>In mathematics, multiple authors are always listed alphabetically by family name; ie there is no "first" or "second" author.
Is there any research showing this standard to be fair? People pay more attention to the first item of a list than to the middle ones, making me think that one's position on such a list could have a small benefit. Less important if there are overall less multiple name papers, which it seems from the rest of your comment, but still a factor as long as multiple names on a paper do happen.
Is there any research showing this standard to be fair?
I don't know of any.
Less important if there are overall less multiple name papers, which it seems from the rest of your comment,
Actually, I think multiple authors is far more common than single authors, though I don't know the numbers to back it up. I was responding to a very specific "what-if" scenario of bouncing ideas off someone else, and describing what would happen in that case.
Is there any research showing this standard to be fair? People pay more attention to the first item of a list than to the middle ones, making me think that one's position on such a list could have a small benefit. Less important if there are overall less multiple name papers, which it seems from the rest of your comment, but still a factor as long as multiple names on a paper do happen.