Scientists are motivated by the credit they are given for their discoveries by their peers.Traditional theories of the scientific method in philosophy do not include this motivation, and at first blush it appears as though these theories would regard it as inappropriate. A number of scholars have suggested, however, that this motivation serves to perpetuate successful science. It has been proposed as a mechanism to encourage more scientific effort and a mechanism to effectively allocate resources between competing research programs. This talk presents an economic model of scientists' choices in which these claims can be formalized and evaluated. Ultimately, the paper comes to mixed conclusions. The motivation for credit may help to increase scientists effort in science, but also may serve to misallocate effort between competing research programs.