Credit accrues to already well-known scientists; success breeds success.
Merton's 1968 paper, named from the Gospel of Matthew. Two scientists publish similar work; the better-known gets the citations, the grants and the students, which produces more work and more credit.
In practice
- Two labs publish the same result in the same month; the well-known one is cited four hundred times and the other forty.
- A team's idea is ignored in April and adopted in September when a senior colleague repeats it.
- Standing
- Absorbs the cumulative-advantage entries listed separately in earlier versions.
- Subject
- Sociology & Culture
- Essay
- The measured patterns of social life