not sound like a confession booth or a press release. Think “clean window,” not “velvet curtain.”
Funding only, no conflict
This work was supported by the National Institute of Mental Health under Grant R01MH000000. The funder had no role in study design, data collection, data analysis, manuscript preparation, or the decision to submit the article for publication.
Use this when the funder truly had no role beyond financial support. If the funder did have a role, name the role.
Funding with sponsor involvement
This study was supported by the BrightStart Education Foundation. The foundation provided funding for participant recruitment and reviewed the manuscript for factual accuracy. The authors retained full control over data analysis, interpretation, and the decision to submit the manuscript for publication.
This version is useful because it avoids the foggy phrase “provided support.” Support can mean money, staff, software, data, review, or a mysterious fruit basket with institutional implications.
Conflict of interest, direct relationship
Maria L. Chen has received consulting fees from BrightStart Education Foundation. The other authors declare no conflicts of interest.
Use “declare” or “report” consistently. Some journals prefer one. If the relationship is not financial but could be perceived as relevant, say that clearly.
No conflict of interest
The authors declare no conflicts of interest.
Do not overdecorate this sentence. It does not need a tuxedo.
Author contributions in simple prose
Maria L. Chen contributed to conceptualization, methodology, formal analysis, and writing the original draft. Jordan P. Rivera contributed to investigation, data curation, and reviewing and editing the manuscript. Both authors approved the final manuscript.
This works for many small-team papers. For larger teams, a table may be clearer, but confirm whether the journal wants contributions in the author note, a separate statement, or submission metadata.
Acknowledging nonauthor help
The authors thank Priya Shah for assistance with participant scheduling and Devon Mills for feedback on the survey instructions. Neither individual received compensation beyond regular institutional employment.
Ask permission before naming someone in acknowledgments. Some people do not want their name attached to a paper, especially in sensitive topics. Consent is not just a research participant issue; it is also collegial manners with shoes on.
Prior presentation
Portions of this work were presented at the 2026 Annual Meeting of the American Educational Research Association, Denver, Colorado.
This helps editors and readers understand whether the work has appeared in another form. It is especially useful when abstracts, posters, or preprints exist.
Data and materials availability
Deidentified data and analysis code are available at the Open Science Framework repository listed in the article’s data availability statement.
Many journals prefer a separate data availability statement rather than placing this in the author note. If so, follow the journal. APA formatting is the suit; journal policy is the invitation.
A combined author note example
Author Note
Maria L. Chen https://orcid.org/0000-0002-0000-0000; Jordan P. Rivera https://orcid.org/0000-0003-0000-0000
Jordan P. Rivera is now at the Department of Psychology, Western Plains University.
This work was supported by the BrightStart Education Foundation. The foundation provided funding for participant recruitment and reviewed the manuscript for factual accuracy. The authors retained full control over data analysis, interpretation, and the decision to submit the manuscript for publication. Maria L. Chen has received consulting fees from BrightStart Education Foundation. Jordan P. Rivera declares no conflicts of interest. Maria L. Chen contributed to conceptualization, methodology, formal analysis, and writing the original draft. Jordan P. Rivera contributed to investigation, data curation, and reviewing and editing the manuscript. Both authors approved the final manuscript. The authors thank Priya Shah for assistance with participant scheduling.
Correspondence concerning this article should be addressed to Maria L. Chen, Department of Psychology, Northlake University, 100 College Avenue, Madison, WI 53706. Email: mchen@example.edu
- One sentence for funding.
- One sentence for funder role.
- One sentence for conflicts.
Apply in 60 seconds: If your author note has a sentence longer than 35 words, split it and see whether the meaning improves.
Risk Scorecard: When Your Note Needs Extra Care
Some author notes are low drama. “No funding. No conflicts. Correspondence to Dr. Kim.” Lovely. A clean little paper boat.
Others carry higher risk because they involve sponsors, financial relationships, patents, regulated products, human participants, clinical claims, institutional politics, or contested authorship. Use the scorecard below to decide whether your note needs another review before submission.
Author Note Risk Scorecard
| Risk cue | Score | What to do |
|---|---|---|
| Industry, product, app, device, or curriculum sponsor | 2 | State funding and sponsor role separately. |
| Author received consulting, honoraria, stock, royalties, or travel support | 3 | Add a conflict statement and check journal forms. |
| Sponsor reviewed or edited manuscript | 3 | Clarify what control authors retained. |
| Authorship order disagreement | 3 | Resolve before submission; do not bury it in wording. |
| Human participants, clinical outcomes, or protected data | 2 | Check IRB, consent, data sharing, and journal requirements. |
| Patent, licensing, or commercialization potential | 3 | Ask institutional research administration or legal counsel. |
How to read it: A total of 0–2 is usually routine. A total of 3–5 deserves careful review. A total of 6 or more deserves help from the journal instructions, senior author, research office, or ethics office before submission.
Mini calculator: Count your disclosure load
This simple self-check is not legal or ethics advice. It is a desk-lamp test. The brighter the number, the more careful your author note should be.
Disclosure Load Mini Calculator
Give yourself one point for each “yes.”
- Did any outside funder, sponsor, company, foundation, or agency support the work?
- Did any author have a financial, professional, advisory, or personal relationship that readers could see as relevant?
- Did anyone outside the author team influence design, analysis, interpretation, writing, or publication decisions?
0 points: Your note may be simple.
1 point: Write a clear disclosure sentence.
2 points: Separate funding from conflicts and clarify roles.
3 points: Review journal instructions carefully and consider asking an experienced colleague or research office before submission.
Safety and ethics disclaimer
This article is educational guidance for writing and formatting an APA-style author note. It is not legal advice, institutional policy advice, or a substitute for journal instructions. If funding agreements, employment contracts, patents, human-subject protections, or misconduct concerns are involved, ask the right office before submission.
The Federal Trade Commission is known for emphasizing clear disclosure in public-facing endorsement and advertising contexts. Academic publishing has its own norms, but the same moral weather applies: readers should not need a detective hat to understand material relationships.
For a nearby internal resource on research ethics, see Ethics of Co-Authorship and Collaboration. For data and reproducibility notes, Computational Environment Appendix can help when code, tools, and analysis settings need a home outside the author note.
Common Mistakes That Make Author Notes Look Sloppy
Most author note mistakes are not scandalous. They are small clouds of uncertainty. But small clouds can still delay a submission, especially when editors are sorting dozens of manuscripts before lunch.
Mistake 1: Hiding conflicts inside funding language
Bad version:
This work was supported by BrightStart Education Foundation, with which the first author has collaborated.
Better version:
This work was supported by BrightStart Education Foundation. Maria L. Chen has received consulting fees from BrightStart Education Foundation.
The better version does not whisper. It speaks at normal library volume.
Mistake 2: Thanking someone who should be an author
If someone made substantial scholarly contributions and meets the journal’s authorship criteria, do not solve the problem by thanking them. Acknowledgment is not a side door for authorship.
I once saw a draft thank a statistician for “designing the analytic strategy, running all models, interpreting findings, and revising the Results section.” That is not a thank-you note. That is a coauthor wearing a fake mustache.
Mistake 3: Forgetting permission for acknowledgments
Named acknowledgments can imply endorsement. Ask before naming people. This matters even for friendly colleagues, assistants, and institutional staff.
Mistake 4: Using vague sponsor language
“Supported by,” “assisted by,” and “in partnership with” can be too vague when sponsor influence matters. Explain the role.
Try this structure:
- Who provided support?
- What kind of support was provided?
- What role did the supporter have in design, data, writing, or submission?
- What control did the authors retain?
Mistake 5: Treating “no conflict” as optional
If the journal asks for a conflict statement, include one even when there are no conflicts. Silence can look like omission. A clean “The authors declare no conflicts of interest” is short and useful.
Mistake 6: Mixing APA format with journal-specific forms
APA 7 gives a title page pattern. Journals may require separate funding forms, disclosure forms, author contribution fields, data availability statements, ethics statements, or declarations. Complete both the manuscript text and the submission portal consistently.
Mistake 7: Overloading the author note with biography
The author note is not a mini CV. Do not include awards, keynote titles, book projects, or “Dr. Rivera is passionate about inclusive learning communities.” Save the violins for the faculty profile.
- Separate funding and conflicts.
- Do not use acknowledgments to avoid authorship decisions.
- Match the author note to the journal portal.
Apply in 60 seconds: Search your author note for “support,” “help,” “collaboration,” and “feedback,” then make each word more specific.
A 15-Minute Workflow Before Submission
Use this workflow when the title page is almost done and everyone is impatient. It is designed for the real world, where coauthors reply in fragments and the submission deadline has teeth.
Minute 1–3: Make a disclosure inventory
Write a quick list with five labels:
- Funding
- Funder role
- Conflicts
- Contributions
- Acknowledgments
Do not write polished prose yet. Just list facts. The draft can wear socks with sandals for three minutes.
Minute 4–6: Separate overlapping items
Circle any item that appears in more than one category. For example, if a foundation funded the project and reviewed the draft, it belongs in funding and funder role. If an author received money from the foundation, that belongs in conflicts.
Minute 7–10: Draft the author note paragraph
Use one sentence per issue. Keep the order steady: funding, funder role, conflicts, contributions, acknowledgments.
Quote-Prep List for Coauthors
Send coauthors these questions before finalizing the note:
- Do you have an ORCID iD you want included?
- Has your affiliation changed since the work was completed?
- Did any grant, contract, gift, or internal award support this work?
- Do you have any financial or nonfinancial relationship that could be perceived as relevant?
- Are the listed author contributions accurate?
- Do we have permission to name everyone in acknowledgments?
Minute 11–13: Check journal instructions
Search the journal’s author instructions for required disclosure locations. Some journals want author notes on the title page. Others want separate declarations after the manuscript text. Some want both.
If the journal uses ICMJE disclosure forms, complete them separately. If it asks for CRediT roles, use its preferred categories.
Minute 14–15: Read it like a skeptical reader
Ask four blunt questions:
- Can I tell who funded the work?
- Can I tell whether the funder influenced the work?
- Can I tell whether any author has a relevant relationship?
- Can I tell who did what and whom to contact?
If the answer is yes, the author note is doing its job. It does not need to sparkle. It needs to hold still.
Decision card: Use this when coauthors disagree
Decision Card: Where Should This Go?
If the fact is about money or material support: Put it in funding.
If the fact is about influence or perceived bias: Put it in conflicts or funder role.
If the fact is about scholarly labor by an author: Put it in author contributions.
If the fact is about help from a nonauthor: Put it in acknowledgments, with permission.
If the fact is about where an author works now: Put it in affiliation changes.
When to Seek Help Before You Submit
Most author notes can be handled by careful writers and coauthors. But some situations deserve a second set of eyes. Not the panicked kind. The “let’s prevent an avoidable mess” kind.
Ask the journal editor or editorial office when...
- The author instructions conflict with APA 7 examples.
- The submission system has separate fields that do not match your title page.
- You are unsure whether prior conference presentation or preprint posting must be disclosed.
- The journal uses a specific conflict form or contribution taxonomy.
Ask your institution when...
- A contract controls publication, sponsor review, or data ownership.
- A patent, license, or commercialization path is involved.
- Human participant protections, IRB terms, or consent language affect data sharing.
- A donor, company, agency, or foundation has conditions attached to support.
Ask senior coauthors when...
- Authorship order is unsettled.
- A contributor may deserve authorship rather than acknowledgment.
- The author contribution statement does not match actual work.
- Someone wants to minimize or remove a disclosure.
In one lab meeting, I watched a single phrase, “minor editorial comments,” turn into a 40-minute discussion because the sponsor had suggested interpretation changes. That meeting was uncomfortable. It was also useful. Better a prickly Tuesday than a published correction.
FAQ
Do student papers need an author note in APA 7?
Usually, no. Student papers in APA 7 typically do not include an author note unless the instructor, department, thesis office, or publication plan requires one. Professional papers intended for journal submission usually do include an author note. When in doubt, follow the assignment or journal instructions first.
Where does funding go in an APA 7 author note?
Funding usually goes in the author note paragraph that contains acknowledgments and disclosures. Include the funder’s name and grant number when available. If the funder had a role in design, data collection, analysis, writing, review, or publication decisions, state that role clearly in a separate sentence.
How do you write no conflict of interest in APA format?
A simple sentence is usually enough: “The authors declare no conflicts of interest.” If one author has a conflict and others do not, identify the author with the conflict and then state that the other authors declare no conflicts. Always check whether the journal wants specific wording.
Should author contributions go in the author note?
Sometimes. APA-style manuscripts may include author contribution information in the author note, but many journals require a separate author contribution statement or CRediT taxonomy entry during submission. Use the author note only if it fits the journal’s instructions. Keep contribution language specific and tied to actual work.
Can I thank a research assistant in the author note?
Yes, if the person helped but does not meet authorship criteria, and if you have permission to name them. Acknowledgments are appropriate for assistance such as scheduling, clerical support, technical help, feedback on materials, or limited data collection. Do not use acknowledgments to avoid giving authorship credit when authorship is deserved.
What if funding and conflict of interest are from the same organization?
Separate the two disclosures. One sentence should explain the funding or material support. Another sentence should explain the author’s relationship that could be perceived as a conflict. If the organization also influenced the study or manuscript, add a sentence describing that role and what control the authors retained.
Do I need to include ORCID iDs in the author note?
If authors have ORCID iDs and the paper is a professional manuscript, including them in the author note is common and useful. ORCID iDs help identify authors accurately, especially when names are similar or authors change institutions. Do not include unrelated profile links as substitutes.
What belongs in correspondence information?
Correspondence information usually includes the corresponding author’s name, department or institution, mailing or institutional address if required, and email address. The point is practical: readers, editors, and researchers need a reliable way to contact the person responsible for communication about the article.
Can the author note include data availability?
It can, but only if the journal allows or requests it there. Many journals prefer a separate data availability statement. If data, materials, or code are available in a repository, follow the journal’s preferred wording and location. Do not place sensitive or restricted data details casually in the author note.
What should I do if coauthors disagree about a disclosure?
Pause submission until the disagreement is resolved. Review the journal’s policy, funder terms, institutional rules, and authorship criteria. If needed, ask the corresponding author, department chair, research integrity office, or editorial office for guidance. A disclosure disagreement is not a formatting problem; it is an accountability problem.
Conclusion: Make the Note Boring in the Best Way
The author note felt messy at the start because funding, conflicts, and contributions often arrive braided together. The solution is not to make the prose fancy. The solution is to unbraid the facts.
Write one sentence for who funded the work. Write one sentence for what the funder did. Write one sentence for conflicts. Write one sentence for author contributions if needed. Thank nonauthors only with permission. End with correspondence details. That is the quiet craft.
Your concrete next step: in the next 15 minutes, open your current author note and label every sentence as ORCID, affiliation, funding, funder role, conflict, contribution, acknowledgment, data note, or correspondence. If a sentence has two labels, split it. The result may not sing, but it will stand upright. In academic publishing, that is often the loveliest music.
Last reviewed: 2026-05
