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How can I deal with students who are not interested in the class but the credits?
I had asked all of the students during introductory class why they were taking this particular course. And one of the students replied they were taking it for the credit hours. I found it disrespectful and chewed the student a bit in the class. And it might have impacted my grading for that student. What should be the proper reply to such an answer? Should I ask them to drop the course?

If your university has credits requirements, isn't it unavoidable that students will take some courses solely to comply with them rather than out of interest for the topic? This was surely the case for me and many people I know

I have to say, I'm a bit concerned that you "chewed the student a bit in class". Don't ask questions you don't want to hear the answer to ...

Also, in case this wasn't obvious, there are more students in your class who are in it only for the credit - they just have learned to not tell people in authority things they don't want to hear.

If I were the student you "chewed" in front of the rest of the class, I would be considering an academic complaint. Your Dean would certainly hear about it. As you reported it, this was distinctly unprofessional at best, and possibly serioius misconduct.

If you punish people for being honest, they will stop being honest with you. A useful lesson to learn, for teachers, managers and parents alike.

Please do not let it impact your grading for that student. You'll likely be committing serious academic misconduct by doing so, as you'll be having their grade affected by your opinion of them rather than their work.

What did you find disrespectful? That he had to take the class to graduate? Or that he told you a truth you didn't like? If the latter, would you have preferred he lied? Is that not disrespectful? Or were you just upset (which is understandable) and rationalizing it as being disrespectful?

Regarding "And it might have impacted my grading for that student.": That sounds like a potentially serious problem.  Additionally, this incident may suggest that there's a deeper, underlying problem to be addressed.

It does not matter why they took the course, if you are going to bully students in class and not mark their papers fairly, then you should rethink your career. Maybe ask the same thing to HR at your uni in the exact same wording if you want confirmation of that.

How can I deal with students who are not interested in the class but the credits? You treat them exactly like the other two.

Let me take a slightly more sympathetic approach to answering this, even if I do ultimately come to the same conclusion as others. I will then offer some concrete suggestions.
As someone who teaches a lot of compulsory classes that students really don't want to take, at least at first (yay, stats for biologists 101), let me start by saying I sympathise with the feeling when students don't want to be there.
Someone up-thread asked why you want to be a teacher. For most of us, we are absolutely in love with our subjects and have dedicated our lives to their pursuit. Many of us, even those that value or enjoy teaching, are, or at least started off as, primarily researchers. It’s more than just a dedication to the subject; it’s a dedication to the life of the mind - irrespective of its utilitarian consequences. We often, at least initially, value teaching as a way of allowing others the same access to the life of the mind as we had. Far from being more interested in our power over others, rather than education, it’s the exact opposite. We'd do away with grades if we could and are only interested in students coming and really learning.
It then seems to us that someone who is there for the credits is not interested in learning. They are just interested in getting a licence to get a job, and they'll do the learning to get it, they suppose, if they have to.
I have often felt like saying "If you're here for the credits, come to me at the end of the lecture, and you can have them, then we don't need to waste each other's time further".
Of course I shouldn't and don't ever do that. It would obviously be against university rules. But it would also be wrong. Apart from anything else, the student loses the opportunity to learn, even if they don't realise they wanted it.
As others have outlined, there are many reasons why a student might take your class without a preexisting interest in it. They might need the credits to continue with their degree - this isn't just about "getting a piece of paper"; they might not be able to learn about the things they do want to learn about without keeping their credits up. Also, making someone feel like they don't belong in a class is not a good way of creating a welcoming, safe feeling, productive learning environment for others in the class, let alone that student.
Over time I've come to realise that while I might have thought that there was something almost morally superior about learning for its own sake, that was my prejudice, and letting go of that is essential to your own happiness in your job. Because, surprise, you are going to have to deal with many students taking your class for credit, perhaps even the majority, over your career.
You have a chance now to make the student love your subject, or alternatively (like with my stats class), teaching them something they will only realise was important later.
In terms of grading. I actually don't see how perceived enthusiasm can't help but affect our grading when we are grading anything that isn't 100% objective, right or wrong answers. I might even go so far as to say that anyone who claims otherwise is fooling themselves. So good on you for identifying biases that might stay unconscious for other people.
However, acknowledging our biases is only any good if we act of this knowledge to counteract our biases. Perhaps just self knowledge is enough to reduce our bias, but I think probably not. This is why I think anonymous marking is important in summative assessment where possible. Many online marking systems will allow you to hide the identity of students until after all the marks are finalised. Or you can ask students to put their student ID on the paper, rather than their name.

While I agree with some of the things you said, I'm very concerned that OP @AliMustafa accepted your answer out of all because he chose to interpret your answer as an affirmation of his grading "policy". OP, please listen to all advice in this thread and not just the ones you like to hear; and realize that as a teacher, your responsibility is to grade the students fairly, and not based on some prejudgement you took up on the introductory class because a student gave an honest, realistic answer to you instead of some PR-like lie. Ian, I'd consider emphasizing this in your answer.

@Neinstein Virtually every class I took as an undergraduate included a "participation" component, which is a proxy for enthusiasm in all the ways that are of any importance, since by definition it favors students who engage with the material in ways that the instructor finds emotionally rewarding.  OP is simply being a little bit more "honest and realistic" about his emotional reaction to students than is typically the case with university instructors.

@tbrookside Neither of us are in OP's head, but I'm afraid about it's not only honestness and realism. Sure, instructors are human, not robots; but they should actively work on not letting these feelings impact the academic integrity of the course. The way OP asked this question - how it was stated as a natural consequence that he will negatively discriminate the student, and how he seems to think that firing them for their honest and (really not surprising) answer is a plausible and OP reaction, is very concerning for me and suggests this is more than just being open.

@tbrookside also - "participation" is not really "enthusiasm", it's more about engagement and activeness. And you really cannot decide on the final (subjective) "score" for participation based on a single (and honest) answer on the introductory lesson. This is not OK in any way.

@Neinstein No, I chose his answer because he proposed a solution, i.e., anonymous grading. I would have mentioned it when I picked it as an accepted answer, but I gave all of my rep as a bounty and couldn't even comment. The rest of the people have made excellent points, but they are primarily about shaking the instructor's conscience and are internal. There should be external mechanisms and checks rather than expecting the instructor to take the high moral grounds (which they should). But since we are fallible, finding solutions to our biases is better.

@AliMustafa Nice to hear. Sorry for my untrue concern then.

Good answer, especially the bit about happiness doing your job.  I've learned that you can't make a student interested in your subject, all you can do is encourage what they interest they bring with them.  In my subject (programming) it is pretty difficult to do well without being interested in what you are doing as thoughtful practice is so important.  I try to design my courses so that students can slog through to a pass, but it is not the easiest or most pleasant method!

As Alessandro Codenotti wrote in the comments, it's unavoidable that students will take courses solely to comply with credits requirements. It's also unavoidable that some people simply will not find your topic interesting. This doesn't mean they shouldn't take your course - the final exam presumably only tests the student's mastery of the material and not their passion for the subject. If they are not interested but can still learn the topic, that's more power to them and they deserve a good grade.
Since their motivation for taking the course isn't really relevant to you, commend them for their honesty and say you hope they'll learn something interesting from the course, then move on.

Upvote for "commend them for their honesty"

Being a student, to me this is the perfect answer! It's truly unfathomable to me how some teachers seemingly completely forget that they themselves too once were students and that such things are just unavoidable.

Precisely so. You're not there to win a popularity contest, you're there to teach people a specific syllabus.

@Valorum and they are there to learn, it is a partnership.  If they don't bring some interest with them, they are making their job more difficult rather than yours!

Your response to this is very toxic. If being honest in regards to the attendance of your courses results in hostility and possibly poorer grades, then nobody will continue to be honest with you in the future. I would hope that everyone recognizes that this is an inherently bad learning and teaching environment.
In addition, in this day and age, if your goal is to acquire a degree, you will have to chew through courses solely for their credit points. It is 100% inevitable. Should a student give up on their bachelor's or master's because you deem their reason for participating in your course not good enough? That is a ridiculous line of thinking and is out of touch with reality.
It is not your place to judge any students reason for participation. They are all adults and they chose this, and your job is to teach and help them pass your course. If they pass, it's because of merit and not because of some arbitrary reason you deem good enough.
As for the question in the title, those not interested in the course will helpfully sort themselves out by simply not interacting with you more than they need to.

in this day and age == since forever

This is a structural issue at many (probably most) institutions, and isn't the student's fault. They may have a specific goal but the institution requires them to take certain other courses. You've probably dealt with this in life as well in many places. Who enjoys spending a day at the passport office? Should the passport official turn you away because you admit that you are willing to fill out a form but don't enjoy it? Of course not!
What you can do is teach the course so well that the student realizes its importance, relevance, or just how fun it can be! Do your job!

One of the reasons for encouraging students to take courses they might not have otherwise is that they may learn something anyways, or find an interest they did not know they had, thanks to instructors who are passionate about their topics and convey this to their students.

This isn't an issue, but a feature of the US system, at least.

@BryanKrause - One of the other reasons, though, is that while "teaching a person to do a thing" cannot possibly take a remarkably equal 4 years for so many occupations, it can if you sufficiently pad it out with required courses, which means every student pays the universe the same hefty sum, regardless of how long it might have really taken them to learn an occupation. In my opinion, it is basically just a scam by universities at this point.

@JamieB 4 year universities are not job-training programs.

I'll have to support @BryanKrause on his point of "finding an interest". I experienced this first hand in university and even wrote my diploma thesis on this topic, even though I couldn't fathom what it was good for and even failed an important exam in it at first.

My university (as many in Poland still do, I suppose) didn't have something like choosing classes. You chose your programme, which later split into several tracks, and that's it. For some reason as CS students we had a single electronics and metrology class, taught by two professors. Attendance in the lectures was around ~2%, the professors still took it in good humor, being aware of the realities of ours system. Hell, they even made it relatively easy to pass, aware that we are forced and almost none of the students have any interest in it...

Funnily enough, I ended up working as an embedded developer after failing that class, and retook it flying through the labs since I have learned the stuff OJT.

@jaskij similar for the US. Every degree has what we call a "catalog" that spells out how to qualify for a degree. There are classes you absolutely have to take (ex: Computer Engineering students have to take calculus & physics), there are groups of classes you have to select from (ex: you have to take some humanities credits but you can choose a history class or a social science class) and then maybe you have to take one or more credits in a more general group of classes (for example, you could choose either a kinesiology course or a psychology course)

So true!  I took a linguistics course because I was obliged to take enough gen ed credits to graduate, and it looked like the path of least resistance.  Turned out that the topic and teachers made that course one of the most fun courses I took in all of college!  I still find little ways to sneak what I learned there into my daily life.

@jaskij What I find in mandated classes is that the classes are dumbed down, for the benefit of the uninterested students, to the point where no one can find any joy in them.

@BryanKrause It has been conducive and enlightening for me to read the answers and suggestions of fellow academics. Since you are a moderator, I would like to ask whether it is possible for you to delete the question?

@AliMustafa Q&A here are meant to be for the benefit of more than just the original asker, and a lot of other people have put effort into answers, and it's not fair to them to delete their work.

@BryanKrause Understandable. But there should be some logic on the site where if a question does not have answers, then the user can delete it (the site already allows this), and if the question has answers and effort from the community, then the user has the option to retract the question. This retraction means that the user name of the asker will be concealed or replaced with just "Anonymous" or "Stack Overflow" since SO owns the questions and the answers (I am not aware if the site allows this).

@AliMustafa The content license here requires SE to honor requests to dissociate your name from a post. However, note that there are some consequences, that this is permanent, and that it really should be used sparingly. For details and how to request dissociation see https://meta.stackexchange.com/q/96732

@AliMustafa you could delete your account as a measure of last resort

@moonman239 PasserBy in our system (at least ten years ago) all classes are mandated, period. The only choice you have is choosing one of several tracks, which can be compared to subfields I believe. But the classes for the degree and the track are preset by the department. No catalogue or anything.

You don't.
This is unavoidable. If the system requires the students to collect X credits, but they are only interested in courses totaling Y < X credits, they will take X - Y worth of courses solely to get the credits.
There is nothing wrong with this. The student will take courses they wouldn't choose on their own, which will expand their knowledge in other directions than their main interest. They may find it more interesting than they initially thought, and focus on the topic more in the future.

And it might have impacted my grading for that student. [...] Should I ask them to drop the course?

I find this statement very concerning. You openly admit to have a big negative bias on the student as if it was a natural thing. It is not. Not only is it a serious misconduct, but it is totally uncalled for. The reason for the student taking the course is totally irrelevant for their grades, and does not reflect their work at all. Frankly, this have been the introductory lesson, and you are already deciding on lowering their grades. Please, grade the students fairly, based on their performance, and not on your prejudgement.
Depending on the way you "chewed" the student, I would also be concerned about the student sensing your negative bias. This could reflect on your student ratings and may also reach the dean as a complaint if the student feels discriminated or harassed. The other students may also be repelled by your reaction. I'd suggest that you may want to sort this out.

OK, I was sort of in the students' shoes at one point in my life and I believe the correct spin on the matter is "You guys took this for credit? Good, because that's all the more people I can convert to having the same love of the subject that I do".
I mean, let's be real, cultivating interest is the main point of having a lecturer. If a person is determined enough, then they could most likely learn any subject from any field by themselves using public resources.

And if you don't convert them, then be satisfied that you've at least introduced them into a subject you love and let them be into their personal subject of interest.

I will not repeat the numerous excellent points in other comments (in brief, it is not the student's fault for being honest that they are required to take some courses that they are not required to take), but I will add one point to answer your question of what you should do.
After chewing out a student in the class for such a reason, the responsible thing for you to do would be to follow up with an apology in front of the same class for humiliating the student for no good reason. Such an apology would probably greatly improve all of your students' perception of you (which you have probably severely damaged, whether you realize it or not) and would also greatly help you to become objective and fair in grading the student whom you had chewed out.

Very good point.  If the student had an Autistic Spectrum Disorder (ASD) they may be likely to give very honest answers to direct questions and not pick up on any subtext or "social" aspects to questions.  "chewing out" such a student for an honest answer to a direct question could be the basis of a very serious academic complaint.  This may be more of an issue for some subjects that others, but it is worth considering the SPLDs or other issues that may affect students in your class.

I think you should first figure out the following:

Why are you a teacher? Do you teach because you want to help people learn, do you teach beause you want to have a sense of authority and this was the simplest way to get there, etc?
What are the policies of my institution? For example, does our college only teach to people that say publicly they want to be there. If the answer is No, as it should be, you're in violation.
Are you the kind of person that takes offense easily?
Do you need to discuss with the student further, maybe involve their advisor and figure out a way for the student to take classes that they are interested in - which might not be possible.

I agree with where you're coming from, but I think you should add why you think these questions should be asked - what did OP do wrong, what makes it appear OP just wants to excercise power above the student, why may they be easily offended - because without such comments the answer could come off as passive-agressive and offensive, making OP miss the whole point.

You're not wrong, but don't forget that for many academics, the only reason they are teachers is because they are forced to and have no choice but to teach classes if they want to be able to do their research. It's a stupid system that forces bad teachers on students and wastes the time of researchers, but it's the system we have. I used to love both teaching and research but most researchers I know would be ecstatic if they could do their research without needing to teach (undergraduate, at least) courses.

Consider the various service and administrative requirements at your school that are part of your job. For example: serving on a committee, writing reports, submitting grades, undergoing mandatory training (harassment, workplace bullying), vaccination requirement, etc. Whatever.
Now, let's say for the various tasks in this vein that are required of you, an administrator showed up and asked, "Why exactly are you [serving on this committee/writing this report/etc.]?"
And if you responded with "Because it's required for my job" instead of, "Because it's so inherently exciting!", then the administrator suggested that this was disrespectful and that you should be fired, how would you feel about that?
You should treat the student the same way you think you should be treated in this analogous situation.

There is a very good text about the systemic reasons which force students to attend to classes which they are not interested in. It is called No cops in the lecture hall: cheating and what (not) to do about it and you can find it here. I always wanted more people to read the text, and this is a good opportunity because it fits perfectly.
It is not your job to morally police your students, which are grown up people and know what is good for them and what not. People are interested and motivated if they have the freedom to do what makes sense for them in their situation, and when they are not forced by external pressures. You do not know the situation of your students.
Edit: Since I was asked to, I will try to summarize the argument of the essay in my own words. But be aware that the argument lives from the long explanation, the personal experience and the examples given in the text, which are hopefully relatable to any reader who has gone through school and university.
We do, as a matter of fact, live in a capitalistic society. As a consequence people in all countries of the world, even in the more wealthy countries, do not have a right to live, eat and be healthy per default. Instead they must either work, or they must be rich to begin with. For example in Germany (which is the country where I live), even though the state will prevent you from starving if you are unemployed, the money you get is by no means enough to live in dignity and it doesn't allow you to be an active part of society. In most countries of the world poor and unemployed people have it significantly worse. In the US the only good way to access health care is employment, and the state doesn't do very much to prevent homelessness (correct me in the comments if I am wrong).
On the other hand a school education and often also a university degree is often necessary or extremely useful if you like to get employed. Especially mathematics is an integral part of many degrees, and students have to pass their mathematics exams in order to have a reasonable chances for a well-paid job. (I am thinking about programmers for example.) It is thus not surprising that students will sit in courses (and even whole programs) in which they are not interested in to begin with, and which they only attend for the credits. It would be weird to blame them for it, since wanting a good job, a secure future and a life in dignity is a very good reason to go through higher education. Studying just for the sake of it is a privilege of the wealthy. Of course at some point (be it a PhD or a postdoc) you can expect people to do it because of their interest in the subject, but a mathematics undergraduate degree (or worse, mathematic lectures for non-mathematician) is way to early in my opinion. Here are the facts:

The language of mathematics, as practiced as a professional discipline,
is esoteric and inaccessible to an overwhelming majority of people. (Cited from the essay)

People who do not perform conventionally well on mathematical assessments are often shut out from opportunities to secure the basic essentials
for life (for example, being hired for a job, even if the job has little or
nothing to do with what one might see in a mathematics course). (Also copied from the essay)

As a consequence people will go to mathematics courses not because they like them, but because they need to do them. And they will cheat if they do not have the resources or abilities to complete the course with good or reasonable grades. I understand that this goes against the grain of a teacher, who really likes their subject and wants to share their excitement about it with their students. You can do that anyway: Make the requirements to pass the course as low as you can (without getting into trouble). Allow your students to engage with you and your material independently from grades and course requirements. Those who are interested will engage with you and be happy to learn, and those who can not or don't want to won't learn a lot anyway if you force feed them. Their is no reason to think less of them. They will have very good reasons why they sit in your course, and they will put effort into those things in their life which are most important to them in their current situation. You are doing no harm whatsoever if you let students pass and give them good grades even if they do not engage actively with your course material. And what you really shouldn't do is punish them for a situation, which isn't their fault. After all, is it the job of a university to teach mathematics and do research together, or is it the job of a university to gatekeep and decide who is worthy of employment, success and a good life?

Thanks for this excellent contribution!  I mourn that you are being downvoted for sharing this view.

@DanielR.Collins I have :)

Thank you for expanding on the linked article. However, the conclusion that one should "let students pass" in any case is catastrophic in a scaffolded multi-course sequence, and can result in harmful or even deadly consequences for professionals working in medical, engineering, etc. fields.

@DanielR.Collins There is of course no principle which applies to all case at once. Of course there are situation where it is important to test that a person knows their stuff, for example medicine and engineering, as you said. I also wouldn't like people to get drivers licences without a test. However most of the exams that I have written in my life haven't been of this type!

@DanielR.Collins Also we do not ask PhD students to write 3 exams every semester, and their work can certainly be safety critical too.

Not only will there inevitably be students who aren't really that interested in your class, it is quite likely that at some point you will have to teach a class that you are not really that interested in. Unless you're in a very privileged position, everyone has to teach entry-level courses some time and after a few repetitions of the same material it gets old. Or you have to pick up someone else's class because they got sick at the last minute and it's not really your area, or you just have other stuff in your life that you would rather be doing at that exact moment.
Would you rather have students appreciate that you are still doing a good job of teaching even if there are maybe other things you would rather be doing, or would you have them deem it unacceptable that it wasn't your very favorite thing even if you still do a good job of teaching?

I'll add to the other answers that, depending on how dramatic the actual incident was, you might consider saying in class that your question and response to the answers were a bit out of line.  The targeted student and others might appreciate it, and it might help you get back any respect you might have lost.  If it wasn't a big deal in the classroom, you should probably not do this.

I guess the fundamental issue is whether your course is filtering, or is educating/exposing students. If you are required to give a sufficient number of bad grades, etc., then, really, I don't see any truly educational content in the issue.
Yes, the more delicate, interesting, and important issue is about classes that kids have been coerced, one way or another, to take. Ideally, yes, the course is "good for them". But they will often have heard gossip in advance, and be somewhat hostile, or, at best, indifferent. Even in my graduate courses, often a large fraction of the people have imbibed a skeptical, if not hostile, attitude. So I view my job as two-fold: explaining the why, in addition to the what, ... and maybe, further, saying that, yeah, of course, I do trust their sensibilities, and that I'm not here to attempt to beat them down by trying to invalidate their own judgement. :)
Occasional snide comments about Central Administration do tend to suggest that we're all on the same side. :)  Seriously, I do want to communicate to the students (undergrads or grads) that I am not "tool of the administration", or any such thing.
In that context, for people who've shown up "just needing credits", I take it as a challenge to tweak them, getting them "sucked into" engaging with the topics. That kind of thing. And, if they don't, well, I can't begrudge them that, and I won't disparage them, although I might give them advice.

In your situation, here is what I might say.
Good morning, students! If you remember, yesterday I asked why you were here, and one of you said "just for the credits", and I said some pretty harsh things in reply. I've had some time to think about what I said, and why. And the first thing I want to do is to say sorry, without any reservations at all, to [insert student's name]. And I'd like to say a bit about why.
Let's imagine something together. Imagine if I said right now, "I will keep teaching this course, but from now on, none of it is for credit. I will deliver my lectures, but the university won't officially count it as attendance. I will set you assignments and mark them, but the marks will not count towards any final grade. And you will sit your final exams, but the grade will not appear on your transcript. You will have to find another course to fill out the credits you need."
If I really meant that, I'd expect very few of you would turn up to my next lecture. I'd expect some of you to walk out right now!
But what this demonstrates is that all of you are here for the credits. Of course, some of you are also here because you are deeply passionate about standard deviations and F-tests. Some of you are here because you really want to be here. But all of you are here because you need to be here.
Indeed, I too am here because I need to be here. I love stats. I love teaching you all about stats. But if the university told me tomorrow that I was now going to do it for free, that I would no longer be paid, I too would walk out of class. I am here teaching you statistics for the cash, just as you are here learning statistics for the credits.
Is there anything wrong with that?
Well, for starters, there is a little voice in my head right now saying, "No! No! Students should be here purely for the love of the subject! It's a shame if they're only here because they need to be!" But my reply is that over the course of life all of us do many things mostly because we need to. We should not be ashamed of that! Interestingly, the people who can devote their energies purely to what they want to do are usually people who somehow have extra time and money to meet their basic needs. They also happen to be people with extra time and money to shape culture and tell others what is right and wrong. It is a mighty suspicious coincidence that they end up glorifying 'doing what you want to do' and putting down 'doing what you need to do', isn't it?
But here is my other fear. I would feel very sad if you felt, week in, week out, that dragging yourself to my class was an unenjoyable chore. Just because you need to be here doesn't mean it has to be a terrible time! In fact, because you need to be here, it is my job to make sure that, at least some of the time, you want to be here! And the wonderful thing is that as humans, we are wired to love learning new things, both because we crave novelty and we enjoy the feeling of a good logical puzzle clicking together. If I am doing my job well -- if I am showing you that the statistical tools in this course are sensible, useful, and vital for modern life -- then I am sure we will have many wonderful 'aha!' moments together, and you will enjoy coming here.
So, please come along with me on this journey. I will do my best to teach, and I hope you will do your best to learn, and together let's do our best to explore the wonderful world of statistics. Precisely because we need to be here, let's make it a joy to be here. You've come here for the credits. I've come here for my paycheck. But let's see if we can come away with a love of statistics.


text:
May a non-student person working in a research university lab that hosts PhD students refuse to teach PhD students how to do lab work without more $?
May a person whose job title isn't instructor of labs/instructor of PhD students/lab-assistant and who is working full-time (non-student) in a research university lab under a professor who recruits PhD students refuse to teach their boss's PhD students how to do lab work or ask for additional pay if they were to ask them to be a surrogate instructor?
If there's no pay, it's not part of the contract, there won't be any recognition, and for all they know the PhD student might lie to the professor that they know everything, didn't need to be taught, and knows more on how to do lab/bench-work than the expert who works there full time in the lab not as a student, takes credit for a protocol they did not invent, puts it into a PhD thesis without acknowledgement, etc.

It's hard to answer hypotheticals like this, and what's "allowed" probably comes down to contracts / policies. I suggest you think about what you actually want to know, and rephrase the question. Also, you might want to specify what part of the world you are in.

"the PhD student might lie to the professor that they know everything", probably not, since you're also reporting what you've done, including teaching this PhD student, to the professor. Right?

If you happen to be in Germany (I don't know if your username means that) the public service contracts specify that the employer can give you other tasks compatible with your pay grade. I mean, at least the state of Bayern even forced researchers and PhD students to stop their research work and do contact tracing for covid when the state decided that the employees in the health authorities  were not enough for the task...

@JochenGlueck - I'm not sure about contact tracing, but we had huge numbers of volenteers to do covid related things at the university I work at in the UK - some of my dodgy code is still part of a testing lab's software stack.

Other answers and comments here have discussed whether your contract specifies training, or more unspecific things like "relevant duties". Bottom line, though, is if they want you to spend time training students, and your contract says they can require you to, that will take away time from your actual lab tasks (assuming you don't work longer, which definitely should trigger higher payments). Do your bosses want that? You would have to ask them.

Are you wanting to avoid training students in lab work because you don't want to/don't like doing it, or because it uses time you need for other duties and you're worried that a slowdown there will be looked upon badly? More generally, what aim are you trying to achieve by avoiding doing this teaching work?

Of course you can always refuse to do so, and legally you may or may not be in the clear (as Anonymous Physicist says, you would need to check your work contract carefully, and particularly check if there is wording related to "other duties" if it does not mention training explicitly).
However, refusing to train others and/or refusing to cooperate with others on grounds of your job not being an "instructor" is a seriously career limiting move, pretty much independently of where you work. In a scientific lab this may even more be the case, since many labs do have a fairly clear expectation that providing practical training to research students is, in fact, a key element of permanent research staff's job.
My impression is that there are deeper issues that you should try to resolve instead. Is the lab hiring students with too little practical knowledge, so that training consumes too much of your work time? Would you expect more acknowledgement for your own contributions to the student's research? Do you feel underpaid for what you do in practice? It's probably more constructive and practical to focus on these questions rather than straight-out stopping to help others in the lab.

As an aside, my answer would be different if this was about teaching formal classes or providing undergraduate courses. These are very different activities which you can and should indeed refuse to do unless your contract explicitly covers undergraduate teaching. However, helping research students (who are after all your colleagues in the lab) one-on-one is, at least in my mind, a very different story.

I'll give you an example. The university hires me because they need me to create some software. In the UK, with the amounts of money that universities can pay, I'd have to work extremely cheap and do them a huge favour. In that situation, if you try to make me do things that I don't want to do, and you convince me to leave and go back to making proper money, that "career limiting" move is yours.

@gnasher729 That's neither here nor there. If you don't like your job or perceive it as severely underpaid you can always leave and get a different job. That doesn't change that if you want to remain and progress at the university refusing to do something that many people would consider a natural part of the job isn't going to help you.

@gnasher729 That said, I don't disagree with you - staff engineers, and generally all non-faculty staff, tend to get underpaid at universities, to the extent that it is hard to find and keep good people. But that doesn't change the answer to the question.

it's not part of the contract

You can legally refuse to do anything that is not required by a contract or the law.  Be careful, as some contracts require unspecified "other duties" or permit termination for "no reason."
Depending on your contract and local law, you "may" refuse, but you should not.  Teaching useful skills is the right thing to do; that includes teaching the skill of honesty and the skill of giving credit where it is due.
You should certainly be paid for your teaching efforts.

Almost all contracts to work in an academic lab I've ever seen have some specific clause that can be interpreted as helping others in the lab, and i've NEVER seen a job description that doesn't include "and all other reasonable requests for your line manager".

Minor quibble with the last paragraph: why should the OP be paid extra for doing that? They're being paid a salary already. If their boss wants them to spend some of the hours that they would be working anyway training people instead of doing lab work, I don't see why the OP is entitled to more money based purely on that.

@EJoshuaS-StandwithUkraine If they prefer not to do something that's outside of their job description, but would be willing to do it with a pay rise, then it's better for everyone - and more honest - if they say "yes, but only if you pay me more" instead of just saying "no". Having such a preference is not a matter of entitlement, although they may also actually be entitled to a pay rise if they take on new duties that they could be paid more to do elsewhere - the employer isn't entitled to hire someone to do easy work on a low salary, and then give them harder work and no raise.

Still, the OP said in their question "If there's no pay..." There literally  is pay: their salary.

You can also legally refuse to do something that's in your contract, giving you employer the ability to legally fire you.  This seems like more than a legal issue

@ScottSeidman The consequences of breaching a contract can, potentially, be worse than firing.

This will depend a little bit on your contract and/or whether you live in a jurisdiction with at-will employment. If you do live in such a jurisdiction and your contract doesn't say otherwise, you would be perfectly free to refuse to do that and they would be perfectly free to fire you for your refusal.
That being said, whether you're technically required to or not, refusing to do this is a very fast way to alienate your boss and co-workers. No one like people who refuse requests that they perceive as reasonable because "it's not my job."
My job title has nothing to do with teaching, but it's generally expected that I'll conduct training and knowledge transfer as required, and that I'll make myself available to answer questions from other staff members.
Also, unless you're being asked to work unpaid overtime, you're paid the same way either way.

Who does that person refuse to? If the person responsible for your employment asks you to do something, you will very likely do it. (In this case, there would be an exception if teaching those PhD students required some official qualification that isn't there, or if someone asks you to teach people how to interact with 110kVolt power lines, or if the person has been sexually harassed by the PhD student and similar).
If a PhD student asks for help, they are not in any position to give you orders unless orders have come earlier from a different place. Especially if you don't have the time because you have another job to do, and if their behaviour is such that you don't do it because you are nice.
If the PhD student lies about what they have been shown, or what they have been taught, or not, that PhD student very likely is putting themselves into a totally untenable situation.

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Should I admit to accidentally cheating on an exam?
Like most students and professors during the pandemic, I attended my classes online for over a year.  The online lectures weren't mandatory, and I stopped attending after the first day and relied on my readings to guide me.
During our first test, the class had a practice test that if completed (right or wrong) added points to your overall grade. I did so and finished my test.
Now, here is where the issue occurs. I had no problem with the material on test one but needed more help with understanding the material for exam 2. Before exam 2, I hired a tutor to explain to me the areas that I needed help with, with practice test 2 (which wasn’t against the academic policy) before taking the actual exam.
This is where I messed up. I met with the tutor and went over the practice exam. Well, unfortunately for me, the practice exam that I thought I was taking was the actual exam. Apparently, there was only a practice exam for exam 1 and not exam 2 or any other following exam (there was no password needed to take the exam).
I should have doubled checked that I wasn't taking the actual exam and if there was a practice exam.
Should I confess to the professor?

I am a bit confused about this, I never known a uni to release the questions like this, if that really happened then I would imagine the majority of your class would have done something similar, so you should be asking is it morally right for most your class to have done something like that and only you getting penalised for it? It is the responsibility of the university to ensure exams are invigilated properly.

I heavily edited your question to remove the parts where you go through self-flagellation and (in my opinion) irrelevant information. Feel free to revert if I went with a too-heavy hand.

When did this happen? In the last few weeks? Spring semester? A year or two ago?

Please don't remove the content of your question when you find an answer. Other people read this site in the future, and the answers will make no sense with the question edited this way. "Thank you" can be said in comments—and, really, by accepting the best answer.

Where I'm from there's often no such thing as a practice exam. You sometimes practice with actual exams from previous years. It would be the professor's mistake if the real exam was "out there". Any exam that's public is material that is free for you to study. The professor should never reuse the same exam verbatim. Are you even sure if it was exactly the same exam? Maybe they were just very similar.

@moo The OP is not in control of what the university does. They are in control of their own actions. So I think whether it is morally right to confess is indeed the right question.

@MichalMior if something has been accidentally exploited you can guarantee other people have deliberately exploited it. Not recognising the fault lies with the university and blaming the student is not a good approach. It is morally correct regardless if the OP mentions it or not, I don't remember seeing any exam questions without being in a room with multiple invigilators. This is like getting in a car for a driving lesson and you finish the lesson and finding out it was a test, would the student be at fault then too if they had help without knowing? Why should people take blame for others.

If it was accidental, then it wasn’t cheating (edit: see the comments at the bottom for a clarification of what I meant and why I stand by this statement). The only wrongdoing I can think of that you might be legitimately accused for is not bringing this to the attention of the professor immediately after you discovered the issue (or soon after, as opposed to letting the matter slide for more than a year) — that is indeed not appropriate and likely to be seen as dishonest.
But as they say, better later than never. If you confess, it’s unimaginable to me that you would be kicked out of the university, especially if your confession comes with a suggestion for how to make amends for what happened. The most logical thing is to offer to retake the exam in an honest way and be assigned a new grade based on how well you do in it. If I were your professor, I would welcome seeing a student demonstrate this kind of personal growth, and would be happy to help make things right.
I can’t say if you should confess or not. But as a general rule, I am of the view that it’s good to live one’s life in a way that one can sleep well at night. Good luck!

Edit: I see some people in the comments are disagreeing with my basic premise that “if it was accidental, it wasn’t cheating”. I think this disagreement is based on one of two possible misconceptions, so let me address those:

You might be conflating between some behavior being cheating and that behavior appearing to be cheating to people on the outside who do not know the state of mind of the person committing the action.
In the law, most crimes require a guilty state of mind as a necessary element for a person to be considered guilty of the crime. This isn’t universal, and some crimes explicitly don’t require this element, but nonetheless a guilty mindset is a basic principle that underlies most legal systems and the ethical theories the legal systems are based on. So the same issue would be relevant to a question of whether someone cheated on an exam.
For an illustration of the distinction between actually being guilty of something and only appearing to be guilty (or actually being innocent and only appearing to be innocent), see this answer.

You might have understood that I’m claiming that OP didn’t behave dishonestly at all. No, I’m not saying that; what I’m saying is that the act of accidentally taking the exam using improper help was not cheating. The aftermath of that event, in which OP didn’t report to the professor the accidental violation of the exam rules and allowed their course grade to benefit from the violation, was in fact dishonest, and could reasonably be described as cheating. But that part consisted of action (or, rather, inaction) that was intentional, not accidental.
The fact that actual dishonesty did take place is likely why OP feels anguished and is thinking about confessing. If my position was that no dishonesty had occurred, I would not recommend confessing, as there wouldn’t be anything to confess.

If the mental anguish of the OP is leading them to be more careful, then that is sufficient.

@Buffy well, not everyone likes to live in a permanent state of mental anguish, even if it has some positive effects. Anyway, as I said I’m not taking sides on the question of whether OP should confess. I’m not Dostoevsky, only a guy with some knowledge about academia.

"not Dostoevsky", just a distant relative. amiright?

“If it was accidental, then it wasn’t cheating” — strong disagree. There’s no doubt OP made a mistake, and I’m not going to make a call on whether they should confess or not. But for a non-online analogy, if I take an exam in class and use my text book to help me answer the questions then that’s cheating, regardless of whether I knew or not. Your argument opens the door to all kinds of “I was never told I wasn’t allowed to use my text book!” arguments. OP even said they weren’t much in touch with the lecturer.

@MacRance that’s a good analogy. Using a textbook because you didn’t know you weren’t allowed to wouldn’t be cheating either. Of course, you’d have to have a pretty convincing explanation of how you failed to possess such important knowledge if you expect your claim to be believed, considering that in normal circumstances this is announced to the class multiple times ahead of the exam, and is written at the top of the exam, along with “Read all the instructions carefully”.

@DanRomik I completely agree with you. Especially on the fact that you’d need a “pretty convincing explanation for failing to possess such knowledge”.

@MacRance see the edit where I address your critique more in depth.

In principle, I don’t think “they [the OP] didn’t know” gives them a pass. For example, if the grading was done on a curve, it seems clear that the ethical thing to do is for the OP to admit to their advantage and retake the test. Sure — even if their performance on the second test were to change the curve — it’s unlikely other students’ test/course grades would be updated; but in a situation where each student’s performance is estimated relative to their peers, it seems unethical to not come forward. Of course, if the class is long over, it’s probably best to learn the lesson and move on.

IMO, the major difference between OP's case and @MacRance's example above is that MacRance does not (hypothetically) claim to have somehow used the textbook accidentally — they merely claim ignorance of the rules. This would be similar to the OP claiming that they knew they were taking the real exam, but not that having someone assist them with it was forbidden. But what the OP claims is that they (somehow) mistook the real exam for a practice exam. That's claiming ignorance of the facts of the situation, not of the rules.

It seems relevant that OP reported (in a comment that unfortunately appears to have been deleted) "I always explained my thought process [to the tutor] ... and only used my answers (even if they were wrong)" (my emphasis). I interpret this to mean everything submitted as an exam answer was OP's own work, and the tutor's intervention pointing out mistakes was effectively after the fact and without effect as to the exam submission. This suggests that ultimately the rules weren't broken, making moot the question of intention and the distinction between ignorance of facts versus rules.

To the extent that what you've described is cheating, it was the wrong thing to do. However, whether what you've described is, in fact, cheating in the first place isn't entirely clear. Moreover, as with most moral questions, beyond being simply a matter of right vs. wrong, this is a matter of degree.
Was this cheating at all? As you tell it, you had no intention to cheat. Does one need to intend to cheat to do so? Perhaps not, but the phrase "accidentally cheating" in your question's title strikes me as a contradiction, which suggests that there may need to be some premeditation required for an act to be one of cheating.
You elaborate on what happened with your tutor in some of your comments to other answers:

I always explained my thought process with each problem and only used my answers (even if they were wrong) ...
If I was wrong, the tutor would show me where I went wrong to help me learn.

Presuming you didn't change your submitted answers after the tutor pointed out where you went wrong, your answers would appear to be entirely your own. To me, this indicates no cheating was involved.
But again, even if this was cheating, it was limited in its effect. If this was a midterm or final exam worth a significant portion (e.g., >30%) of your total course grade, that would be one thing, but it sounds like that isn't the case. You mention neither this nor "any other following exam" had practice versions, suggesting more than one followed the one in question, and I think we can safely assume you didn't make this mistake again for any of those.
In other words, you sought help by having someone explain why your own answers on a single exam were incorrect. (Frankly, I'm unconvinced that even rises to the level of transgression, but...) Recognizing you may have made an error, you avoided doing so in the future. And your error, if it was one, likely had a relatively small effect on your overall course grade. So if this was cheating at all, it was to such a limited degree as to be almost trivial.
As a fellow human, my conclusion is that your apparently profound regret about this matter is enough to serve as both penalty and deterrent. As a professor who has seen some questionable exams, as well as dealt with confirmed, blatant, bad faith instances of cheating, my assessment of what you describe is that it's a minor infraction.
So to answer your question about confessing to the professor: if this is an infraction at all, it's minor enough that, were I your professor, I would prefer never to know about it or have to address it. Given its limited significance in the overall course, not to mention your ongoing regret being its own punishment, I wouldn't see this as needing an institutional response. (And given the amount of paperwork those responses require, I'd be more upset about dealing with the bureaucracy of it all than I would have been with what you did in the first place.) Ultimately, I'd suggest that having confessed to the Internet, you can leave your professor out of it, give yourself a break for being a conscientious student doing the best they could during a global pandemic, and work on forgiving yourself, while of course allowing the experience to guide your conscience and future actions.

Yep, this even sounds more like a "quiz" than an "exam"...the 7% is tiny, but even more relevant is that it doesn't sound like your tutor was the one doing the answering of the questions, which is when it would be cheating. If you answered the questions and got advice on them afterward, that's totally appropriate for a tutor, whether it be on a homework assignment, an exam, a quiz, or whatever. If the work was yours, you have nothing to feel guilty about. But even if it was a marginal case, given the low stakes and the fact you didn't do it again, I'd say no need to involve the prof.

As a fellow human, my conclusion is that your apparently profound regret […] is enough to serve as both penalty and deterrent. The problem with this statement is that the profound regret may be a too severe penalty. For people with a certain personality type, they will fixate on the anguish and carry it with them for many years into the future. That’s probably disproportionate to the size of the offense. In that case, allowing the person to confess would be an act of kindness, and the minor annoyance (if any) that this might cause the instructor is pretty much irrelevant.

@DanRomik very much agreed. But in situations where the regret is too severe a penalty, the confession doesn't necessarily need to be made to the person against whom the transgression was made. Indeed, in some (far more severe) cases, a confession can cause further harm to that person. In any case, the effects of the confession on the confessee should be an important consideration in making a confession: entreating an act of kindness ought not to be done in a manner that is itself unkind. And since OP has effectively already confessed here, there's no need for further confession.

Honestly, I think the university screwed up here. If they leaked the exam before the actual exam everyone will have done the same as you, but knowingly.
I don't think you did anything wrong. I think besides learning some stuff and making valuable connections in life uni is actually about learning how to take shortcuts.
In the real world you aren't paid for wasting time doing everything by the textbook but for solving problems. You have this difficult situation going at home and this should be your priority. I would take any shortcut I could find.
As long as you aren't trying to shoot rockets into space and putting people's lives at risk because you were cheating on this exam it really does not matter.
Uni will make everyone re-take the test if they find out. I think you studied hard for the test and learnt everything there was to learn. I would not mention it or beat yourself up. Focus on the things that matter - your family, your health, your energy. The next course in uni will keep you busy soon enough.

I would say the fault is not in mistaking the actual exam for the practice exam but in not admitting the fault immediately when you noticed the mistake. Personally, if I wasn't still taking the class, I wouldn't bother the professor with it. Similar experiences of not admitting faults quickly in my own past have taught me that it is important to try be above reproach in everything that I do.

Short answer, in your case, based on the legal definition provided below, no, you did not cheat, quoting a reference example:
One cheats by

deceiving any person, fraudulently or dishonestly induces the person so deceived to deliver any property to any person, or to consent that any person shall retain any property, or intentionally induces the person so deceived to do or omit to do anything which he would not do or omit if he were not so deceived, and which act or omission causes or is likely to cause damage or harm to that person in body, mind, reputation or property, is said to "cheat".

So, if you suspected or have prior knowledge to the fact that the practice exam was de facto the real exam, or even probabilistically could be such, then you "cheated".
However, as you claim no prior knowledge, you are innocent, but only you can honestly make this assessment.
I would advise not to personally report it, perhaps anonymously at some future time, as you are placing the matter in the hands of others to subjectively assess your honesty that, in my opinion, is not generally pragmatically advisable.

The definition you cite appears to be from the penal code of India. It's unclear if OP is referring to an institution in India, but since this is not a criminal proceeding the cited definition would likely have no bearing.

It is but an example of british common law showing that cheating involves a premediated  intent to deceive so as to acquire an item of value.

But does the British common law definition of an act apply universally? It's plausible that a given university or other institution of learning could have its own definition (explicit or otherwise), which would take precedence if the act occurred there. Also based on the varied answers here, there appear to be quite a few tacit definitions of "to cheat". So basing judgment in this case on one highly particular definition just seems rather arbitrary.

Yes. It is bothering you now and will continue to do so.
Personally I find going over even a practice exam with a (paid?) tutor problematic. The goal of an exam is to see what YOU have learned, not what the tutor knows.

By this logic, going over a practice exam at all is problematic, but I don't see how the tutor makes it worse. By talking to the tutor, you are doing additional learning, and therefore you know more. It's not a controlled assessment of the efficacy of the course materials.

No, a practice exam is for you to practice - and if given in Moodle there should be much feedback from the instructor if questions are answered wrong. Going over them alone is fine. But I understood taking the practice exam with the tutor. That I don't approve of.

Oh, I see what you mean. If the results are used anywhere, then yeah, I get that.

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Feeling guilty about being second author
I'm second author on a paper I have been working on with 7 others for a while. It has to do with machine learning in medicine. I did a bit of the programming but I mostly got help from my mentors (and from Stack Overflow). The parts of the paper I wrote were scrapped/revised by others in my group. The things I wrote barely impacted the paper.
However in the end I ended up being listed second author out of 8 people, which I don't think I deserve. I asked the person who is third author if they wanted to switch with me but they gracefully declined. I still feel genuinely like I don't deserve to be second author and I don't want to be accused down the line of inflating my position on the paper.
Should I insist to be taken down to third/fourth author (which is what I think I deserve)?

Is the list of authors alphabetical?

" I don't want to be accused down the line of inflating my position on the paper" how could someone accuse you of something like that? do you have undisclosed special privileged relationship with first (or last) author?

No the list of authors is not alphabetical. Also the thing about being accused of inflating my position on the paper is that I'm applying for graduate school soon and I don't want it to seem like I just did this paper as a resume booster where I made myself second author when in reality I don't think I deserved second author.

"accused down the line of inflating my position on the paper" Nobody cares about middle authors enough to make this accusation.

Just because your writing was revised doesn't mean you didn't contribute. In addition to the programming, you clearly participated in discussions with the other team members, and they clearly felt that positive impact.

Impostor syndrome much? Seriously though, no one is going to accuse you of anything, especially since you (a) didn't make the choice yourself, and (b) already made an attempt to weasel your way out of it.

scrapped/revised => built on, ie they were a foundation, got them started, pointed them in the right direction, enabled them to make progress. Sounds like you were an ideal team member.

If your proposed accusation does come at some point, despite others assuring that it's not probable, then all you can do is tell the truth and anyone with a good faith concern about your order in authorship would be satisfied. Also, I doubt you got help from your mentors and Stack Overflow that you literally copied and pasted into your code or manuscript that worked instantly, you still had to use your brain to make it work for your project. Sometimes you just do good work and only others can see it for what it is.

Evidently the 7 other authors think you deserve it, including the person with whom you generously offered to switch authorship, so I would recommend not to look at the gift horse's teeth any further.
If you were worried that the paper might not be up to your quality standards and that you'd be criticized for the quality in the future, I think you would have mentioned that, and that you wouldn't want to be an author at all, so I'm fairly sure that's not the case.
I would be happy to know that my co-authors value my contributions to the extent that they do for yours :)

Thanks, that's very comforting. However I also feel bad because it maybe seems like I did more than I actually did. My friends think I did this amazing programming when in reality I mostly got help from my mentors and stack overflow. I don't want to be put higher on the list when perhaps I don't deserve it as much.

@toad-goldenkart Honestly that sounds like what 90% of programmers do.

@toad-goldenkart Last Thursday, I searched Stack Overflow to find information about a specific workflow requirement for a function I was implementing. I didn't realize until I'd read the entire answer that I myself had written it a few years ago. There is so much surface area in programming that constantly referring to documentation is the norm even for architect-level developers.

@toad-goldenkart In my job I'm not paid for about 90% of what I do, it's as you say mostly copy-pasting chunks of other code. But that last 10% is the important bit, it might be just a few lines but it's the part that makes everything else flow. And if you are good at that bit you might not even notice it yourself

@toad-goldenkart - I'm a research programmer, and work with non technical biologists - my "tiny contributions" from my perspective (running their data through a pipeline that I built for another group, and stripping out some special characters) ended up being, from their perspective, worthy of an authorship. Why? because they couldn't have completed their paper without it, and it represented a new use of a particular technique in their field. The best guides to how deserving of this you are is your co-workers, trust them on it!

@toad-goldenkart I get help from Stack Overflow. That's normal, and is what 90% of programmers do. You still use skill knowing what to search for, which answers are reliable, and how to modify them. And, I've just had an experience working with non-technical medics. They loved a "tiny contribution" I made by plotting some data in R with a graphic whose design I took from a paper I once read on data visualisation. These things are habits to us, so they're partly unconscious and we don't notice them much. But they're big achievements to outsiders: like sewing is to someone who can't sew.

Reading a paper presenting a list of 8 authors, I would think "that was a big team work effort".
In my eyes, the difference between the 2nd and the 5th would be negligible. And even regarding the contribution of the first author with respect to the others, I would expect it to be only marginally larger.
In the long run, if your curriculum is composed of only 3 papers, it is not that important if you are first or fourth author, it is important that you can leverage on one paper because you enjoyed the work and you think the message of the paper gives something to the scientific community.
On the other hand, if you have 20 papers, it is not that important if you are first or fourth author because you are in a big group and you should be able to present a coherent research story treading altogether various papers (well, not all of them altogether :D ).
Disclaimer: unfortunately my opinions belongs to me, you will find plenty of a**holes doing all sort of nasty things to be in position (n-1), producing all kind of weird rankings to "rationally" quantify importance of an author based on the median and sigma deviation of the co-authorship position. "Don't feed the troll": don't give too much importance to co-authorship position that would feed those behaviours.

I'm willing to believe that there may not be a big difference between 2nd and 5th author, but then you seem to suggest that there's also no difference between 1st and 4th author no matter how many papers you have.  This isn't my impression in fields in which author order matters---is this really what you meant?

@Kimball It is really what I mean. Publish 1-2 papers as 1st author during PhD, then one as 1st author every couple of year as PostDoc or Ass.Prof. and 2 or more as not-first authorper year. Then when Full Prof., 1 paper as 1st author every 3-4 year, 3-4 paper/year as co-auth and you are in the median.
These papers will come out "simply" because of good working conditions.
If you are not even a PhD student, whatever author position&paper is good.
If you worry too much about auth. position, or printed nr. of papers, you are bound to meaningless suffer (plus you may be a horrible colleague)


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When can a PhD student remove someone as a co-author from a paper?
I was hoping someone can help me with an issue that has been bothering me for some time.
Last year I came up with an idea for a project for my PhD. I don't know why, but for some reason myself and my supervisor decided to work on this project in collaboration with another PhD student and his supervisor from another University in a different country.
Throughout the project both PhD supervisors had very little involvement in the project. The other PhD student had only very minor involvement. The project lasted about a year, during which time we met as a group maybe 5 times and we would simply tell the two supervisors what we had done and they would just say it looks good.
Now I worked on this project about 92-95% myself and the other PhD student contributed, about 5%. I did all the background work myself and wrote code myself, and ran experiments myself. The other PhD students contributions involved mainly helping me to debug code or helping to make my code more efficient.
One thing that annoyed me was he was in the final year of his PhD and devoted as little time as he possibly could to this project. He always had some excuse as to why he cant work on the project right now. It was always "I'm submitting my thesis in January and cant work on this project until then", followed by "I got an extension on my thesis until March so cant work on the project till then", followed by "I got an extension on my thesis till June so cant work on the project until then".  Then he finally submitted his thesis and these excuses changed to "I'm doing an online course for two weeks so cant work on this project until this is finished" or "I am going on holidays for two weeks so cant do anymore until I'm back". Keep in mind throughout much of this time he was always on standby to offer minor help such as helping me debug code, but he did very little. He was also present in all our online meetings with our supervisors and he would always keep himself informed on what I have done and he would be interested in knowing my progress and he would offer suggestions on problems I encountered. But his attitude was always like "i can help but cant devote too much time into it". Before we started the project he did mention before how he tries to be involved in many projects but do only a small amount of work just to "get his name on a paper". At the time I never thought much about this but towards the end of this project I realized that's exactly what he was using me for.
Before I knew it, the project was done practically entirely myself. It then came to write the paper. I wrote the entire paper myself from start to finish. This PhD student then changed a few minor grammar details and said "I corrected a lot of mistakes and can't contribute anymore until after my thesis defense". He then had his defense and continued not to be involved in the writing of the paper, but said he was happy for it to be submitted. My supervisor also agreed.
Then the other PhD supervisor was "too busy" to read the paper until about 6 weeks have passed. He read a few paragraphs and said he doesn't want it submitted until he has read all of it. The paper is about 20 pages and he read about 10. He then made a few minor changes and said he wanted other things included and said he cant do anymore as he is going on holidays. That was about 3 weeks ago now and there is still no sign of him reading or editing it anymore. Bear in mind this supervisor had no involvement in the project until all the work was done and the first draft of the paper was written. He is now essentially holding the project hostage and putting me at risk of another group publishing a similar paper before we do and thus affecting my PhD and the countless hours i put into the project.
The other PhD student at this time is not helping implement suggestions from his supervisor and is expecting me to implement everything he had previously demanded the first time he read the paper.
My question is, do I have good enough reason to remove both of these people as co authors and stop them from holding my work hostage? The difficulty is primarily on the fact that the other PhD student made very minor contributions, but as little as he could. The other PhD supervisor is someone who could be grading my PhD down the line so I don't want us to fall out, but I'm sick of him not taking this project seriously.
One thing I never mentioned was my supervisor also did little to nothing, but because he's my supervisor I'm less annoyed at him being included as an author.
Edit: To simplify the question, I should have stated that I meant removed as an author but kept in the acknowledgements section. This is when they made very minor contributions but were "too busy" to do any real work throughout the project.

Not specific to this question, but you simply need to stop feeding such people who use you. You stated "he did mention before how he tries to be involved in many projects but do only a small amount of work just to "get his name on a paper".", and that is sufficient reason to never collaborate with him.

From what you describe, I do not think you have any basis to remove these coauthors (particularly the other graduate student). They have given you intellectual and material support throughout and expect to be authors based on your earlier conversation. If you want to change the parameters of what was agreed in that initial conversation, you need a new conversation where everyone agrees with the new plan. That might include changing someone from an author role to an acknowledgement, but this is not something you can simply do unilaterally without a discussion.
It's very rare for collaborative work to be divided evenly - you should not expect a paper with 4 authors has 4 equal contributors measured in time spent. Usually one person leads things and does the majority of the work, while others may contribute particular elements or provide guidance, advice, and direction.
In my field at least, this asymmetry is captured in authorship order: the first author is expected to have given the primary effort toward the project. However, it's still expected that not all authors contribute "equally" even in fields where authorship order does not indicate level of contribution. Many journals now ask for a statement about author contributions, which will indicate which parts of the project different authors were responsible for and will generally highlight the person who did the majority of the work.
I'd also note that thesis writing time is a very stressful time for a graduate student - they're preparing a document of a form they've likely never produced before that is going to be used to judge their entire PhD. It's the ultimate final exam. I don't think this other student has been trying to lead you on or get away with doing the bare minimum - they are busy and perhaps feeling overwhelmed. Stress doesn't stop when you finish, either - they've got to figure out what things come next in their career. Your project is a side project for them, so they're putting in side project effort.

I think this would be just as valid in a field that cared little about author order (math, say).

To complement this answer, think in terms of working with your own supervisor to guarantee that you finish on time. Let the rest take its course, as it is only one paper. But get a commitment from the supervisor that it won't delay you even if it delays this paper.

"It's very rare for collaborative work to be divided evenly - you should not expect a paper with 4 authors has 4 equal contributors measured in time spent." I argee, as long as n of authors is small (let's say <6). Then, the contributions start to be more evenly divided the more the authors.

Co-authors holding work hostage by taking too long to review/contribute is unfortunately very common. Once the parameters of authorship are decided (as they were in this case), delays would not generally be considered sufficient reason to make major changes (remove them as co-authors).
This experience will, however, make you more cautious of picking co-authors in the future, that's a long term benefit. In the worst case, you may get scooped by the other group-which also happens and is painful, but not life-altering.
The best bet is to use all persuasive means at your disposal and convince these two co-authors to move faster. I venture to suggest that your supervisor may do a good job at this, so you could try to bring them on board first. You could diplomatically hint that this would be a major contribution from them (given that they have otherwise had a minor role).


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Can I still decline an accepted counter offer before signing a contract?
I am currently in a tenure-track assistant professor (AP) position. About one month ago, I got an AP position offer from a better ranked university, with a good startup package. When I informed my current department of the offer, the head wanted me to stay. They eventually came up with an acceptable counter offer.
Without deep thoughts and given the short time window for decision, I indicated I would stay. They are starting to prepare a contract/formal retention offer for me to sign. But now I have second thoughts and came to realize I prefer the external offer. So I wondered if I still have the freedom to change my mind at this moment, given that I have already expressed my acceptance of the counter offer? I haven't turned down the external offer yet. How can this situation be dealt with?

This may be a local, legal, question. Some verbal agreements might be binding (some places), especially if the other party has spent resources due to the agreement. Consult a lawyer to be sure.

Can you suggest a suitable place for this question? Thanks

For local, legal questions a suitable person to ask would be a lawyer.

The question itself isn't out of bounds but, but personal linked information can be found by those you don't want to see it, and legal advice here is worth exactly what you've paid for it. Good Luck.

Workplace SE may be another place. The general opinion there will be 'never take a counter-offer'...

You don’t have a counter offer yet - you are told one is coming. Until you have it in writing and have signed it, you don’t need to apologize for not taking it. What if the actual offer isn’t what was verbally offered?

If there is a counter offer, there should be a proposed contract shown to you. And then you sign the contract, or you don't. It's up to you. If you signed, you signed. If you didn't, you didn't. And yes, workplace.stackexchange which should have more expertise in this area, will tell you to never accept a counter offer. There are very good reasons for that.

can you shed some light on the reasons? I head some reasons for industrial positions. I am not sure if the same applies for academia. Thanks! At this moment, I haven't got the contract yet. My department went through the details about the counter offer with me and I indicated my decision to stay in an email.


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How not to get jealous with people in academia and research which are more sucessful than me?
I am a 2nd year research masters student in a  University in Europe. My nationality is not European or North American. I will try getting admission in PhD after completing this.
In childhood and adulthood, my father has been very abusive of me. In childhood and adulthood , I used to read books of famous scientists and mathematicians, philosophers and wanted to be like them.( Maybe reading them was an escape from my abusive and loveless family).
But due to abuse of my father, not so great grades as I didn't had advice of my father, I ended up getting low grades in last year of high school.I didn't became fully masculine and had poor self esteem due to my absent father. I ended up taking a very poor course in a poor college. Abuse of my father increased, I fell into depression. Although, I had support of my mother and due to her motivating me , I exceled in math and ended up getting a great masters program in Math in my country. In 4th semester of my msc there was a provision of doing master's project and my thesis advisor was from another institute and he stopped replying to my e-mails . I got stressed and did my thesis by myself and got a 9/10 grade. After completing my master's in june 2020 , I was planning to apply for a PhD in Europe and took a break to study more pure mathematics. But , due to my father being abusive and not understanding me, I got admitted in hospital ( mental) . I was already taking depression pills. I moved to another city and my mother began to live with me( she started working in a school far from our hometown). I began to apply for PhD applications in Europe. But after I filled 5 out of 7 forms and was filling application form for a masters program in France as a backup, I had to submit the LOR by myself.
I realized that my masters thesis advisor( dummy advisor of my institute. original never replied after giving a research paper) was writing LOR of some one else but name was mine and that book was studied by me in my bachelors degree. After that I have studied 2 books and in my thesis I studied 5 research papers. I don't know what to say of neglect of these professors.
As I see the people who win medals in the university , during their PhD's , Abel Prize , Fields Medal , Nobel Prize etc. I used to idolize them in my childhood. My sibling is also in depression and video game addict. I have began to realize that these people and geniuses who win those prize  have most time support of some people in their life and if not , then they have steel like ambition and will and many times are mentally gifted.
I am not a genius. I have accepted that. I take pills of depression and will take them for life. I read books of therapy and psycology to understand myself and heal myself as good therapy was not available in my country. I don't seek therapy in the European country I live as whenever I tell to the therapists the things I have suffered, I am always in Tears., I cry so much in therapy. ( I have changed 3-4 therapists in my home country and none was of any help, my home country is very poor and with corrupt healthcare system).  I am not gifted . I was able to leave my country to study abroad due to sheer hardwork of mine, sacrifices of mine and sacrifices of my mother. I will not able to win any even small prize which my idols won. I have realized that the depression and anxiety were just a symptom and cause was my abusive father.
I have read somewhere that fatherless children have problem with authority and live dangerously.

Can you please tell how should I not get jealous of my peers who have great credentials, worked with great people , been in great institutions, are smarter/ intelligent than me, who had great guidence, who had great foundation and great upbringing, respect my prof.s and the superstars in the field knowing that I will never be like them. (I have not disrespected any of them till now but I feel that I might do it and it will be disastrous to my career which has already been going bad.)

Kindly guide me.

(1) You have gone through a lot and your determination is admirable. However dealing with this kind of problems is not really an academic problem in my view (your specific academia question could probably arise in any field). (2) Even though I have great sympathy, ultimately we have to accept life as it is. There are things we can change, but our past (or the advantages other people have had) is not one of them. (3) Therapists should be used to clients crying. That's not a reason in my view to not do therapy. (4) Have you tried out something like meditation, awareness training etc.?

@ChristianHennig I have read a book but never actually did. For a past couple of weeks , I was thinking that I should do it and I will definitely do it.

It sounds like you have had some extremely difficult experiences and shown strong character. Therapists in the country where you live might be better than therapists in your home country. Could you tell a therapist in advance, before meeting them, that you always cry in therapy? Then they might be able to start very gently. For example, you could start by talking about something that is not your main problem or your most difficult past experiences. Perhaps you could also talk to a doctor about the anti-depressants, and they might have some good advice.

As for how to avoid envy, even people who have easier childhoods often feel envy of people who are more successful in their careers. As you say, it is often partly due to their good fortune. But you don't have to be the best, or anywhere near the best. You can still do good work, and there are many jobs and careers that are possible in the world.

@Oliver882 Thank you very much for the advice.


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Can I copy and paste my publications to my thesis?
I saw similar questions but not exactly the same as my situation. I have three papers prepared during my Ph.D., one is published already, and the other two are just manuscripts that have not been submitted yet. If I copy and paste the contents from my papers to my thesis:

For the one published, will my thesis be considered plagiarism？
For the ones that have not been published, will those be considered plagiarism by the publisher when I submit them in the future because the same content has shown up in my thesis?

Many Thanks!

This depends heavily on the norms and conventions in your field and at your institution. You need to ask your advisor about this.

It depends.  At my phd institution, there was a specific format/template for this kind of Frankenstein thesis (hence the idea of combining several published or submitted papers into a thesis was sort of encouraged).  I would speak to your advisor.

https://academia.stackexchange.com/a/150/9482

Thanks all for the comments. It seems like everyone is talking about question 1. What about question 2? Does it also depend on each individual publisher?

Regarding question 2, see e.g. Will journals publish research that is already published in a PhD thesis?, Paper was rejected for high similarity with parts of my own dissertation, or Can I publish parts of the Ph.D thesis as a paper in a journal?. In short, yes, it depends on the publisher but with good journals there is rarely any issue.

I'll try to summarize some of the issues.
First, there is the concept of the stapled thesis that is common in some fields/places. The thesis consists of a set of published papers (published) and, perhaps some unifying commentary. The thesis itself is (largely) just a collection.
Publishers usually require that you give them copyright to things of yours that they publish, and will give you back a license for some (but not all) uses. That license, these days, will almost always give you rights to include the work in a "stapled" thesis (I don't know of exceptions, actually, but must admit the possibility). Generally, though, a stapled thesis probably isn't considered by the publisher to be a "republication" of the already published work.
Somewhat orthogonal to that is the notion of self plagiarism. This is a form that has only some of the characteristics of (ordinary) plagiarism, though without misattribution of the person who originated the ideas. Self plagiarism is considered a violation because if you, for example, copy-paste your own earlier work without citation, you break the chain of evidence for discoveries. The early work contains context that a researcher wants to see along with the current work. You avoid self plagiarism by quoting and citing the early work, permitting that chain of context to be followed.
A third issue you raise opens the problem that if you put unpublished work in a thesis (your unpublished manuscripts) and if that is considered publishing then some publishers won't accept it. That is becoming somewhat less of a problem these days with preprint servers (and is not much of a problem at all in some fields that welcome preprints), but you need to be sensitive to that. But, if you have unpublished work, you can do what you like with it, copy-paste, whatever. It just might limit what you can do afterwards.
Generally speaking it is better (and a better habit) to keep things clean. If you copy, do so judiciously and with citation. Make sure that your license (from published work) permits what you want to do. Ask if you aren't sure. If you cite, you avoid hints of plagiarism.
If you want to write a non-stapled type of thesis using early work the best path is to treat the work as you would the work of anyone else. Quote from it, but not too extensively, just as you would from the work of others, and cite what you use. Then, if the thesis contains new results and extensions to old results, it might just be publishable as a new work. I'll also note that the license from a publisher will probably give you rights to copy somewhat more extensively than you could from other works, but likely not unlimited copying.
A major issue for you, however, is what your university expects in a thesis. If they accept a stapled thesis, you are fine. Write up the "bridge/summary" commentary if needed and staple it together. If they accept a new summary of old work, you are probably fine, but keep it clean - quote and cite. But if they expect an entirely new work (unlikely under the circumstances) then you need to provide that.
It would, however, seem odd to me if the university permitted unlimited copy-paste without quote or citation. That is just poor scholarship.
I hope this is enough commentary to guide you.

I don't know where you study, but it is not a problem at all in the US. My doctoral dissertation is just a simple and straight combination of my published and unpublished journal manuscripts, and it is totally not a problem at all for me.
If you go and check journal publishers' policy about reusing your own manuscript as part of your dissertation (such as Elsevier), you will find most of these journal publishers don't have any problem if you use your own published first-author manuscript as part of your dissertation. Some publishers may require you to get copyright permission, and some publishers may just want you to make a simple acknowledgment. But you need to follow journal publishing companies' policies and your institution's policy.
I quote Elsevier's policy regarding your question here: "Can I include/use my article in my thesis/dissertation? Yes. Authors can include their articles in full or in part in a thesis or dissertation for non-commercial purposes." Weblink is here: https://www.elsevier.com/about/policies/copyright/permissions
So please check your institution's policy and journal publishing company's policy.

Even in the US, this differs by field.

OK. My file is engineering, just to clarify here

Yeah, for most fields outside of engineering, it's pretty abnormal to just simply copy and paste publications into a thesis, as they don't necessarily connect


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Should the introduction of a paper be broad or specific
My field of background is material science. I am writing a paper regarding some novel properties we discovered from a material system. I struggled a lot with the introduction. Since the entire work is a random discovery (but also pretty important), I wanted the introduction to focus on prior knowledge of the material. But my PI insists that we should have a "bigger picture" so that we can shoot for a better journal. I am wondering, is that really necessary for an editor and/or reviewer?

See also: https://academia.stackexchange.com/questions/91729/how-general-should-my-introduction-be and https://academia.stackexchange.com/questions/101799/scientific-research-paper-how-broad-should-the-introduction-be

May also be worth checking out How to write a strong introduction into a research paper?

An introduction should be both broad and specific.
Usually, you start with a rather broad view on the topic. It is possible to exaggerate this, if course. From this first, broader section it should become clear why it is important to work on your topic and what motivated your work. So stay focussed on what is relevant for your work.
While going further into the introduction, your text becomes more and more specific. Basically, you try to achieve a smooth transition between your broad start and the end of the introduction which should be very specific: There, you usually formulate your hypothesis in one way or another.
There are various ways to write a good introduction for a given paper, you only have to find one of those. As a general guideline, you should only write what is relevant in order to understand why your hypothesis is important and makes sense, not more, but also not less.

I think your PI is correct here. You'll want to write different introductions depending on the audience, which depends in part on the journal. I suggest you  read a sample of introductions from a few different relevant journals and analyze how they differ. If you do that, I suspect you will find that introductions in the broader scope or higher-impact journals tend to have a broader starting point and  emphasize the bigger picture more, while a very focused introduction specific to a single material might make more sense in a specialist journal.
Now, ideally, the reviewer is an expert in the topic of your paper and can handle either type of manuscript, but in a generalist journal the editor and more importantly the readers are fairly unlikely to be specialists or have previous interest in the system you studied. If you don't accommodate them, why should your paper be published in that journal instead of a specialist one? If you want to say "because our finding is important" you'll want to explain why that is, which naturally leads back to explaining the bigger picture.

Introductions are often the only part of the paper that are being read. They give you a chance to explain why your result is important (in addition to many other things such as explaining what your result is). You have thought more about your results than any reviewers will ever do (unless the circumstances are truly extraordinary) and what is clear to you (a random discovery that is "pretty important") might not be so clear to them. The same goes for readers. A bad introduction can result in an unwarranted rejection.
You probably should listen to your PI and think about the "bigger picture".


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Adding name to previously published pre print in new journal
Can we add a coauthor to a previously published preprint and submit it to a peer-reviewed journal? I know we can publish the pre print in many journals but how about adding name?
Please note that the mentioned preprint is available online.

You should publish a paper in only one journal, publishing the same paper in another journal is not good.

It is totally wrong. Pre print is not journal!  most journals will happily consider, review and publish papers that have already been published as preprints. This can be the case if the work has changed substantially since its first publication or even if the definitive version is virtually identical to the preprint version.

There must be some terminology confusion here, at least for me. It sounds like you have uploaded a preprint of your manuscript, perhaps multiple versions, to multiple preprint distributors/websites. But it has not yet been peer reviewed, accepted for publication, and published by a journal. Is that right?

My pre print is published. I uploaded the same to a journal and explained that this was published as a pre print. They mentioned no problem .Now it needs revision after peer review of that journal.

If you publish a preprint with a certain list of authors, and then publish the "same" paper with different authors, it would look like you have been careless in publishing the pre-print, without giving proper credit to all the co-authors and/or without obtaining consent for publication from all your co-authors.
Ask the (to be added) co-authors if they want to appear in the pre-prints (and please provide a reasonable explanation why they were not in the coauthors list in first place), then if they answer yes you should update the pre-prints as well, to be fair and consistent (the exact same work, even if presented in different media and formats, should have the exact same authors list).