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Guidelines for Journal of Electronic Theses and Dissertations Authors

Journal Policies

The Journal of Electronic Theses and Dissertations (J-ETD) editors have established protocols for editors, authors, and peer reviewers. Authors should read About the J-ETD and these Guidelines for Authors carefully prior to submitting a manuscript.

Article Types

  • Full-Length Papers should include a structured abstract of no more than 250 words (see below), and text of no more than 5,000 words. Full-Length Papers undergo a double-blind peer review process.

  • Electronic Theses & Dissertations (ETDs) in Action articles should include a title page, a narrative abstract of no more than 250 words, and text of no more than 2,000 words. This category of article is intended for the presentation of short, focused, and innovative projects, where substantial preliminary and novel results are of importance to the journal readership but not substantial enough in content to warrant a longer presentation. Submissions for ETDs in Action undergo a double-blind peer review process.

  • Letters to the Editor should not exceed 900 words and should include no more than 1 table or figure and no more than 10 references. Letters to the Editor are reviewed internally by the editors.

  • Reviews, including products, tools, and books should not exceed 900 words and should include no more than 1 table or figure and no more than 10 references. This category of article is intended to inform readers about new tools and resources that are relevant to ETD production, hosting, and/or metadata sharing activities. Reviews undergo a double-blind peer review process.are reviewed internally by the editors.

  • Commentaries present viewpoints or interpretations on ETD topics and cover important or timely topics of interest to the journal readership. Commentaries should not exceed 2000 words and must include a narrative abstract of no more than 250 words. Commentaries undergo a double-blind peer review process.

Peer Review Process

  • All submissions are subject to review and publication at the discretion of the editors. Manuscripts within scope will be reviewed by at least two reviewers. On completion of this process, usually within 4 weeks, the managing editor will notify authors of their decision and provide guidance or change requests if deemed necessary.
  • J-ETD uses a double-blind peer review process, which means that the identities of the authors are concealed from the reviewers, and vice versa, throughout the review process. To facilitate this process, authors should make every effort to ensure that the manuscript contains no clues to the authors' identity. The manuscript itself should not include authors' names, institutional affiliations, contact information, funding statements, or acknowledgements. This information should be included in the cover letter and/or entered into the submission system during the submission process.
  • Within the manuscript, follow these additional guidelines:

    • Replace any information in the abstract and text that would identify the authors, including institution names and URLs, by substituting words such as: [institution name blinded for review].

    • Limit citations to your previous work to papers that are relevant for those reviewing the submitted paper. If it is necessary to cite your own work, cite papers published by the authors in the text and in the reference list as follows: ‘[Anonymous, 2015 – blinded for review]’. Use the third person to refer to work the authors have previously undertaken, e.g., replace any phrases like “as we have shown before” with “… has been shown before [Anonymous, 2015 – blinded for review].”

    • Make sure figures do not contain any affiliation related information. Name your files with care. Make sure your document properties are also anonymized and have your name and institution removed.

    • If your manuscript is accepted for publication, you will be required to put back in information that was blinded for peer review (references to the authors, their institutions, self-citations, etc.) before final copyediting can take place.

Manuscript Preparation

  • Please follow the conventions of an APA 7th Edition Professional Paper (omit all author information, which will be included in the cover letter submitted as a separate file).

  • The manuscript must be submitted as a Microsoft Word file or a Rich Text Format (RTF) file.

  • Double space the entire manuscript, including abstract, body, references, and legends
  • Use left justification only, so that the right margin is ragged.

  • Number pages consecutively, beginning with the abstract.

  • Use a standard font (such as Times New Roman or Helvetica).

  • Use font size 12 points (for tables as well as text).

  • All articles must be accompanied by an abstract. The abstract should not include institutional affiliations or other clues to the authors’ identity.

  • Each component of the article should be included in one single file and begin on a separate page, as follows: abstract, body text, references, appendices

  • APA style includes a running header on each page

  • All figures, charts, or diagrams should include an APA-style attribution. Figures should be numbered consecutively.

  • Prepare a separate cover letter to introduce your manuscript to the editors and include article title and author identification information – see more guidelines below

Cover Letter

  • Prepare a separate cover letter to introduce your manuscript to the editors. The cover letter should provide a brief statement of competing interests, include article title and author identification information, and contain any information that you want the editors to know

    • Title of manuscript

    • Author(s), with each author's highest academic degree or professional certification.

    • Institutional affiliation for each author, with city, state, and country.

    • Name, address, telephone number, and e-mail address of the author responsible for correspondence.

    • Clearly state the purpose of the paper and its expected contribution.

    • Funding statements and/or other acknowledgments.

    • Any previous presentation of the data or findings in a preliminary report or abstract.

    • A statement to inform the editors of potential competing interests or no known competing interests. Failure to advise the editors of competing interests can form the basis for non-acceptance or future retraction of an accepted manuscript.

Tables, Charts, Figures and Illustrations

  • Tables and charts:

    • Prepare tables with the table editor built into your word processing application.

    • Include original tables and charts where they should appear in the manuscript (not at the end of the manuscript file).

    • Using a previously published figure or table without explicit permission from the copyright owner will delay your manuscript consideration. Original figures and tables are recommended.

    • Number tables and charts in the order in which they are cited in the text.

    • Provide a descriptive title for each graphical element, whether a table, chart, figure, or illustration.

    • When possible, the data files used to create tables and charts should additionally be submitted as supplemental files.

  • Figures and illustrations:

    • Do not include titles and legends in illustration files.

      • Number figures in the order in which they are mentioned in the text, and provide a brief but descriptive caption (legend) for each figure.

    • Includes figures and illustrations where they should appear in the manuscript (not at the end of the manuscript file).

    • All artwork (figures, photographs, and illustrations) should additionally be submitted as supplemental files to be processed for publication.C
    • The required format is TIFF, EPS, or JPEG with the following resolutions: 1,200 dpi for line figures (e.g., graphs), 600 dpi for grayscale figures (e.g., photographs), and 300 dpi for color figures.

References

  • References must follow the APA Style (7th Edition), commonly available with citation management tools for producing manuscripts.

  • Authors are requested to check all references for completeness, including year, volume number, and pages for journal citations. Strive to make it easy for readers to find the work you referenced.

  • For online content, give additional details, like the date accessed, in case the URL or its content changes. Strive to have a year and corporate author(s). For works in conferences or workshops, add date and location data.

  • It is imperative that authors check to be sure that all references mentioned in the text are listed in the reference section. Where available, DOIs (digital object identifiers) for the references must be provided and hotlinked in the manuscript. Please include the entire URL, e.g., https://doi.org/10.7191/jeslib.2014.1063. Use the free DOI lookup on CrossRef's website to check your citations. If no DOI is available, include the URL in the citation.

Checklist for Submissions

  • Submissions may be returned to authors if they do not adhere to these guidelines.

  • The submission has not been previously published, nor is it before another journal for consideration (or an explanation has been provided in the cover letter to the editors).

  • The submission file is in Microsoft Word, LaTeX, OverLeaf or RTF file format.

  • The manuscript, including the abstract, has been prepared for anonymous peer review by masking author names, affiliations, URLs, and self-citations.

  • References follow the APA 7th Style format.

  • Where available, DOIs and URLs for the references have been provided.

  • The text is double-spaced; uses a 12-point font; and pages are numbered.

  • All tables and figures are numbered.

  • The text adheres to all stylistic and bibliographic requirements outlined in these guidelines.

  • A cover letter has been prepared as a separate file.

Article Submission Agreement

Please review the following submission agreement ("Submission Agreement"). During the manuscript submission process, you will be asked to agree to the following requirements. The journal editors are providing this as a courtesy, so you plan ahead to agree or contact the managing editor if you have any concerns.

Warranties and Overview

Thank you for submitting an article to the Journal of Electronic Theses and Dissertations (the "Journal").

To submit an article (the "Article"):

  • You must be the author, or the authorized agent of the author(s) and copyright holder (if different from the author(s));

  • the author(s) must have approved the work for publication;

  • the author(s) must have agreed to submit the article to the Journal;

  • the author(s) must accept full responsibility for the content of the Article;

  • the Article must be the Author(s) original work and must not contain any libelous or unlawful statements or infringe on the rights or privacy of others or contain material or instructions that might cause harm or injury

  • the Article must not have been previously published, is not pending review elsewhere, and will not be submitted for review elsewhere pending the completion of the editorial decision process in J-ETD.

  • A published preprint has copyright at the moment of creation. Ideas are not copyrighted, expressions of ideas are copyrighted. A conference presentation has its own identity as well. An article manuscript for J-ETD must uniquely present an idea that is dissimilar from earlier versions.

  • By submitting the Article, you represent and warrant that the above are true.

  • Each article submitted will undergo the Journal's editorial decision process. The Journal is not under any obligation to publish the Article. We will send you notices at the email address associated with the listed corresponding author.

  • Authors of original work accepted for publication in J-ETD grant first publication rights to the Journal but retain ownership of the copyright of their content and all other rights. All content in J-ETD, unless otherwise noted, is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-Non-Commercial-ShareAlike 4.0 International License (https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-sa/4.0/),which permits non-commercial, share-alike distribution, reproduction and adaptation in any medium and for non-commercial purpose provided that it is properly attributed.

  • Authors are responsible for obtaining the rights to use 3rd party materials prior to submission.

  • By clicking Accept you agree and consent to the Submission Agreement.

Submission Process

  • To submit articles electronically, the submitting/corresponding author must create and login to an Scholarworks@UAEU account. Manuscripts must be submitted electronically in Microsoft Word or RTF format, using the Submit Article button located on the J-ETD home page in the left sidebar. Authors should follow the entry instructions for each field.

  • Author Information: All submissions require name, affiliation, and email address for each author.

  • Article Title: Titles should use headline capitalization. General rules include: capitalizing the first word in the title, the last word in the title and the important words in the title.

  • Short Title: Include an abbreviated title of not more than 65 characters (including spaces), to be used as a running header for the article.

  • Article Type: Select an article classification; the editors reserve the right to edit this suggestion as necessary. Refer to the full descriptions of each article type above.

  • Disciplines :During the manuscript submission process, select academic subject disciplines that best describe your submission.

  • Abstract: All articles must be accompanied by an abstract. An APA abstract is a comprehensive summary of your paper in which you briefly address the research problem, hypotheses, methods, results, and implications of your research. Because the Bepress/UAEU publishing platform automatically formats a standard cover page for the article, the abstract page should be the first page of the manuscript submission. A brief research abstract should not be more than 250 words. The abstract should not include institutional affiliations or other clues to the authors’ identity. The abstract should not include references or URLs.

  • Keywords: Include a list of suggested keywords. Separate keywords with a comma. Keywords make your content more easily discoverable by Google Scholar and other search engines.

  • Data Availability: Please provide information about the availability of data underlying the findings in this manuscript, including location of the data, unique identifier (DOI, accession number, and/or persistent URL), and instructions, if applicable.

  • Acknowledgments: Enter funding statements and/or other acknowledgments.

  • Corresponding Author(s): Enter current contact information for the corresponding author(s), including: name, affiliation, complete mailing address, email address.

  • Creative Commons License: Select the default Creative Commons License.

  • Full Text of Submission: Upload your manuscript as a Microsoft Word, LaTeX, Overleaf, or a Rich Text Format (RTF) file.

  • Cover Letter: Refer to the Cover Letter guidelines above for information about what should be included in your cover letter.

  • After clicking on the Submit button, the system will display a submission confirmation page so that you can review your submission. There are links at the bottom of this page where you can revise your submission, upload additional files (see next section below for more information about this process), or log out. You will also receive a system-generated email message to confirm receipt of your submission.

  • Additional Files: Normally Figures and illustrations should be included in the manuscript (refer to the Tables, Charts, Figures and Illustrations guidelines above). You may also make research data files available. To submit additional files, select the option on the submission confirmation page to “Upload additional files to be displayed on the web page alongside this article (e.g. data sets, video clips, or sound files).” Upload each file individually and enter a description of the file, such as its table number, figure number, and/or suggested caption. When all additional files have been uploaded and described, click the Save File(s) button.

  • Revisions: To revise your submission at a later time, log into your Scholarworks@UAEU account, click on the title of your submission, and select the option in the menu in the upper left to Revise Submission. To upload new or updated supplemental files, select the option to Manage Additional Files.

Acceptance

  • Once a manuscript is accepted for publication, authors will be required to put back information that was blinded for peer review (references to the authors and their institutions, self-citations, etc.) before final copyediting can take place. All manuscripts undergo reformatting by the Managing Editor to fit the design layout agreed upon by the Editorial Board of J-ETD.

Corresponding Author Responsibilities

  • It is the responsibility of the corresponding author to submit the manuscript and all related files (appendices, data, tables/charts/figures/illustrations, media, etc.) and be prepared to receive and comply promptly with all communications from the editors. Revised manuscripts should be uploaded in the online system in a timely fashion and must also include a separate document, uploaded as a supplementary file, outlining the changes that have been made and point-by-point replies to each of the reviewers’ comments. It is the corresponding author’s responsibility to ensure all listed authors are aware of the submission process and approve the final article for publication.