average time to publish a research paper

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• Published: 10 February 2016

Does it take too long to publish research?

• Kendall Powell 1  

Nature volume  530 ,  pages 148–151 ( 2016 ) Cite this article

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Scientists are becoming increasingly frustrated by the time it takes to publish a paper. Something has to change, they say.

When Danielle Fraser first submitted her paper for publication, she had little idea of the painful saga that lay ahead.

She had spent some 18 months studying thousands of fossil species spread across North America from the past 36 million years, and now she had an intriguing result: animal populations were spread widest across latitudes in warm, wet climates. Her work, crucial to earning her PhD at Carleton University in Ottawa, Canada, might be used to make predictions about the response of mammals to climate change — a key question in ecology today. So, with her PhD adviser's encouragement, she sent it to Science in October 2012.

Ten days later, the paper was rejected with a form letter. She sent it to another prestigious journal, the Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences . Rejected. Next, she tried Ecology Letters . Bounced. “At this point, I definitely was frustrated. I hadn't even been reviewed and I would've loved to know how to improve the paper,” recalls Fraser. “I thought, 'Let's just get it out and go to a journal that will assess the paper'.”

In May 2013, she submitted the paper to Proceedings of the Royal Society B , considered a high-impact journal in her field. The journal sent it out for review — seven months after her initial submission to Science . “Finally!” Fraser thought. What she didn't know was that she had taken only the first steps down the long, bumpy road to publication: it would take another three submissions, two rejections, two rounds of major revisions and numerous drafts before the paper would finally appear. By that point, she could hardly bear to look at it.

Fraser's frustration is widely shared: researchers are increasingly questioning the time it takes to publish their work. Many say that they feel trapped in a cycle of submission, rejection, review, re-review and re-re-review that seems to eat up months of their lives, interfere with job, grant and tenure applications and slow down the dissemination of results. In 2012, Leslie Vosshall, a neuroscientist at the Rockefeller University in New York City, wrote a commentary that lamented the “glacial pace” of scientific publishing 1 . “In the past three years, if anything, it's gotten substantially worse,” she says now. “It takes forever to get the work out, regardless of the journal. It just takes far too long.”

But is the publication process actually becoming longer — and, if so, then why? To find out, Nature examined some recent analyses on time to publication — many of them performed by researchers waiting for their own work to see the light of day — and spoke to scientists and editors about their experiences.

The results contain some surprises. Daniel Himmelstein, a computational-biology graduate student at the University of California, San Francisco, analysed all the papers indexed in the PubMed database that had listed submission and acceptance dates . His study, done for Nature , found no evidence for lengthening delays 2 : the median review time — the time between submission and acceptance of a paper — has hovered at around 100 days for more than 30 years (see 'Paper wait'). But the analysis comes with major caveats. Not all journals — including some high-profile ones — deposit such time-stamp data in PubMed, and some journals show when a paper was resubmitted, rather than submitted for the first time. “Resetting the clock is an especially pernicious issue,” Himmelstein says, and it means that the analysis might be underestimating publication delays.

Some data suggest that wait times have increased within certain subsets of journals, such as popular open-access ones and some of the most sought-after titles. At Nature , the median review time has grown from 85 days to just above 150 days over the past decade, according to Himmelstein's analysis, and at PLoS ONE it has risen from 37 to 125 days over roughly the same period.

Many scientists find this odd, because they expect advances in digital publishing and the proliferation of journals to have sped things up. They say that journals are taking too long to review papers and that reviewers are requesting more data, revisions and new experiments than they used to. “We are demanding more and more unreasonable things from each other,” says Vosshall. Journal editors counter that science itself has become more data-rich, that they work to uphold high editorial and peer-review standards and that some are dealing with increasing numbers of papers. They also say that they are taking steps to expedite the process.

Publication practices and waiting times also vary widely by discipline — with social sciences being notoriously slow. In physics, the pressure to publish fast is reduced because of the common practice of publishing preprints — early versions of a paper before peer review — on the arXiv server . Some of the loudest complaints about publication delays come from those in biological fields, in which competition is fierce and publishing in prestigious journals can be required for career advancement. This month, a group of more than 70 scientists, funders, journal editors and publishers are meeting at the Howard Hughes Medical Institute campus in Chevy Chase, Maryland, to discuss whether biologists should adopt the preprint model to accelerate publishing . “We need a fundamental rethinking of how we do this ,” Vosshall says.

In March 2012, Stephen Royle, a cell biologist at the University of Warwick, UK, started on a publication mission of his own. His latest work answered a controversial question about how cells sense that chromosomes are lined up before dividing, so he first sent it to Nature Cell Biology ( NCB ), because it is a top journal in his field and an editor there had suggested he send it after hearing Royle give a talk. It was rejected without review. Next, he sent it to Developmental Cell . Rejected. His next stop, the Journal of Cell Biology , sent the paper out for review. It came back with a long list of necessary revisions — and a rejection.

Royle and his lab spent almost six months doing the suggested experiments and revising the paper. Then he submitted the updated manuscript to Current Biology . Rejected. EMBO Journal . Reviewed and rejected.

Finally, in December 2012, he submitted it to the Journal of Cell Science ( JCS ), where it was reviewed. One reviewer mentioned that they had already assessed it at another journal and thought that it should have been published then. They wrote that the work was “beautifully conducted, well controlled, and conservatively interpreted”. A second reviewer said that it should not be published. The editor at JCS decided to accept it. The time between first submission to Nature Cell Biology and acceptance at JCS was 317 days. It appeared online another 53 days later 3 . The work went on to win the JCS prize as the journal's top paper for 2013.

Despite the accolade, Royle says that the multiple rejections were demoralizing for his student, who had done the experiments and needed the paper to graduate. He also thinks that the paper deserved the greater exposure that comes from publication in a more prestigious journal. “Unfortunately, the climate at the moment is that if papers aren't in those very top journals, they get overlooked easily,” he says. And Royle, who has done several publication-time analyses and blogged about what he found, has shown that this experience is not unusual. When he looked at the 28 papers that his lab had published in the previous 12 years, the average time to gestate from first submission to publication was the same as a human baby — about 9 months (see go.nature.com/79h2n3 ).

But how much of these delays were his own doing? To publish the chromosome paper, Royle indulged in the all-too-familiar practice of journal shopping: submitting first to the most prestigious journals in his field (often those with the highest impact factor) and then working his way down the hierarchy . ( Nature Cell Biology 's current impact factor is 19; JCS 's is 5.) Journal impact factor or reputation are widely used by scientists and grant-review and hiring committees as a proxy for the quality of the paper. On the flip side, critics say that editors seek out the splashiest papers to boost their publication's impact factor, something that encourages journal shopping, increases rejection rates and adds to the wait time. Journal editors reject this; Ritu Dhand, Nature editorial director in London, says that Nature 's policy of selecting original, important work “may lead to citation impact and media coverage, but Nature editors aren't driven by those considerations”.

How much time does journal shopping add? In the analysis of his group's research papers, Royle found that more than half were shopped around, and that this consumed anywhere from a few days to more than eight months. He went on to analyse all the papers published in 2013 that are indexed in PubMed, and examined whether higher impact factor correlated with longer median publication times. He found an inverted bell-shaped curve — the journals with the lowest and highest impact factors had longer review times than did those in the middle. For the vast majority of those in the middle, review times stood at around 100 days — matching Himmelstein's analysis. Those with the very highest impact factors (30–50) had a review time of 150 days, supporting the idea that pitching a paper to a series of top journals could result in significant delays in publication.

Many scientists, editors and publishers have long acknowledged that journal name is a flawed measure of the quality and value of a piece of research — but the problem shows no signs of going away . “Where your paper is published doesn't say anything about you, your paper's impact or whether it's right or wrong,” says Maria Leptin, director of EMBO, an organization of Europe's leading life scientists and publisher of the EMBO Journal . “Nobody has the courage to say, we, as a funding organization, or we, as a tenure committee, are not going to look at where you publish as opposed to what you publish .”

And the obsession with prestigious journals is just one source of delay — as Fraser, who was battling to publish her paper on ancient animal populations — was about to found out.

Peer review

By October 2013, a full year had passed since Fraser had first submitted her paper to a journal, and she had pretty much stopped caring about impact factor. By this point, the paper had spent two months in review at Proceedings of the Royal Society B , before coming back with mixed reports — and a rejection. So Fraser decided to try PLoS ONE , a journal that says it will publish any rigorous science, regardless of its significance, scope or anticipated citations. It has an impact factor of 3, and a reputation for rapid publication.

PLoS ONE sent the paper out to a single reviewer. Two months later, Fraser got a decision letter that essentially stated that the paper was rejected but might be eligible for re-review if the suggested revisions were made. She made the revisions, adding citations and a small amount of reanalysis. In March 2014, she resubmitted the manuscript, which PLoS ONE sent out to a different reviewer. Another two months passed before she received the new review: major revisions, please.

“I'm just happy they didn't tell me to go away,” recalls Fraser. “I do have e-mails from the time that say, '1-millionth draft'!” She persevered, making more revisions to meet the reviewer's demands, and in June 2014 submitted the paper to PLoS ONE for a third time. Success! The paper 4 was published online 23 months after she had first sent it to Science . The long peer-review and revision process did improve the paper, Fraser says now. “It was really much better.” But did the main conclusion of the paper change? “Not really.”

It takes forever to get the work out, regardless of the journal.

Last year, Chris Hartgerink, a behavioural-sciences graduate student at Tilburg University in the Netherlands, ran an analysis of the Public Library of Science (PLOS) family of journals since the first one launched in 2003. (He chose the journals largely because they make the data easily accessible, and because he was waiting for a paper to be published in PLoS ONE .) He found that the mean review time had roughly doubled in the past decade, from 50–130 days to 150–250 days, depending on the journal (see go.nature.com/s3voeq ). And when Royle looked at eight journals that had published cell-biology papers over the past decade, he found that publication times had lengthened at seven of them, mostly because review times had stretched out.

One contention is that peer reviewers now ask for more. When Ron Vale, a cell biologist at the University of California, San Francisco, analysed biology papers that had been published in Cell , Nature and the Journal of Cell Biology , in the first six months of 1984 and compared that with the same period in 2014, he found that both the average number of authors and the number of panels in experimental figures rose by 2–4 fold 5 . This showed, he argued, that the amount of data required for a publication had gone up, and Vale suspects that much of the added data come from authors trying to meet reviewers' demands. Scientists grumble about overzealous critics who always seem to want more, or different, experiments to nail a point. “It's very rare for the revisions to fundamentally change a paper — the headline doesn't change,” Royle says. His analysis of his group's publication times showed that almost 4 months of the average 9-month gestation was spent revising papers for resubmission.

Many scientists also blame journal editors, who, they say, can be reluctant to provide clear guidance and decisions to authors when reviews are mixed — unnecessarily stringing out the review and revision process. Journal heads disagree, and say that their editors are accomplished at handling mixed reviews. Cell editor-in-chief Emilie Marcus in Cambridge, Massachusetts, says that editors at her journal take responsibility for publication decisions and help authors to map out a plan for revisions.

Technological advances mean that research now involves handling more and more data, editors say, and there is greater emphasis on making that information available to the community. Marcus says that her journal is working to cut review times by, for example, increasing the number of papers that go through only one round of revision — 14% of their papers did so in 2015. In 2009, Cell also restricted the amount of supplemental material that could accompany papers as a way to keep requests for “additional, unrelated experiments” at bay.

PLOS executive editor Veronique Kiermer, based in San Francisco, declined to discuss the specifics of Fraser's paper, but she called its total review time of nine months an “outlier” and said that it was “not ideal to have research being evaluated by a single person”. She acknowledges that PLoS ONE 's publication time has risen; one factor is that the volume of papers has, too — from 200 in 2006 to 30,000 per year now — and it takes time to find and assign appropriate editors and reviewers. (PLOS used 76,000 reviewers in 2015.) Another, says Kiermer, is that the number of essential checkpoints — including competing-interest disclosures, animal-welfare reports and screens for plagiarism — have increased in the past decade. “We'll do everything we can both in terms of technology and looking at workflows to bring these times to publication down,” she says.

Dhand says that at Nature , too, editors find it harder to find reviewers than in the past, “presumably because there are so many more papers that need reviewing”. Himmelstein found that the number of papers in PubMed more than doubled between 2000 and 2015, reaching nearly 1 million articles.

Technology advances

Digital publishing may have had benefits in shortening 'production' time — the time from acceptance to publication — rather than time in review. In Himmelstein's analysis, time spent in production has halved since the early 2000s, falling to a stable median of 25 days.

Several new journals and online publishing platforms have promised to speed up the process even more. PeerJ, a family of journals that launched in 2013, is one of several that now encourage open peer review, in which reviewers' names and comments are posted alongside articles. The hope is that the transparency will prevent unnecessary delays or burdensome revision requests from reviewers.

It's very rare for the revisions to fundamentally change a paper.

The biomedical and life-sciences journal eLife launched in 2012 with a pledge to make initial editorial decisions within a few days and to review papers quickly. Reviewers get strict instructions not to suggest the 'perfect experiment', and they can ask for extra analysis only if it can be completed within 2 months. Otherwise, the paper is rejected. Randy Schekman, a cell biologist at the University of California, Berkeley, and editor-in-chief of eLife , says that these policies mean that more than two-thirds of the journal's accepted papers undergo just one round of review.

In a 2015 analysis, Himmelstein created a ranking by the median review time for all 3,482 journals that had papers with time stamps in the PubMed database from January 2014 to June 2015 (see go.nature.com/sscrr6 ). PeerJ had a relatively fast time: 74 days after submission. At eLife , it took 108 days, and PLoS ONE took 117. By comparison, Cell 's review time was 127 days; Nature 's was 173 days; PLoS Medicine took 177 days; and Developmental Cell was among the slowest of the popular biomedical journals, at 194 days. Marcus notes that comparison between journals is difficult because the publications define received, revised and accepted days differently, and that Developmental Cell places a high priority on timely review.

Preprints reconsidered

One way for biologists to accelerate publication is by embracing preprints. These allow work to quickly receive credit and critique, says Bruno Eckhardt, associate editor of Physical Review E and a theoretical physicist at the University of Marburg in Germany. “It is almost like going on Facebook — it means you are ready to go public,” he says. A preprint submitted to bioRxiv — a server run by Cold Spring Harbor Laboratory in New York — is published online within 24 hours and given a digital object identifier (DOI); subsequent revisions are time-stamped and anyone can read and comment on the paper. “The minute a research story gets into the public domain, it benefits from the collective power of different brains looking at a problem,” says Vale. What's more, proponents say, preprint publishing can simply be added onto the conventional publication process. F1000Research , which launched in 2012, does this by publishing papers first, then inviting open peer review and revision.

Some scientists are going a step further, and using platforms such as GitHub, Zenodo and figshare to publish each hypothesis, data collection or figure as they go along. Each file can be given a DOI, so that it is citable and trackable. Himmelstein, who already publishes his papers as preprints, has been using the Thinklab platform to progressively write up and publish the results of a new project since January 2015. “I push 'publish' and it gets a DOI with no delay,” he says. “Am I really gaining that much by publishing [in a conventional journal]? Or is it better to do what is fastest and most efficient to get your research out there?”

But preprints and real-time digital publishing platforms are no panacea. Vosshall says that many biologists are “terrified” of preprints because they fear getting scooped by competitors or losing credit and intellectual-property rights for their ideas. And even after preprint publishing, scientists can still find themselves slogging through peer review and chasing high-impact journals for a final publication to adorn their CV. Vosshall says that the scientific community relies on conventional journals to serve as a 'prestige filter' so that important papers are brought to the attention of the right readers. Without them, “How do we find the good stuff?” she asks.

For Fraser, her PLoS ONE publication proved a success. When the paper was finally published after its almost-two-year wait, she got positive responses, she says. It has been viewed nearly 2,000 times, had 51 shares on Facebook and Twitter and got 280 downloads. The publication also helped her to secure her current position — as a postdoctoral fellow at the Smithsonian Institution Museum of Natural History in Washington DC. “I pretty much got the top postdoc that I could have gotten.”

Still, the whole process is not something she wants to endure again — so these days, she tends to send her papers to mid-range journals that are likely to publish her work right away. “If my ultimate goal is to get a faculty job, I can't afford to wait two years on a single paper,” she says.

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Research Article

Time to publish? Turnaround times, acceptance rates, and impact factors of journals in fisheries science

Roles Conceptualization, Data curation, Formal analysis, Investigation, Methodology, Software, Validation, Visualization, Writing – original draft, Writing – review & editing

* E-mail: [email protected]

Current address: Southeast Fisheries Science Center, National Marine Fisheries Service, Beaufort, North Carolina, United States of America

Affiliation Department of Applied Ecology, North Carolina State University, Morehead City, North Carolina, United States of America

• Brendan J. Runde

• Published: September 23, 2021
• https://doi.org/10.1371/journal.pone.0257841
• Peer Review
• Reader Comments

Selecting a target journal is a universal decision faced by authors of scientific papers. Components of the decision, including expected turnaround time, journal acceptance rate, and journal impact factor, vary in terms of accessibility. In this study, I collated recent turnaround times and impact factors for 82 journals that publish papers in the field of fisheries sciences. In addition, I gathered acceptance rates for the same journals when possible. Findings indicated clear among-journal differences in turnaround time, with median times-to-publication ranging from 79 to 323 days. There was no clear correlation between turnaround time and acceptance rate nor between turnaround time and impact factor; however, acceptance rate and impact factor were negatively correlated. I found no field-wide differences in turnaround time since the beginning of the COVID-19 pandemic, though some individual journals took significantly longer or significantly shorter to publish during the pandemic. Depending on their priorities, authors choosing a target journal should use the results of this study as guidance toward a more informed decision.

Citation: Runde BJ (2021) Time to publish? Turnaround times, acceptance rates, and impact factors of journals in fisheries science. PLoS ONE 16(9): e0257841. https://doi.org/10.1371/journal.pone.0257841

Editor: Charles William Martin, University of Florida, UNITED STATES

Received: July 6, 2021; Accepted: September 10, 2021; Published: September 23, 2021

Copyright: © 2021 Brendan J. Runde. This is an open access article distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution License , which permits unrestricted use, distribution, and reproduction in any medium, provided the original author and source are credited.

Data Availability: All relevant data are within the manuscript and its Supporting information files.

Funding: The author(s) received no specific funding for this work.

Competing interests: The authors have declared that no competing interests exist.

Introduction

Settling on a target journal for a completed scientific manuscript can be a non-scientific process. Some critical elements of the decision are intangible, e.g., attempting to reach a certain target audience or how well the paper “fits” within the scope of the journal [ 1 – 3 ]. Others, such as turnaround time, acceptance rate, and journal impact, can be measured but (other than impact) these metrics are often challenging to locate, leading authors to make decisions without full information [ 3 , 4 ].

Timeliness of publication has been reported as among the most important factors in the decision of target journal [ 4 – 8 ]. Prolonged peer review and/or production can be a major hindrance to authors [ 9 ]. Aarssen et al. [ 4 ] surveyed authors of ecological papers and found that 72.2% considered likelihood of a rapid decision a “very important” or “important” factor in choosing a journal. In some fields, research outcomes may be time-sensitive, so lengthy review can render results obsolete even before publication [ 10 ]. Desires and expectations for turnaround time are often not met: Mulligan et al. [ 11 ] found that 43% of survey respondents rated “time-to-first-decision” of their most recent article as “slow” or “very slow.” Allen et al. [ 12 ] found that authors in the life sciences expect peer review to take less than 30 days (although this may be unrealistic). Moreover, Nguyen et al. [ 7 ] conducted a survey of authors in conservation biology in which the vast majority (86%) of respondents reported that their perceived optimal duration for peer review was eight weeks or under, though their experienced peer review time was on average 14.4 weeks. Over half of the respondents in Nguyen et al. [ 7 ] believed that lengthy peer-reviews can have a detrimental impact on their career, including individuals who reported that the lack of timely publication obstructed their acceptance into educational institutions and caused delays to degree conferral.

Despite the obvious and documented importance of journal turnaround time, published per-journal values are almost non-existent (BR, personal observation). Some journals do publicize “time-to-first-decision” on their (or their publisher’s) webpages (e.g., ICES Journal of Marine Science ), but summary statistics of times to acceptance and publication remain generally unavailable to the public. Lewallen and Crane [ 13 ] recognized the importance of turnaround time and recommended authors contact potential target journals and request information directly. However, this approach is time-consuming and unlikely to result in universal acquiescence from potential target journals. Moreover, because the duration of the review process is unpredictable, journals are more likely to give an average or a range—as an indicator—rather than guarantee a specific turnaround time (H. Browman, Ed. in Chief, ICES J . Mar . Sci ., personal communication).

In many biological journals, individual papers contain metadata that can be used to generate turnaround times. Specifically, a majority of journals in the sciences report “Date Received,” “Date Accepted,” and at least one of “Date Published,” “Date Available,” or similar on the webpage or in the downloadable PDF of each paper (BR, personal observation). Aggregating these dates on a per-journal basis allows for the calculation of turnaround time statistics, which would be extremely valuable to authors seeking to identify an ideal target journal.

In this study, I present summary data on turnaround times for over 80 journals that regularly publish papers in fisheries science and the surrounding disciplines. I restrict my analyses to this field out of personal interest and because cross-discipline comparisons may not be apt. Moreover, my goal in this study is to provide field-specific information, and data on journals in other disciplines was beyond that scope. In addition, I provide per-journal information on impact factor and acceptance rate (where available) which are also key factors in deciding on a target journal [ 4 ]. The information presented herein is intended to be used in concert with other factors, including authors’ notions of their paper’s “fit,” to refine the process of selecting a target journal.

Literature review and journal selection

I began by developing a list of journals that regularly publish papers in fisheries science. On 20 March 2021, I searched the Web of Science Core Collection (Clarivate Analytics; v.5.35) for published articles with “fisheries or fishermen or fishes or fish or fishing” as the topic. These terms were used by Branch and Linnell [ 14 ] for a similar purpose. I refined this search by selecting only “Articles” and “Proceedings Papers” thereby excluding reviews, meeting abstracts, brief communications, et cetera. Finally, I truncated the search to include only documents that were published during 2010–2020. This search resulted in 242,280 published works. Using Web of Science’s “Analyze Results” tool, I compiled a list of source titles (i.e., journals) that have published >400 papers meeting the specifics of my query. This threshold was used because it emerged as a natural break in the list of journals. A total of 85 journals met these requirements. I removed from this list journals that publish strictly in the field of food sciences (e.g., Food Chemistry ) as well as hyper-regional journals that may not be of broad interest to authors in the field (though their exclusion is not indicative of their quality). Finally, I added several journals ad hoc that had not met the 400-paper minimum. These additions were included either because of my personal interest (e.g., Marine and Coastal Fisheries and Global Change Biology ) or because of their relevance and value in among-journal comparisons (e.g., Science and Nature ). After removals and additions, the list included 82 total journals.

Turnaround time.

In the spring of 2021, I accessed webpages of each of the 82 journals selected for inclusion. For each journal, I located publication history information (i.e., dates received, accepted, and published) on the webpages or in the PDFs of individual papers. I tabulated these dates for each paper. Generally, I aspired to gather dates for all papers published from present day back to at least the beginning of 2018. It was my explicit goal to compare timeliness of publication only for original research papers. For all journals where possible, I excluded papers if they were not original research articles. Some journals publish a higher proportion of reviews, brief communications, errata, or editorials, all of which likely have a shorter turnaround time than original research. Most journals list the paper type on each document, allowing for easy exclusion of papers that were not original research.

I examined distributions of time-to-acceptance (calculated as date accepted – date received ) and time-to-publication (calculated as date published—date received ). For date published , I used the earliest date after acceptance, i.e., if “date published online” and “date published in an issue” were both provided, I used only “date published online.” Some articles reported acceptance times that are inconsistent with the usual paradigm of peer review (for instance, progressing from received to accepted in 0 days). It is highly unlikely (perhaps impossible) that an unsolicited original research article could be accepted or published within 30 days of submission. I assumed that any implausibly short publication histories either were typographical errors, artifacts of that journal’s methods for tracking papers, or the papers were simply not unsolicited original research articles. I therefore excluded from further analysis any papers with a time-to-acceptance or time-to-publication of fewer than 30 days; by-journal proportions of such papers ranged from zero to 0.06 ( Table 1 ). Similarly, some papers reported publication times on the order of several years or more since receipt. While extreme delays in publication are certainly possible, I assumed that any paper with a time-to-publication of over 600 days was either a typographical error or a result of extenuating circumstances for which the journal staff and reviewers likely played no role. I therefore excluded papers with a time-to-acceptance or a time-to-publication of over 600 days from further analysis; by-journal proportions of such papers ranged from zero to 0.08 ( Table 1 ). Paper-by-paper information on the duration from receipt until reviews are received is generally not available. However, this so-called “time-to-first-decision” is often available on journal websites. Where available, I obtained time-to-first-decision for each journal.

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https://doi.org/10.1371/journal.pone.0257841.t001

I generated summary data for each journal in this study in R [ 15 ]. Specifically, I examined median time-to-acceptance, median time-to-publication, median time between acceptance and publication, proportion of papers published in under six months, and proportion of papers published in over one year. For the latter two metrics, I selected six months and one year because, though arbitrary, these durations may be representative of many authors’ notions of short versus long turnaround times. Medians were used because distributions of time-to-acceptance and time-to-publication were usually skewed right (see Results ).

Some journals included in this study have an extremely broad scope. Specifically, Nature , PeerJ , PLOS ONE , Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences , and Science publish papers on topics reaching far beyond fisheries or ecology. I hypothesized that turnaround times of fisheries papers published in these journals may be dissimilar to turnaround times for these journals overall since internal editorial structure at the journals may differ among disciplines. I queried Web of Science for “fisheries or fishermen or fishes or fish or fishing” for each of these five journals individually, obtained turnaround times for the resulting papers, and compared median times to publication for fisheries papers and for all papers in each journal.

COVID-19 pandemic effects

During the COVID-19 pandemic, some journals offered leniency to authors and reviewers when setting deadlines to account for the increased probability of extenuating personal or professional circumstances (B. Runde, personal observation). Because of this phenomenon, I hypothesized that turnaround times for each journal may be different prior to and after the start of the COVID-19 pandemic. Hobday et al. [ 16 ] showed that for seven leading journals in marine science, times in review were shorter in February–June 2020 as compared to the previous year. For each journal in my study, I compared times-to-publication of all papers published during the year prior to the pandemic (1 March 2019–29 February 2020) and the year following the beginning of the pandemic (1 March 2020–28 February 2021). As above, papers were excluded from this analysis if their time-to-publication was extremely short (< 30 days) or extremely long (> 600 days). I conducted two-sample Wilcoxon tests to examine for differences in publication times between these two periods. Significance was evaluated at the α = 0.05 level. Analyses were performed in R [ 15 ].

Impact factors

The most widely used metric of impact, impact factor, is considered flawed by some scientists due to the disproportionate influence of review articles and its propensity for manipulation [ 17 – 19 ]. Nonetheless, impact factor is still listed on many journal webpages and is relied on by many authors [ 20 – 22 ]. I obtained impact factor for 2018 (the most recent year for which it was available for all journals) from https://www.resurchify.com/impact-factor.php . Impact factor is calculated as the number of citations received in a given year by all articles published in that journal during the previous two years, divided by the number of articles published in that journal during the previous two years.

Acceptance rates

I searched the web for reliable (i.e., not anecdotal) information on per-journal acceptance rates, which was generally limited. Most journals reject a percentage of submissions at the editorial stage prior to peer review (so-called “desk rejections”) due to a lack of fit within the journal’s scope, deficiencies in writing quality, and/or insignificant scientific merit [ 23 ]. Of course, rejections after peer review also occur, and overall rejection rates are increasingly made available on journals’ or publishers’ websites or in compendium papers [e.g., 20 ]. Unfortunately, rates of desk rejections are still rarely available online [ 23 ]. However, many journals’ overall acceptance rates are reported either on their own page or on the publisher’s website. For instance, Elsevier and Springer both offer acceptance rates for some (but not all) of their journals on their JournalFinder ( https://journalfinder.elsevier.com/ ) and Journal suggester ( https://journalsuggester.springer.com/ ) respectively. I extracted reported acceptance rates wherever available and tabulated them per journal. In addition, I sent email correspondence to Editors-in-Chief and/or publishers of each of the journals included in this study asking for their journal’s desk rejection rate and overall acceptance rate. When information was provided, it was tabulated on a per-journal basis. In some cases, acceptance rates provided via email were not equal to the rate provided on the journal’s webpage. In these cases, the value provided by the editor or publisher was used, as it is likely more recent and thus more valid. Such chases did not differ in these figures by more than 10%. It is possible that there are discrepancies in the calculation of acceptance rates, e.g., resubmissions may be tabulated differently among journals. I made no attempt to account for these potential differences in the present study.

Data analysis

I examined summary data for each journal and calculated correlations between median time-to-publication, difference in median publication time during COVID-19 as compared to the prior year, impact factor, and acceptance rate (where available). I plotted correlations using the R package ‘corrplot’ [ 24 ]. In addition, I plotted relationships between median time-to-publication and impact factor.

From the 82 journals in this study, I extracted publication information for 83,797 individual papers. Median times to acceptance ranged from 64 to 269 days and median times-to-publication ranged from 79 to 323 days ( Fig 1 ). Turnaround times did not differ substantially for fisheries papers in any of the five broad-scope journals in this study ( Fig 2 ); therefore, for the other analyses in this study data from these journals were not restricted to fish-only papers. The ranges of times-to-publication for each journal were generally broad ( Fig 3 ); the middle 50% often spanned a range of 100 days or more. Distributions were typically skewed right. Virtually every journal in the study published one or more papers that took close to 600 days to publish (the maximum timespan retained in the analysis). Percentages of papers published in over one year ranged from 0 to 28%; percentages of papers published in under 6 months ranged from 2 to 99% ( Table 1 ). Of 82 journals examined, 28 had significantly different (Wilcoxon p < 0.05) times-to-publication in the year following the start of the COVID-19 pandemic as compared to the previous year. Of these 28, 12 were significantly faster and 16 were significantly slower during the pandemic ( Table 1 ).

https://doi.org/10.1371/journal.pone.0257841.g001

PNAS is Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences .

https://doi.org/10.1371/journal.pone.0257841.g002

Central vertical lines represent medians, hinges represent the 25 th and 75 th percentiles, and lower and upper whiskers extend to either the lowest and highest values respectively or 1.5 * the inter-quartile range. Black dots represent papers that were outside 1.5 * the inter-quartile range. Boxes are shaded to correspond with 2018 Impact Factor, where darker green represents higher impact.

https://doi.org/10.1371/journal.pone.0257841.g003

I was able to obtain overall acceptance rate information for 60 journals in this study. Of these 60, I gathered desk rejection rates for 27 journals. For each of these 27, I calculated acceptance rates for papers that were peer-reviewed (i.e., not desk rejected). There was a weak positive correlation between this value and the proportion of articles that were peer-reviewed, implying that rates of the two types of rejections are not independent ( Fig 4A ). Higher impact journals tended to have higher desk rejection rates and lower percentages of acceptance given that peer review occurred. Of the 60 journals with overall acceptance rate information, I obtained time-to-first-decision for 48 journals; I plotted overall acceptance rate against these values ( Fig 4B ). There was no clear relationship between these variables; however, journals with higher impact tended to have lower acceptance rates and shorter times-to-first-decision.

A) The proportion of submissions that are peer-reviewed (i.e., 1 minus the desk rejection rate) versus the acceptance rate of submissions given that they are peer-reviewed for 27 journals that publish in fisheries and related topics. B) Time-to-first-decision (d) versus overall acceptance rate for 48 journals that publish in fisheries and aquatic sciences. Points in both panels are shaded to reflect 2018 Impact Factor of each journal, where darker green means higher impact.

https://doi.org/10.1371/journal.pone.0257841.g004

There was no strong correlation between any pairwise combination of median time-to-publication, difference in median publication time during COVID-19 as compared to the prior year, impact factor, and acceptance rate ( Fig 5 ). A moderate correlation (Pearson correlation = -0.43) was found between impact factor and overall acceptance rate, a phenomenon that has been documented previously [ 4 ]. The relationship between a journal’s median time-to-publication and impact factor was broadly scattered ( Fig 6 ).

Correlation bubbles are colored and shaded based on the calculated Pearson correlation coefficient, where negative correlations are pink, positive correlations are green, and darker shades and larger sizes represent stronger correlations.

https://doi.org/10.1371/journal.pone.0257841.g005

Inset panels shows a broader view to include Science and Nature which have high impact factors.

https://doi.org/10.1371/journal.pone.0257841.g006

There are clearly intrinsic differences in turnaround time among journals that publish in fisheries science ( Fig 3 ). The causes for these differences are varied, and some are artifacts of the journal’s specific publishing paradigm. For instance, some journals publish uncorrected, non-typeset versions of accepted manuscripts very shortly after acceptance; for the purposes of this study, such papers were considered published even if they were not yet in their final form. I elected to consider any post-acceptance online version “published” because such versions can be shared and cited, thereby fulfilling the desires of many authors [ 7 ] and meeting one of the overall goals of science—disseminating research results. However, some journals do not publish any manuscript version other than the finalized document. Such journals have inherently longer turnaround times than those hosting unpolished versions online, and I made no attempt to specify or account for those differences in this study.

In addition to differences in which versions are published online first, differences in journal production formats can influence turnaround time. Some journals publish monthly, some publish quarterly, and some publish on a rolling basis (particularly those that are online only). Strictly periodical journals may choose to allow accepted papers to accumulate prior to publishing several in an issue all at once. Such journals, especially those with page limitations, may have a backlog of papers that are accepted but not yet published. I made no attempt to differentiate between journals based on these format differences, which certainly influence time-to-publication.

Similarly, some journals (or publishers) may enter revised manuscripts into their system as new submissions. This practice ostensibly artificially deflates turnaround times and may also artificially deflate acceptance rates. Unfortunately, to my knowledge no journals state publicly whether this is their modus operandi , precluding the possibility of applying any correction factor or per-journal caveat herein.

Beyond these differences in production time that stem from journal structure, the time it takes to publish a paper can be divided into time the paper is with editorial staff, reviewers, and authors after review. Differences may exist in author revision time among journals; it is possible that reviews of manuscripts submitted to higher impact journals are more thorough and therefore require longer response times. However, I found no association between impact factor and turnaround time ( Fig 6 ), so it may be that no such differences exist. Further, extenuating circumstances on the part of the author(s) of a paper may result in extremely lengthy revision times. There is no data available on per-journal rates of extension requests, but presumably it is low and approximately equivalent across journals. I removed from my dataset any papers that took longer than 600 days to publish. Still, I present median turnaround times in this study as a measure that is robust to outliers.

In contrast to time with the authors, it seems likely that among-journal differences in time with editorial staff and reviewers are responsible for a large portion of differences in overall turnaround time. Delays at the editorial and reviewer level may be inherent to each journal, and could be a result of editorial workload (i.e., number of submissions per editor), level of strictness of the editor-in-chief when communicating with the associate editors, or differences in persistence on the part of the editors when asking reviewers to be expeditious. In addition, some journals may have a more difficult time finding a suitable number of agreeable reviewers; this may be especially true for lower-impact journals although no association between IF and turnaround time was found. A majority of authors surveyed by Mulligan et al. [ 11 ] had declined to review at least one paper in the preceding 12 months, mainly due to the paper being outside the reviewer’s area of expertise or the reviewer being too busy with work and/or prior reviewing commitments. If among-journal differences do exist in acceptance rates of review requests, this could possibly alter turnaround times.

In this study, I treated impact factor as a proxy for the quality of individual journals. While impact factor is often still used in this way [ 22 ], its limitations are well-documented by authors across many disciplines [e.g., 25 – 27 ]. For instance, the calculation of how many “citable” documents a single journal has produced is often dubious, as this may or may not include errata, letters, and book reviews depending on the publisher [ 28 ]; misclassification can inflate or deflate a given journal’s impact factor, and the rate of misclassification may depend on the individual journal’s publishing paradigm [ 29 ]. Alternatives to impact factor, such as SCImago Journal Rank (SJR) and H-index, have been proposed and may in some cases be more valid metrics of journal prestige or quality [ 30 , 31 ]. Comparison of these bibliometrics among journals in fisheries was beyond the scope of this paper, and I elected to use only impact factor given its ubiquity and despite its known disadvantages.

The COVID-19 pandemic had no discernable field-wide effect on turnaround time, and differences in turnaround time during the pandemic were not correlated with acceptance rate or impact factor ( Fig 5 ). Hobday et al. [ 16 ] found minor changes in turnaround time during COVID-19 (through June 2020) for seven marine science journals; they reported only slight disruptions to scientific productivity in this field. Overall, my results corroborate those of Hobday et al. [ 16 ], although some journals took significantly longer or significantly shorter to publish during COVID-19. It is unclear whether these correlations were causal, as non-pandemic effects may have affected turnaround times at these individual journals.

The turnaround times, acceptance rates, and impact factors presented in this paper are snapshots and may change over time. The degree to which these metrics change is likely variable among journals. However, barring major changes in journal formats or editorial regimes, the data presented here are probably applicable for the next several years at least. Indeed, median monthly turnaround times for most journals in this study were approximately static for the period from January 2018 to April 2021 ( Fig 7 ). Similarly, acceptance rates and impact factors [ 32 ] are generally strongly auto-correlated from one year to the next. I therefore suggest that the metrics presented here can be used by authors as a baseline, but if more than several years have transpired it may befit the reader to obtain updated information (particularly on impact factor and acceptance rate, which are generally more accessible than turnaround time). In addition, it is theoretically possible that this paper itself may alter turnaround times and/or acceptance rates for some journals. Enlightened readers may elect to change their submission habits in favor of certain journals that are more expeditious or that otherwise meet their priorities for a given paper. Authors without a preconceived notion of a specific target journal should still consider the paper’s “fit” to be the most important factor in their decision [ 1 ]. I suggest that after assembling a shortlist based on fit, authors should use the results of this paper to select a journal that best aligns with their priorities.

The dashed horizontal line at 1.0 represents the baseline proportion.

https://doi.org/10.1371/journal.pone.0257841.g007

Supporting information

https://doi.org/10.1371/journal.pone.0257841.s001

Acknowledgments

This manuscript benefited greatly from discussions with H. I. Browman, D. D. Aday, W. L. Smith, R. C. Chambers, N. M. Bacheler, K. W. Shertzer, S. R. Midway, S. M. Lombardo, and C. A. Harms. My thanks to K. W. Shertzer and H. I. Browman for reviewing early drafts of this paper. I am grateful to my advisor, J. A. Buckel, for allowing me the time to pursue this side project while I worked on my dissertation. Thanks to the numerous editors, publishers, and other journal staff who replied to my requests for journal information.

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• 24. Wei T, Simko V. R package "corrplot": Visualization of a Correlation Matrix (Version 0.84). https://github.com/taiyun/corrplot . 2017.
• 28. Rossner M, Van Epps H, Hill E. Irreproducible results: a response to Thomson Scientific. Rockefeller University Press; 2008.

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Time to Publish: When is Right for Your Research?

As research continues to advance and evolve, the question of when to publish can often be an arduous process. Deciding on when is best for publishing a paper or research project will vary based upon various criteria including the scope of the work, field complexity and its implications in academia. This article will explore these key components which help determine when it’s appropriate to share one’s findings with the public, providing valuable insight into this critical aspect of scholarly work. Additionally, we will assess ways in which one may prepare their material prior to submission along with some considerations that must be taken into account during this important step towards publication.

I. Introduction to Time to Publish

Ii. when is the right timing for your research, iii. analyzing and evaluating relevant criteria for publication, iv. the role of peer review in deciding the appropriate moment to publish, v. impact factors, citation metrics, and other considerations when determining when to publish, vi. understanding different types of journals: open access vs traditional subscription-based models, vii. exploring funding opportunities that may facilitate publishing at an early stage.

Timing is Everything Time and timing are both essential components to consider when publishing research papers. From the decision of which journal to publish in, to strategically deciding when the paper should be published – proper planning ensures successful publication.

The optimal time for submitting a research paper depends on individual factors such as: where you plan to submit it; what your goals are with regard to impact; how quickly feedback needs to be gained; and many other considerations. To begin, it’s best practice to choose an appropriate journal before finalizing one’s content – this can have major implications on acceptability by editors or reviewers. Additionally, there may also be seasonal deadlines that affect availability of journals or even readership patterns at certain times of year that could help maximize reach potential or expedite reviews/publication process depending on specific subject matter being presented in the research paper itself. For instance, if authors intend for their work focused around current events then submission during peak news cycles might aid discoverability more so than periods in between those same occurrences — provided all quality criteria has been met accordingly prior submittal procedures were followed correctly . In summary , scheduling well-thought out timelines will enable authors attain highest levels of exposure for desired results and ensure timely completion based upon objectives set forth previously discussed steps must first take place .

Starting Early Research is a process of discovery, and the earlier you begin that journey, the better. Start researching early to allow yourself time for experimentation, collecting data & evidence and understanding concepts thoroughly before building your hypothesis or argument. Identifying key literature in your field will also enable you to develop an understanding of current trends within research which can prove essential when starting out. This way, by beginning ahead of schedule you’ll have plenty of time should any surprises crop up during the course of study – be it results outside expected ranges or changes in methodology!

• Allow enough leeway so as not to end up rushed near submission date.

Timing Publication Once all findings are completed and analysed properly, then comes one more important aspect: timing publication correctly. Pay attention here; getting published too soon may mean overlooking something crucial due to lack experience while delaying could potentially mean missing opportunities for recognition if other researchers release similar work first. Publishing at just the right moment allows experts from all over world access valuable information through journals & conferences – these events often create their own deadlines throughout year thus ensuring pertinent content remains relevant.

• Strike balance between deliberating on details while remaining timely with publication.

Finding the Right Venue

For an academic research paper, it is essential to select the right venue for publication. As such, there are various factors that need to be evaluated before submitting a manuscript. These criteria can be divided into four main categories: quality of editorial process; reputation and impact factor; cost-benefit analysis; and peer reviews.

To ensure that one’s work receives due consideration from readership and experts alike, selecting a journal with good credibility is vital. Impact factor indicates how often articles published in the journal have been cited by others – making it easier to determine which journals are preferred in each field or specialty area. It’s also wise to consider costs associated with publishing as well as potential returns on investment (ROI) from both monetary and non-monetary sources like citations or recognition among peers.

• Peer review serves as another important criterion since papers undergo thorough examination prior to being accepted.
• Apart from assessing relevance, suitability of the forum should not be overlooked – time constraints may dictate when manuscripts should reach respective editors.

In order for an article submission to succeed, authors must meet all requirements set forth by their chosen publication source while taking into account its importance within their respective fields of study or specialization areas. Additionally, choosing appropriate timing will play a crucial role in ensuring successful acceptance rate since some publications prefer specific seasons over others when releasing new issues so timely preparation plays significant part here too!

The peer review process is an essential component of deciding when to publish research findings. By relying on the opinion of experts in a field, it provides invaluable insight into the quality and accuracy of any given paper. In order for such feedback to be effective, authors must consider both positive and negative reviews from their peers.

• Timing: The primary role of peer review is determining the most appropriate time for publication. If reviewers believe that changes are necessary before publishing, then authors should take this opportunity to revise or improve upon their work accordingly.

In general, researchers should strive to have their articles accepted as soon as possible; however they must also remain conscious that premature release can lead to inaccurate information entering circulation in the public domain without being fully vetted by peers first. Delaying too long can potentially deny vital data access where needed sooner rather than later – such as during medical crises – so striking a balance between timeliness and validity is key here.

In academia, when to publish research paper is an important question. As a researcher or professor, it’s necessary to consider all aspects of the publication process. Impact factors and citation metrics are two key considerations that can help determine the most beneficial time for submitting your work.

• Impact Factors : Academic journals have impact factors associated with them which measure their relative importance in a field of study. Journals with higher impact factor values tend to be more prestigious and considered as better places for publishing your work due to wider exposure they provide.
• Citation Metrics: Citation metrics are statistics used by researchers to measure how often papers from particular authors or institutions have been cited in other publications. Higher citations indicate that people find the author’s published works valuable enough use them as part of their own research efforts.

Ultimately, these both should be taken into account when deciding when to submit research papers for publication; however, other less tangible elements such as audience engagement and potential need for further collaborations also play significant role in determining the timing of article submission

When publishing research papers, it is important to understand the differences between open access and traditional subscription-based journals. Open access refers to journals that are freely available on the internet; this includes both commercial and non-commercial publications. Traditional subscription-based journals require a fee in order for readers to access their content.

• Open Access: A growing number of open access options are now available for authors seeking to publish their work online. These include preprint servers such as arXiv, institutional repositories like DSpace or ePrints, subject specific repositories such as PubMed Central and RePEc, disciplinary databases like MathSciNet or Web of Science Core Collection (WoSCC), peer reviewed journal directories like DOAJ, publisher operated platforms such as BioMed Central (BMC) Journals Network etc.
• Traditional Subscription Based Journals: This type of publication requires a fee from readers wishing to gain full access. The cost depends upon whether one wishes single article/issue download privileges only or also have an annual subscription with unlimited downloads throughout the year. Typically these fees range from $10 – $50 per article depending on publisher policies.

The decision regarding which model should be chosen rests entirely with researchers – when deciding where best place your paper in each case there will always be pros & cons involved which must be weighed against each other before making any decisions based on personal needs & preferences. Ultimately all types can provide effective scholarly communication but it is up you choose correctly so that your research gains maximum reach amongst its target audience!

Discovering and Applying for Funding The process of research publication often requires financial resources to facilitate the various stages. As a result, exploring potential funding opportunities should be considered in order to move forward with publishing at an early stage.

Researchers may take advantage of existing funds available from public sources such as government grants or private organizations like foundations. Additionally, individual universities and academic institutions typically provide support by offering internal grant programs that are tailored specifically to faculty and student researchers.

• At this juncture it is important for those who wish to publish their work quickly have completed all necessary preparations before applying.
• In addition, there can be short timelines associated with the application window which further encourages promptness.

When planning for when to submit your paper for review consideration keep in mind that most journals require submissions year-round; however, many peer reviewed outlets prefer seasonal manuscripts during Spring (April) or Autumn (September). Thus applicants should aim towards submitting papers several months prior these peak periods as acceptance times tend vary depending on journal policies.

English: Overall, the timing of publication is an important consideration when engaging in research. There are various factors that can influence a researcher’s decision on when to publish their findings. These may include gaining approval from colleagues and journals, ensuring adequate review time has passed and considering the wider implications of disseminating one’s work into public forums. Through understanding these key considerations, researchers should be better equipped to make informed decisions regarding publishing timelines for their own projects.

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Timescale to publish an article for a Springer Nature journal

It is not possible to put a definitive timescale on when an article will be published as there are many aspects in the process which are unpredictable. For example, although we try to limit the review period as much as possible we are highly dependent on the availability of reviewers and the time they are able to allot to each review, and therefore for a full research article the review process can typically take from 3 to 6 months.

If further information about the speed of publishing an article is available, it will be found on the journal's page on SpringerLink .   Please contact the journal for any submission related queries.

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How long does it take to publish a research paper?

Nature : The experience many researchers have when trying to publish their research results can be stressful, and for some journals the length of the peer-review process seems to be growing substantially. Daniel Himmelstein of the University of California, San Francisco, analyzed submission and acceptance dates for all papers indexed in the PubMed database and found that the median time between submission and acceptance has been roughly 100 days for the past 30 years. In Himmelstein's data it appears that the longer delays are more common for the journals authors most desired to be published in and in popular open-access journals. Nature 's turnaround time has increased from 85 days to 150 days over the last decade, and  PLoS ONE's  has gone from 37 to 125 days in about the same period. In some fields the delay is less; in physics, for example, the publication of preprints of articles is thought to help increase final print publishing turnaround times. In the biological sciences a group of researchers and publishers is meeting to discuss whether the disciplines should adopt a preprint model for articles.

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How to Write and Publish a Research Paper in 7 Steps

What comes next after you're done with your research? Publishing the results in a journal of course! We tell you how to present your work in the best way possible.

This post is part of a series, which serves to provide hands-on information and resources for authors and editors.

Things have gotten busy in scholarly publishing: These days, a new article gets published in the 50,000 most important peer-reviewed journals every few seconds, while each one takes on average 40 minutes to read. Hundreds of thousands of papers reach the desks of editors and reviewers worldwide each year and 50% of all submissions end up rejected at some stage.

In a nutshell: there is a lot of competition, and the people who decide upon the fate of your manuscript are short on time and overworked. But there are ways to make their lives a little easier and improve your own chances of getting your work published!

Well, it may seem obvious, but before submitting an academic paper, always make sure that it is an excellent reflection of the research you have done and that you present it in the most professional way possible. Incomplete or poorly presented manuscripts can create a great deal of frustration and annoyance for editors who probably won’t even bother wasting the time of the reviewers!

This post will discuss 7 steps to the successful publication of your research paper:

• Check whether your research is publication-ready
• Choose an article type
• Choose a journal
• Construct your paper
• Decide the order of authors
• Check and double-check
• Submit your paper

1. Check Whether Your Research Is Publication-Ready

Should you publish your research at all?

If your work holds academic value – of course – a well-written scholarly article could open doors to your research community. However, if you are not yet sure, whether your research is ready for publication, here are some key questions to ask yourself depending on your field of expertise:

• Have you done or found something new and interesting? Something unique?
• Is the work directly related to a current hot topic?
• Have you checked the latest results or research in the field?
• Have you provided solutions to any difficult problems?
• Have the findings been verified?
• Have the appropriate controls been performed if required?
• Are your findings comprehensive?

If the answers to all relevant questions are “yes”, you need to prepare a good, strong manuscript. Remember, a research paper is only useful if it is clearly understood, reproducible and if it is read and used .

2. Choose An Article Type

The first step is to determine which type of paper is most appropriate for your work and what you want to achieve. The following list contains the most important, usually peer-reviewed article types in the natural sciences:

Full original research papers disseminate completed research findings. On average this type of paper is 8-10 pages long, contains five figures, and 25-30 references. Full original research papers are an important part of the process when developing your career.

Review papers present a critical synthesis of a specific research topic. These papers are usually much longer than original papers and will contain numerous references. More often than not, they will be commissioned by journal editors. Reviews present an excellent way to solidify your research career.

Letters, Rapid or Short Communications are often published for the quick and early communication of significant and original advances. They are much shorter than full articles and usually limited in length by the journal. Journals specifically dedicated to short communications or letters are also published in some fields. In these the authors can present short preliminary findings before developing a full-length paper.

3. Choose a Journal

Are you looking for the right place to publish your paper? Find out here whether a De Gruyter journal might be the right fit.

Submit to journals that you already read, that you have a good feel for. If you do so, you will have a better appreciation of both its culture and the requirements of the editors and reviewers.

Other factors to consider are:

• The specific subject area
• The aims and scope of the journal
• The type of manuscript you have written
• The significance of your work
• The reputation of the journal
• The reputation of the editors within the community
• The editorial/review and production speeds of the journal
• The community served by the journal
• The coverage and distribution
• The accessibility ( open access vs. closed access)

4. Construct Your Paper

Each element of a paper has its purpose, so you should make these sections easy to index and search.

Don’t forget that requirements can differ highly per publication, so always make sure to apply a journal’s specific instructions – or guide – for authors to your manuscript, even to the first draft (text layout, paper citation, nomenclature, figures and table, etc.) It will save you time, and the editor’s.

Also, even in these days of Internet-based publishing, space is still at a premium, so be as concise as possible. As a good journalist would say: “Never use three words when one will do!”

Let’s look at the typical structure of a full research paper, but bear in mind certain subject disciplines may have their own specific requirements so check the instructions for authors on the journal’s home page.

4.1 The Title

It’s important to use the title to tell the reader what your paper is all about! You want to attract their attention, a bit like a newspaper headline does. Be specific and to the point. Keep it informative and concise, and avoid jargon and abbreviations (unless they are universally recognized like DNA, for example).

4.2 The Abstract

This could be termed as the “advertisement” for your article. Make it interesting and easily understood without the reader having to read the whole article. Be accurate and specific, and keep it as brief and concise as possible. Some journals (particularly in the medical fields) will ask you to structure the abstract in distinct, labeled sections, which makes it even more accessible.

A clear abstract will influence whether or not your work is considered and whether an editor should invest more time on it or send it for review.

4.3 Keywords

Keywords are used by abstracting and indexing services, such as PubMed and Web of Science. They are the labels of your manuscript, which make it “searchable” online by other researchers.

Include words or phrases (usually 4-8) that are closely related to your topic but not “too niche” for anyone to find them. Make sure to only use established abbreviations. Think about what scientific terms and its variations your potential readers are likely to use and search for. You can also do a test run of your selected keywords in one of the common academic search engines. Do similar articles to your own appear? Yes? Then that’s a good sign.

4.4 Introduction

This first part of the main text should introduce the problem, as well as any existing solutions you are aware of and the main limitations. Also, state what you hope to achieve with your research.

Do not confuse the introduction with the results, discussion or conclusion.

4.5 Methods

Every research article should include a detailed Methods section (also referred to as “Materials and Methods”) to provide the reader with enough information to be able to judge whether the study is valid and reproducible.

Include detailed information so that a knowledgeable reader can reproduce the experiment. However, use references and supplementary materials to indicate previously published procedures.

4.6 Results

In this section, you will present the essential or primary results of your study. To display them in a comprehensible way, you should use subheadings as well as illustrations such as figures, graphs, tables and photos, as appropriate.

4.7 Discussion

Here you should tell your readers what the results mean .

Do state how the results relate to the study’s aims and hypotheses and how the findings relate to those of other studies. Explain all possible interpretations of your findings and the study’s limitations.

Do not make “grand statements” that are not supported by the data. Also, do not introduce any new results or terms. Moreover, do not ignore work that conflicts or disagrees with your findings. Instead …

Be brave! Address conflicting study results and convince the reader you are the one who is correct.

4.8 Conclusion

Your conclusion isn’t just a summary of what you’ve already written. It should take your paper one step further and answer any unresolved questions.

Sum up what you have shown in your study and indicate possible applications and extensions. The main question your conclusion should answer is: What do my results mean for the research field and my community?

4.9 Acknowledgments and Ethical Statements

It is extremely important to acknowledge anyone who has helped you with your paper, including researchers who supplied materials or reagents (e.g. vectors or antibodies); and anyone who helped with the writing or English, or offered critical comments about the content.

Learn more about academic integrity in our blog post “Scholarly Publication Ethics: 4 Common Mistakes You Want To Avoid” .

Remember to state why people have been acknowledged and ask their permission . Ensure that you acknowledge sources of funding, including any grant or reference numbers.

Furthermore, if you have worked with animals or humans, you need to include information about the ethical approval of your study and, if applicable, whether informed consent was given. Also, state whether you have any competing interests regarding the study (e.g. because of financial or personal relationships.)

4.10 References

The end is in sight, but don’t relax just yet!

De facto, there are often more mistakes in the references than in any other part of the manuscript. It is also one of the most annoying and time-consuming problems for editors.

Remember to cite the main scientific publications on which your work is based. But do not inflate the manuscript with too many references. Avoid excessive – and especially unnecessary – self-citations. Also, avoid excessive citations of publications from the same institute or region.

5. Decide the Order of Authors

In the sciences, the most common way to order the names of the authors is by relative contribution.

Generally, the first author conducts and/or supervises the data analysis and the proper presentation and interpretation of the results. They put the paper together and usually submit the paper to the journal.

Co-authors make intellectual contributions to the data analysis and contribute to data interpretation. They review each paper draft. All of them must be able to present the paper and its results, as well as to defend the implications and discuss study limitations.

Do not leave out authors who should be included or add “gift authors”, i.e. authors who did not contribute significantly.

6. Check and Double-Check

As a final step before submission, ask colleagues to read your work and be constructively critical .

Make sure that the paper is appropriate for the journal – take a last look at their aims and scope. Check if all of the requirements in the instructions for authors are met.

Ensure that the cited literature is balanced. Are the aims, purpose and significance of the results clear?

Conduct a final check for language, either by a native English speaker or an editing service.

7. Submit Your Paper

When you and your co-authors have double-, triple-, quadruple-checked the manuscript: submit it via e-mail or online submission system. Along with your manuscript, submit a cover letter, which highlights the reasons why your paper would appeal to the journal and which ensures that you have received approval of all authors for submission.

It is up to the editors and the peer-reviewers now to provide you with their (ideally constructive and helpful) comments and feedback. Time to take a breather!

If the paper gets rejected, do not despair – it happens to literally everybody. If the journal suggests major or minor revisions, take the chance to provide a thorough response and make improvements as you see fit. If the paper gets accepted, congrats!

It’s now time to get writing and share your hard work – good luck!

If you are interested, check out this related blog post

[Title Image by Nick Morrison via Unsplash]

David Sleeman

David Sleeman worked as Senior Journals Manager in the field of Physical Sciences at De Gruyter.

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Acceptance to publication time

This article is based on a blog post from June 2012. All information was correct at the time of posting but may be superseded by the time you read it. We have updated the article slightly and aim to revise it fully soon.

Journals vary a lot in how long they take to publish accepted papers.

Publication speed is one factor that many authors take into account when choosing a journal. The time from submission to publication in a peer reviewed journal can be split into three phases:

• The time from submission from the first decision
• The time needed for the authors to revise
• The time from acceptance to publication

The second of these cannot generally be controlled by the journal, because different papers need different amounts of time to revise and the personal circumstances of the authors can affect the time needed. So only the first and third phases should be used to judge the journal. I cover submission to first decision time in a separate post and will focus on post-acceptance speed here. By ‘publication’ I mean the first time the paper is made publicly available, whether online or in print.

Page contents

What happens after a paper is accepted?

Most journals have variations on a standard procedure: copyediting, typesetting, sending proofs to the authors, checking the proofs, and conversion to various formats (such as XML, HTML and pdf). For print journals, there are extra steps of compiling the pdf files into an issue and preparing them for printing – these steps don’t usually affect the time to online publication, but see below for exceptions to this.

Copyediting involves a professional editor (sometimes employed by the journal, but very often a freelancer), who reads the paper carefully and ensures that it is accurate, clear, readable, in correct English and in the journal’s house style. Typesetting involves laying out the paper in the journal’s format for print or pdf, with the correct fonts and symbols and with the figures at their final sizes. Some journals use the figures as the authors provide them, others edit or even redraw, and most at least check that the figures fit with the accompanying text.

After typesetting (or sometimes before), the author is sent the proof to check, along with any queries from the copyeditor. Some journals use professional proofreaders to check the proofs after typesetting and after the author has sent their corrections, but nowadays this step is skipped by many journals. But someone still needs to incorporate the author’s corrections into the article and do final checks before publication.

In my experience copyediting, typesetting and proof checking a typical research paper usually takes a few weeks. So, if the process starts immediately after acceptance and isn’t delayed, and if there is no delay from a paper gaining its final form and being published, a corrected paper can be published online a few weeks after acceptance. However, delays can occur at any stage.

Some journals display a typical or promised time from acceptance to publication on their websites. I have trawled through lots, and below is a selection. If you find more, please do add them in a comment. Note that these times are neither maximum nor minimum times – they are probably what the editors feel is a typical time, allowing for some papers to be published more quickly and some more slowly.

Times as of 2012

• Average of 10 days: Stem Cells  (Wiley)
• About 3 weeks: BMJ Group journals such as Journal of Medical Genetics
• Within 4 weeks: Biology Open (Company of Biologists)
• Within 6 weeks: PLoS Biology (Public Library of Science), Journal of Cell Biology (Rockefeller University Press)
• Within 6-8 weeks: PLoS Medicine (Public Library of Science)
• Around 8 weeks: FASEB Journal , Systematic Biology (Oxford University Press), American Journal of Human Genetics (Cell Press)
• Within 2 months: Cellular and Molecular Life Sciences (Springer)
• 77 days: Circulation (American Heart Association)
• Up to 12 weeks: Cell (Cell Press)

You can see from this list that journals from the same publisher vary in their promised times and even in whether they promise a time or not.

Factors that affect publication speed

There are many things that can affect how quickly papers are published once they are accepted.

Publication in issues

Scheduling of issues is one of the commonest reasons for delays. Although most journals now publish articles online before print, there are still some that hold accepted papers in a queue until there is space for them in an issue. Elsevier changed to article-based publication in 2010, and their press release at the time claimed that this could shorten acceptance to publication time by up to seven weeks, to only a few weeks.

Some journals have backlogs of accepted papers that lead to delays in publication of months or even years. Others have got rid of these backlogs by changing to publishing online as soon as possible after acceptance and only later assembling papers into issues (I have been involved in helping one publisher with this transition).

Journals that publish only in issues can also delay particular papers for other reasons than space: if they aim for a balance of article types in each issue they may hold a paper over if there are too many of that type in the current issue; or if they want to publicise several papers on the same topic together, they may hold some of them until all are ready.

It is difficult to work out from journal websites whether they publish in issues or not. The best way to check for any particular journal is probably to look at the acceptance dates for articles in a particular issue and see whether they are spread out (in which case publication probably happens by article) or whether they are all a similar time before the issue date (in which case publication is probably by issue).

Copyediting first or later

The most common system is to copyedit, typeset, send proofs to the authors and perhaps proofread before online publication. Some journals, however, now publish the accepted version almost immediately after acceptance, and do any copyediting and typesetting later, replacing the accepted version when the edited and typeset version is ready. The latter journals can therefore boast acceptance to publication times of a few days or even hours rather than weeks.

I have been able to establish that the following publishers post accepted articles online before editing or typesetting for some or all journals:

• Wiley (‘OnlineAccepted’ option offered by some journals)
• Elsevier ( Gastroenterology , publication within 5-7 business days)
• American Chemical Society (all journals, ‘usually within 30 minutes to 24 hours of acceptance’)
• Genetics Society of America ( Genetics )
• BioMed Central (all journals, ‘publication occurs at the moment of acceptance’)

Fast track articles

Some journals have a fast track that offers faster publication for selected articles. This can speed up publication of these articles, but it can result in slower publication for all the non-fast-track articles if staff time is taken up with the fast-track ones. The editors make the decision on which papers are fast-tracked, but authors can usually request it and their request may be honoured if their reasons are judged to be good enough.

The following publishers offer fast-track publication for some or all journals (data as of 2012):

• Oxford University Press (eg European Heart Journal ; publication within 10 days)
• Elsevier (eg Journal of the American College of Cardiology , publication of ‘Expedited Publications’ within 10 days)
• Annals of Internal Medicine (publication within 3 weeks)

Acceptance date issues

When looking at journal acceptance to publication times, it is worth bearing in mind that the acceptance date is the date when the final formal letter of acceptance is sent to the author. In reality, the decision to publish in principle is often made earlier, and the authors receive an email saying that the paper will be accepted as long as they make some final minor changes. Authors often feel at this point that the paper has been accepted, and it is usually safe to celebrate at this point. But it is not a final acceptance, and acceptance to publication times are measured only from the formal acceptance date.

How to estimate how fast a journal will publish after acceptance

I suggest following these steps to work out how fast your target journal is likely to publish your accepted paper.

• Check if it publishes accepted versions before any editing or typesetting. If so, publication time is likely to be 0–3 days.
• Check if it publishes papers online as soon as possible after acceptance, rather than waiting for an issue (print or online). Check whether this happens to all papers or just when the author requests, and request it if needed. If your paper is in this system, publication time is likely to be about 3–8 weeks.
• Check what the journal’s website says about the acceptance to publication times they aim for, and multiply by about 1.5 to get a maximum probable time. If this time has elapsed after acceptance, you can justifiably email the editors requesting an update.
• Look at some recent papers: most journals give the dates of acceptance and online publication on the paper, and often on the page containing the online abstract, so you can get a feel for how much time elapses between these events.
• If it publishes only in print, be prepared for a long wait!

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Home → Get Published → How to Publish a Research Paper: A Step-by-Step Guide

How to Publish a Research Paper: A Step-by-Step Guide

Jordan Kruszynski

• January 4, 2024

You’re in academia.

You’re going steady.

Your research is going well and you begin to wonder: ‘ How exactly do I get a research paper published?’

If this is the question on your lips, then this step-by-step guide is the one for you. We’ll be walking you through the whole process of how to publish a research paper.

Publishing a research paper is a significant milestone for researchers and academics, as it allows you to share your findings, contribute to your field of study, and start to gain serious recognition within the wider academic community. So, want to know how to publish a research paper? By following our guide, you’ll get a firm grasp of the steps involved in this process, giving you the best chance of successfully navigating the publishing process and getting your work out there.

Understanding the Publishing Process

To begin, it’s crucial to understand that getting a research paper published is a multi-step process. From beginning to end, it could take as little as 2 months before you see your paper nestled in the pages of your chosen journal. On the other hand, it could take as long as a year .

Below, we set out the steps before going into more detail on each one. Getting a feel for these steps will help you to visualise what lies ahead, and prepare yourself for each of them in turn. It’s important to remember that you won’t actually have control over every step – in fact, some of them will be decided by people you’ll probably never meet. However, knowing which parts of the process are yours to decide will allow you to adjust your approach and attitude accordingly.

Each of the following stages will play a vital role in the eventual publication of your paper:

• Preparing Your Research Paper
• Finding the Right Journal
• Crafting a Strong Manuscript
• Navigating the Peer-Review Process
• Submitting Your Paper
• Dealing with Rejections and Revising Your Paper

Step 1: Preparing Your Research Paper

It all starts here. The quality and content of your research paper is of fundamental importance if you want to get it published. This step will be different for every researcher depending on the nature of your research, but if you haven’t yet settled on a topic, then consider the following advice:

• Choose an interesting and relevant topic that aligns with current trends in your field. If your research touches on the passions and concerns of your academic peers or wider society, it may be more likely to capture attention and get published successfully.
• Conduct a comprehensive literature review (link to lit. review article once it’s published) to identify the state of existing research and any knowledge gaps within it. Aiming to fill a clear gap in the knowledge of your field is a great way to increase the practicality of your research and improve its chances of getting published.
• Structure your paper in a clear and organised manner, including all the necessary sections such as title, abstract, introduction (link to the ‘how to write a research paper intro’ article once it’s published) , methodology, results, discussion, and conclusion.
• Adhere to the formatting guidelines provided by your target journal to ensure that your paper is accepted as viable for publishing. More on this in the next section…

Step 2: Finding the Right Journal

Understanding how to publish a research paper involves selecting the appropriate journal for your work. This step is critical for successful publication, and you should take several factors into account when deciding which journal to apply for:

• Conduct thorough research to identify journals that specialise in your field of study and have published similar research. Naturally, if you submit a piece of research in molecular genetics to a journal that specialises in geology, you won’t be likely to get very far.
• Consider factors such as the journal’s scope, impact factor, and target audience. Today there is a wide array of journals to choose from, including traditional and respected print journals, as well as numerous online, open-access endeavours. Some, like Nature , even straddle both worlds.
• Review the submission guidelines provided by the journal and ensure your paper meets all the formatting requirements and word limits. This step is key. Nature, for example, offers a highly informative series of pages that tells you everything you need to know in order to satisfy their formatting guidelines (plus more on the whole submission process).
• Note that these guidelines can differ dramatically from journal to journal, and details really do matter. You might submit an outstanding piece of research, but if it includes, for example, images in the wrong size or format, this could mean a lengthy delay to getting it published. If you get everything right first time, you’ll save yourself a lot of time and trouble, as well as strengthen your publishing chances in the first place.

Step 3: Crafting a Strong Manuscript

Crafting a strong manuscript is crucial to impress journal editors and reviewers. Look at your paper as a complete package, and ensure that all the sections tie together to deliver your findings with clarity and precision.

• Begin by creating a clear and concise title that accurately reflects the content of your paper.
• Compose an informative abstract that summarises the purpose, methodology, results, and significance of your study.
• Craft an engaging introduction (link to the research paper introduction article) that draws your reader in.
• Develop a well-structured methodology section, presenting your results effectively using tables and figures.
• Write a compelling discussion and conclusion that emphasise the significance of your findings.

Step 4: Navigating the Peer-Review Process

Once you submit your research paper to a journal, it undergoes a rigorous peer-review process to ensure its quality and validity. In peer-review, experts in your field assess your research and provide feedback and suggestions for improvement, ultimately determining whether your paper is eligible for publishing or not. You are likely to encounter several models of peer-review, based on which party – author, reviewer, or both – remains anonymous throughout the process.

When your paper undergoes the peer-review process, be prepared for constructive criticism and address the comments you receive from your reviewer thoughtfully, providing clear and concise responses to their concerns or suggestions. These could make all the difference when it comes to making your next submission.

The peer-review process can seem like a closed book at times. Check out our discussion of the issue with philosopher and academic Amna Whiston in The Research Beat podcast!

Step 5: Submitting Your Paper

As we’ve already pointed out, one of the key elements in how to publish a research paper is ensuring that you meticulously follow the journal’s submission guidelines. Strive to comply with all formatting requirements, including citation styles, font, margins, and reference structure.

Before the final submission, thoroughly proofread your paper for errors, including grammar, spelling, and any inconsistencies in your data or analysis. At this stage, consider seeking feedback from colleagues or mentors to further improve the quality of your paper.

Step 6: Dealing with Rejections and Revising Your Paper

Rejection is a common part of the publishing process, but it shouldn’t discourage you. Analyse reviewer comments objectively and focus on the constructive feedback provided. Make necessary revisions and improvements to your paper to address the concerns raised by reviewers. If needed, consider submitting your paper to a different journal that is a better fit for your research.

For more tips on how to publish your paper out there, check out this thread by Dr. Asad Naveed ( @dr_asadnaveed ) – and if you need a refresher on the basics of how to publish under the Open Access model, watch this 5-minute video from Audemic Academy !

Final Thoughts

Successfully understanding how to publish a research paper requires dedication, attention to detail, and a systematic approach. By following the advice in our guide, you can increase your chances of navigating the publishing process effectively and achieving your goal of publication.

Remember, the journey may involve revisions, peer feedback, and potential rejections, but each step is an opportunity for growth and improvement. Stay persistent, maintain a positive mindset, and continue to refine your research paper until it reaches the standards of your target journal. Your contribution to your wider discipline through published research will not only advance your career, but also add to the growing body of collective knowledge in your field. Embrace the challenges and rewards that come with the publication process, and may your research paper make a significant impact in your area of study!

Looking for inspiration for your next big paper? Head to Audemic , where you can organise and listen to all the best and latest research in your field!

Keep striving, researchers! ✨

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How Many Work Hours Are Requisite to Publish a Manuscript?

Advances in medicine are driven by propagation of research and dissemination of meaningful results from basic science, clinical, or translational studies. Although a randomized controlled trial has the highest power, this is not the most frequently conducted study method in surgery, as randomized trials are often not feasible due to disease infrequency or an inability to conduct an ethically sound trial. In clinical research, the most prevalent study design is a retrospective case series. 1 Quantifying the hours spent on a retrospective study from idea genesis to manuscript publication is an important metric for clinicians, students/trainees, academic departments, and administrators in academic medical centers. It will allow appropriate allocation of funding for research-based activities, including human capital, research infrastructure, academic surgeon compensation, and for promotion/tenure purposes. Currently, there is an absence of a good metric in the literature quantifying the hours that go into publishing a retrospective study. Roland and Kirkpatrick 2 alluded to this question in 1975 but did not study it. This study aims to quantify work hours associated with publishing a manuscript with a retrospective study design.

Following approval of University of British Columbia Children’s and Women’s research ethics board (H12-01664), 16 surgeons with 5 or more published retrospective studies identified via PubMed were selected to participate in this study; a survey was designed as the data collection tool. Careful screening for publications with a retrospective study design was identified on PubMed, based on the surgeon’s name. Investigators were given a package with a separate survey data sheet for each individual published manuscript and were asked to estimate the hours spent by each member of the study team (principle investigator, coinvestigator, resident, research assistant, clinical research coordinator, medical student, and others) toward 8 components of the research cycle: study planning, literature review, ethics application, data collection, data analysis, manuscript preparation, manuscript submission, and postsubmission revision for each publication. Surveys returned with insufficient or incomplete data were excluded. Descriptive/summary statistics were used to analyze the data.

A total of 198 published retrospective studies were identified. Thirteen surgeons returned a total of 171 surveys (81% response rate) published over a 22-year span (1990–2012). The number of contributing authors ranged from 2 to 11, with the number of subjects ranging from 3 to 7071. Results revealed that a median of 177 hours was spent per publication (range, 29–1287). Neither the number of authors nor the number of subjects correlated with the hours spent per publication. The individuals spending the most time per publication were medical students, followed by research assistants and resident trainees (34%, 23%, and 20% of total hours, respectively); Figure 1 graphically depicts these data. The aspect of the research cycle that consumed the most hours was data collection, followed by manuscript preparation and data analysis (23%, 22%, and 13% of total hours, respectively); Figure 2 graphically depicts these data.

Time spent per member of the study team (median hours). Proportion of total time is given in parentheses.

Time spent per component of a published retrospective study (median hours). Proportion of total time is given in parentheses.

Time estimates for publications from start to finish are between 4 and 5 years. 2 , 3 However, there is no published time estimate for the hours of required work during this time. Results of our study suggest that it takes a median of 177 hours (or roughly twenty-two 8-hour days of consecutive work by a single individual) to take a retrospective study from idea genesis to publication; these hours reflect a significant amount of dedication by the study team. Interestingly, the number of authors and study subjects did not seem to correlate with the total hours required to publish a manuscript. One possible explanation is that the number of data points collected as part of the chart review can greatly alter the time requirement, and this was not examined in our study. In addition, databases with preentered patient information could have been used for studies with large number of patients, thereby decreasing the amount of time needed for data collection.

We recognize that a major limitation of our study is the presence of recall bias. This confounding variable is inherent to all retrospective survey-based study designs. Interestingly, several articles have consistently shown that people underestimate the duration of past tasks. 4 , 5 A more accurate way to study the question at hand would be to use a prospective design. However, given that there is an average time lapse of 4–5 years before a project is published and the uncertainty in publication success, a prospective study design may not be either the most effective or efficient study method.

Nonetheless, we hope that the results of this study pave the way for future investigations in this subject to inform the various stakeholders as to the time commitment necessary to ultimately publish surgical scientific research.

The authors have no financial interest to declare in relation to the content of this article. The Article Processing Charge was paid for by the authors.

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How to Publish a Research Paper – Step by Step Guide

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Publishing a research paper is an important step for researchers to disseminate their findings to a wider audience and contribute to the advancement of knowledge in their field. Whether you are a graduate student, a postdoctoral fellow, or an established researcher, publishing a paper requires careful planning, rigorous research, and clear writing. In this process, you will need to identify a research question , conduct a thorough literature review , design a methodology, analyze data, and draw conclusions. Additionally, you will need to consider the appropriate journals or conferences to submit your work to and adhere to their guidelines for formatting and submission. In this article, we will discuss some ways to publish your Research Paper.

How to Publish a Research Paper

To Publish a Research Paper follow the guide below:

• Conduct original research : Conduct thorough research on a specific topic or problem. Collect data, analyze it, and draw conclusions based on your findings.
• Write the paper : Write a detailed paper describing your research. It should include an abstract, introduction, literature review, methodology, results, discussion, and conclusion.
• Choose a suitable journal or conference : Look for a journal or conference that specializes in your research area. You can check their submission guidelines to ensure your paper meets their requirements.
• Prepare your submission: Follow the guidelines and prepare your submission, including the paper, abstract, cover letter, and any other required documents.
• Submit the paper: Submit your paper online through the journal or conference website. Make sure you meet the submission deadline.
• Peer-review process : Your paper will be reviewed by experts in the field who will provide feedback on the quality of your research, methodology, and conclusions.
• Revisions : Based on the feedback you receive, revise your paper and resubmit it.
• Acceptance : Once your paper is accepted, you will receive a notification from the journal or conference. You may need to make final revisions before the paper is published.
• Publication : Your paper will be published online or in print. You can also promote your work through social media or other channels to increase its visibility.

How to Choose Journal for Research Paper Publication

Here are some steps to follow to help you select an appropriate journal:

• Identify your research topic and audience : Your research topic and intended audience should guide your choice of journal. Identify the key journals in your field of research and read the scope and aim of the journal to determine if your paper is a good fit.
• Analyze the journal’s impact and reputation : Check the impact factor and ranking of the journal, as well as its acceptance rate and citation frequency. A high-impact journal can give your paper more visibility and credibility.
• Consider the journal’s publication policies : Look for the journal’s publication policies such as the word count limit, formatting requirements, open access options, and submission fees. Make sure that you can comply with the requirements and that the journal is in line with your publication goals.
• Look at recent publications : Review recent issues of the journal to evaluate whether your paper would fit in with the journal’s current content and style.
• Seek advice from colleagues and mentors: Ask for recommendations and suggestions from your colleagues and mentors in your field, especially those who have experience publishing in the same or similar journals.
• Be prepared to make changes : Be prepared to revise your paper according to the requirements and guidelines of the chosen journal. It is also important to be open to feedback from the editor and reviewers.

List of Journals for Research Paper Publications

There are thousands of academic journals covering various fields of research. Here are some of the most popular ones, categorized by field:

General/Multidisciplinary

• Nature: https://www.nature.com/
• Science: https://www.sciencemag.org/
• PLOS ONE: https://journals.plos.org/plosone/
• Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences (PNAS): https://www.pnas.org/
• The Lancet: https://www.thelancet.com/
• JAMA (Journal of the American Medical Association): https://jamanetwork.com/journals/jama

Social Sciences/Humanities

• Journal of Personality and Social Psychology: https://www.apa.org/pubs/journals/psp
• Journal of Consumer Research: https://www.journals.uchicago.edu/journals/jcr
• Journal of Educational Psychology: https://www.apa.org/pubs/journals/edu
• Journal of Applied Psychology: https://www.apa.org/pubs/journals/apl
• Journal of Communication: https://academic.oup.com/joc
• American Journal of Political Science: https://ajps.org/
• Journal of International Business Studies: https://www.jibs.net/
• Journal of Marketing Research: https://www.ama.org/journal-of-marketing-research/

Natural Sciences

• Journal of Biological Chemistry: https://www.jbc.org/
• Cell: https://www.cell.com/
• Science Advances: https://advances.sciencemag.org/
• Chemical Reviews: https://pubs.acs.org/journal/chreay
• Angewandte Chemie: https://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/journal/15213765
• Physical Review Letters: https://journals.aps.org/prl/
• Journal of Geophysical Research: https://agupubs.onlinelibrary.wiley.com/journal/2156531X
• Journal of High Energy Physics: https://link.springer.com/journal/13130

Engineering/Technology

• IEEE Transactions on Neural Networks and Learning Systems: https://ieeexplore.ieee.org/xpl/RecentIssue.jsp?punumber=5962385
• IEEE Transactions on Power Systems: https://ieeexplore.ieee.org/xpl/RecentIssue.jsp?punumber=59
• IEEE Transactions on Medical Imaging: https://ieeexplore.ieee.org/xpl/RecentIssue.jsp?punumber=42
• IEEE Transactions on Control Systems Technology: https://ieeexplore.ieee.org/xpl/RecentIssue.jsp?punumber=87
• Journal of Engineering Mechanics: https://ascelibrary.org/journal/jenmdt
• Journal of Materials Science: https://www.springer.com/journal/10853
• Journal of Chemical Engineering of Japan: https://www.jstage.jst.go.jp/browse/jcej
• Journal of Mechanical Design: https://asmedigitalcollection.asme.org/mechanicaldesign

Medical/Health Sciences

• New England Journal of Medicine: https://www.nejm.org/
• The BMJ (formerly British Medical Journal): https://www.bmj.com/
• Journal of the American Medical Association (JAMA): https://jamanetwork.com/journals/jama
• Annals of Internal Medicine: https://www.acpjournals.org/journal/aim
• American Journal of Epidemiology: https://academic.oup.com/aje
• Journal of Clinical Oncology: https://ascopubs.org/journal/jco
• Journal of Infectious Diseases: https://academic.oup.com/jid

List of Conferences for Research Paper Publications

There are many conferences that accept research papers for publication. The specific conferences you should consider will depend on your field of research. Here are some suggestions for conferences in a few different fields:

Computer Science and Information Technology:

• IEEE International Conference on Computer Communications (INFOCOM): https://www.ieee-infocom.org/
• ACM SIGCOMM Conference on Data Communication: https://conferences.sigcomm.org/sigcomm/
• IEEE Symposium on Security and Privacy (SP): https://www.ieee-security.org/TC/SP/
• ACM Conference on Computer and Communications Security (CCS): https://www.sigsac.org/ccs/
• ACM Conference on Human-Computer Interaction (CHI): https://chi2022.acm.org/

Engineering:

• IEEE International Conference on Robotics and Automation (ICRA): https://www.ieee-icra.org/
• International Conference on Mechanical and Aerospace Engineering (ICMAE): http://www.icmae.org/
• International Conference on Civil and Environmental Engineering (ICCEE): http://www.iccee.org/
• International Conference on Materials Science and Engineering (ICMSE): http://www.icmse.org/
• International Conference on Energy and Power Engineering (ICEPE): http://www.icepe.org/

Natural Sciences:

• American Chemical Society National Meeting & Exposition: https://www.acs.org/content/acs/en/meetings/national-meeting.html
• American Physical Society March Meeting: https://www.aps.org/meetings/march/
• International Conference on Environmental Science and Technology (ICEST): http://www.icest.org/
• International Conference on Natural Science and Environment (ICNSE): http://www.icnse.org/
• International Conference on Life Science and Biological Engineering (LSBE): http://www.lsbe.org/

Social Sciences:

• Annual Meeting of the American Sociological Association (ASA): https://www.asanet.org/annual-meeting-2022
• International Conference on Social Science and Humanities (ICSSH): http://www.icssh.org/
• International Conference on Psychology and Behavioral Sciences (ICPBS): http://www.icpbs.org/
• International Conference on Education and Social Science (ICESS): http://www.icess.org/
• International Conference on Management and Information Science (ICMIS): http://www.icmis.org/

How to Publish a Research Paper in Journal

Publishing a research paper in a journal is a crucial step in disseminating scientific knowledge and contributing to the field. Here are the general steps to follow:

• Choose a research topic : Select a topic of your interest and identify a research question or problem that you want to investigate. Conduct a literature review to identify the gaps in the existing knowledge that your research will address.
• Conduct research : Develop a research plan and methodology to collect data and conduct experiments. Collect and analyze data to draw conclusions that address the research question.
• Write a paper: Organize your findings into a well-structured paper with clear and concise language. Your paper should include an introduction, literature review, methodology, results, discussion, and conclusion. Use academic language and provide references for your sources.
• Choose a journal: Choose a journal that is relevant to your research topic and audience. Consider factors such as impact factor, acceptance rate, and the reputation of the journal.
• Follow journal guidelines : Review the submission guidelines and formatting requirements of the journal. Follow the guidelines carefully to ensure that your paper meets the journal’s requirements.
• Submit your paper : Submit your paper to the journal through the online submission system or by email. Include a cover letter that briefly explains the significance of your research and why it is suitable for the journal.
• Wait for reviews: Your paper will be reviewed by experts in the field. Be prepared to address their comments and make revisions to your paper.
• Revise and resubmit: Make revisions to your paper based on the reviewers’ comments and resubmit it to the journal. If your paper is accepted, congratulations! If not, consider revising and submitting it to another journal.
• Address reviewer comments : Reviewers may provide comments and suggestions for revisions to your paper. Address these comments carefully and thoughtfully to improve the quality of your paper.
• Submit the final version: Once your revisions are complete, submit the final version of your paper to the journal. Be sure to follow any additional formatting guidelines and requirements provided by the journal.
• Publication : If your paper is accepted, it will be published in the journal. Some journals provide online publication while others may publish a print version. Be sure to cite your published paper in future research and communicate your findings to the scientific community.

How to Publish a Research Paper for Students

Here are some steps you can follow to publish a research paper as an Under Graduate or a High School Student:

• Select a topic: Choose a topic that is relevant and interesting to you, and that you have a good understanding of.
• Conduct research : Gather information and data on your chosen topic through research, experiments, surveys, or other means.
• Write the paper : Start with an outline, then write the introduction, methods, results, discussion, and conclusion sections of the paper. Be sure to follow any guidelines provided by your instructor or the journal you plan to submit to.
• Edit and revise: Review your paper for errors in spelling, grammar, and punctuation. Ask a peer or mentor to review your paper and provide feedback for improvement.
• Choose a journal : Look for journals that publish papers in your field of study and that are appropriate for your level of research. Some popular journals for students include PLOS ONE, Nature, and Science.
• Submit the paper: Follow the submission guidelines for the journal you choose, which typically include a cover letter, abstract, and formatting requirements. Be prepared to wait several weeks to months for a response.
• Address feedback : If your paper is accepted with revisions, address the feedback from the reviewers and resubmit your paper. If your paper is rejected, review the feedback and consider revising and resubmitting to a different journal.

How to Publish a Research Paper for Free

Publishing a research paper for free can be challenging, but it is possible. Here are some steps you can take to publish your research paper for free:

• Choose a suitable open-access journal: Look for open-access journals that are relevant to your research area. Open-access journals allow readers to access your paper without charge, so your work will be more widely available.
• Check the journal’s reputation : Before submitting your paper, ensure that the journal is reputable by checking its impact factor, publication history, and editorial board.
• Follow the submission guidelines : Every journal has specific guidelines for submitting papers. Make sure to follow these guidelines carefully to increase the chances of acceptance.
• Submit your paper : Once you have completed your research paper, submit it to the journal following their submission guidelines.
• Wait for the review process: Your paper will undergo a peer-review process, where experts in your field will evaluate your work. Be patient during this process, as it can take several weeks or even months.
• Revise your paper : If your paper is rejected, don’t be discouraged. Revise your paper based on the feedback you receive from the reviewers and submit it to another open-access journal.
• Promote your research: Once your paper is published, promote it on social media and other online platforms. This will increase the visibility of your work and help it reach a wider audience.

Journals and Conferences for Free Research Paper publications

Here are the websites of the open-access journals and conferences mentioned:

Open-Access Journals:

• PLOS ONE – https://journals.plos.org/plosone/
• BMC Research Notes – https://bmcresnotes.biomedcentral.com/
• Frontiers in… – https://www.frontiersin.org/
• Journal of Open Research Software – https://openresearchsoftware.metajnl.com/
• PeerJ – https://peerj.com/

Conferences:

• IEEE Global Communications Conference (GLOBECOM) – https://globecom2022.ieee-globecom.org/
• IEEE International Conference on Computer Communications (INFOCOM) – https://infocom2022.ieee-infocom.org/
• IEEE International Conference on Data Mining (ICDM) – https://www.ieee-icdm.org/
• ACM SIGCOMM Conference on Data Communication (SIGCOMM) – https://conferences.sigcomm.org/sigcomm/
• ACM Conference on Computer and Communications Security (CCS) – https://www.sigsac.org/ccs/CCS2022/

Importance of Research Paper Publication

Research paper publication is important for several reasons, both for individual researchers and for the scientific community as a whole. Here are some reasons why:

• Advancing scientific knowledge : Research papers provide a platform for researchers to present their findings and contribute to the body of knowledge in their field. These papers often contain novel ideas, experimental data, and analyses that can help to advance scientific understanding.
• Building a research career : Publishing research papers is an essential component of building a successful research career. Researchers are often evaluated based on the number and quality of their publications, and having a strong publication record can increase one’s chances of securing funding, tenure, or a promotion.
• Peer review and quality control: Publication in a peer-reviewed journal means that the research has been scrutinized by other experts in the field. This peer review process helps to ensure the quality and validity of the research findings.
• Recognition and visibility : Publishing a research paper can bring recognition and visibility to the researchers and their work. It can lead to invitations to speak at conferences, collaborations with other researchers, and media coverage.
• Impact on society : Research papers can have a significant impact on society by informing policy decisions, guiding clinical practice, and advancing technological innovation.

Advantages of Research Paper Publication

There are several advantages to publishing a research paper, including:

• Recognition: Publishing a research paper allows researchers to gain recognition for their work, both within their field and in the academic community as a whole. This can lead to new collaborations, invitations to conferences, and other opportunities to share their research with a wider audience.
• Career advancement : A strong publication record can be an important factor in career advancement, particularly in academia. Publishing research papers can help researchers secure funding, grants, and promotions.
• Dissemination of knowledge : Research papers are an important way to share new findings and ideas with the broader scientific community. By publishing their research, scientists can contribute to the collective body of knowledge in their field and help advance scientific understanding.
• Feedback and peer review : Publishing a research paper allows other experts in the field to provide feedback on the research, which can help improve the quality of the work and identify potential flaws or limitations. Peer review also helps ensure that research is accurate and reliable.
• Citation and impact : Published research papers can be cited by other researchers, which can help increase the impact and visibility of the research. High citation rates can also help establish a researcher’s reputation and credibility within their field.

About the author

Muhammad Hassan

Researcher, Academic Writer, Web developer

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How Long Does Peer Review Take?

No one likes to wait. But this often happens in the peer review process.

You’ve submitted a manuscript to a journal. You’ve managed the submission system and uploaded all your files correctly. The editor emailed telling you your article was sent out for peer review . So far so good.

But then you wait. And wait…

How long should you have to wait to receive comments from peer reviewers and the journal editor? In other words, how long does peer review take?

Short answer: It takes up to about 3 months (studies have shown peer review typically takes 7–12 weeks), but there are a lot of variables to take into account. These include the journal’s internal processes and publication frequency, availability of peer reviewers, and other things out of your control.

Here’s some insight into what goes on and how you can give your next manuscript submission a shove in the right direction.

The good, the bad, and the crazy of waiting to get published

Authors often have little or no idea how long peer review takes, and how long they should wait before doing something. And they often end up waiting longer than they need to.

Some waiting it to be expected but if it’s getting too long: Don’t wait, communicate !

Some waited over 5 years to get published

A 2016 survey by Nature Research (see image below) showed some 30% of authors ended up waiting 6 months to 1 year for their articles to be published. In 37% of cases the wait was 1–2 years.

A shocking 15% of survey respondents waited 2–3 years, while 8% waited for 3–5 years.

Even worse, 3% of the 3,644 authors surveyed had waited over 5 years for one of their articles to appear in print

You can start a family in that time!

It doesn’t have to be that way, though.

What’s the average wait?

The average waiting time for authors across academic publishing is actually just 90 days from submission, through peer review, to publication.

This is better than it used to be. Some thanks goes to our era of fast online publishing and open access for articles.

Specific examples

• PNAS averages 10 days from submission to initial decision, 45 days from submission to decision on a full review, and 6.4 months for submission to publication. This is, however, a highly selective journal.
• Open-access journal PLOS ONE takes around 43 days to first decision. Then, all sorts of variable come into play, because the journal deals with such high volume and breadth of studies.

A study of 3,000 articles

A study by Huisman and Smits extracted data from more than 3,000 articles submitted to one website (SciRev). It showed that peer review time in samples ranged from under 4 weeks to more than 3 months, with 10% having to wait even longer.

Interestingly, less than 20% of articles surveyed were rejected without peer review and, indeed, the length of review (up to a point, about 2.5 months) correlated with higher perceived “quality” on the author’s part.

Stages of the submission process include

• Processing the initial article: 1­–2 weeks
• Selecting peer reviewers: 1­–2 weeks
• Sending the paper out for review and waiting for comments: 3–6 weeks
• Rendering an editorial decision: 1­–2 weeks

The problem is: Peer review often doesn’t go smoothly.

• Editors forget.
• Editors can’t find well-matched peer reviewers to work on submissions (actually the most common reason for delay revealed in surveys).
• Editors have a huge backlog to work through.
• Editors have day jobs as full-time academics and are performing tasks for journals “on the side.”
• Peer reviewers don’t always respond to editorial requests, or take a very long time before they submit their reviews.

These things are a mix of human nature and a bit unacceptable.

So really, how long?

So, how long should you wait for your next paper to come back from peer review? Not more than 10–12 weeks, or up to 3 months. Read on to find how to avoid hitting that point and find what to do if you do actually hit it.

How to speed up the review process

There are a number of ways you, the author, can speed up the review.

Newer and open access journals

One way is to select newer and open access and journals. A study found reviewers and editors with these journals tend to be more enthusiastic . It’s often harder, however, for editors to find suitable, able reviewers at older and more established journals.

Engaged journal editors search for eager peer reviewers who can do their review and give comments relatively quickly.

This is often done at journals by adding effective reviewers to journal editorial boards so that some recognition passes back to an individual’s CV or resume.

Publishers know that peer review tasks, performed by busy, working academics are very often not considered important by their institutions as part of academic assessment processes.

Another explanation, though, is that reviewers are simply not being careful enough. This was shown to be partly the case in a well-known pathology journal that had lowered review speed to 16 days for an initial decision.

Yet still, no matter how responsible and well-managed journals may be, there are times when you can give them a nudge.

You can write a polite email to your journal editor and ask what’s going on.

Write the journal editor and ask for an update

Take a deep breath first, no matter how much pressure you’re under. You must keep your cool and mind your manners when your journal is leaving you hanging.

Be polite and professional. Make sure you write your email so as to give something back to the editor, to help and support them, rather than being aggressive or angry (as so many authors are in these situations).

Help them out

You need to make this as easy as possible for the editor. They’re not likely going to remember you right away.

Put all necessary information into your inquiry emails: Names of authors, paper title, the initial manuscript number and date of submission.

If you didn’t include peer reviewer suggestions in your initial cover letter , add them now. If you did include them (as you should have), suggest a few more.

What to write

Address the editor by name (typically, Professor + Last Name or Dr. + Last Name).

Using someone’s name directly in correspondence is one of the most effective ways to get their attention and put them in a favorable mindset to help you: “A person’s name, in any language, is the sweetest and most agreeable sound,” as Carnegie said.

Dear Professor Jones:

Thank you very much for your time taken with our recently submitted manuscript (add title and number here).

We wondered if there is something we can do to expedite the processing of our manuscript. Please inform us about any issue you may have encountered.

We also understand that it can be challenging to find suitable peer reviewers. Accordingly, we are providing a number of candidate peer reviewers with their contact information. These are as follows:

[add peer review info here]

Thank you again for your time and consideration. We await your response.

Corresponding Author

Suggesting peer reviewers

An effective inquiry email to an editor about a manuscript should ideally contain a number of additional peer reviewer suggestions. That’s because it’s quite likely that your paper’s review is being held up by failure to secure reviewers.

Some journals have removed the option for authors to suggest peer reviewers from their submission systems because these were often open to abuse.

But in a cover letter or inquiry letter to a journal you can make suggestions. (Check our Reviewer Recommendation service if you want a customized list of international researchers in your area of specialty).

Here a few simple rules to choosing a reviewer:

• Look to your reading and references A good place to start looking for potential reviewers is in the articles you read or references you’ve used. Authors on these papers will be knowledgeable in fields related to your work and therefore would have a good background from which to assess the various aspects of your manuscript.
• Network You may have met people at conferences, poster sessions, or other networking events. These people are active in your field and may have shown interest in your work. They will also be up to date on the literature and techniques in the field and so would make excellent candidates to review your manuscript.
• Aim for younger and mid-level researchers Heads of department or high-level professors may seem like the most ideal people to evaluate your manuscript; however, they are likely too busy to take on much peer review. Younger scientists are in the process of establishing their careers and authority in the field so they are more likely to be active in the peer review process.
• Be cross-disciplinary If your work is interdisciplinary or uses an analysis method from another field, consider suggesting researchers in this area as well. Although they may not be as familiar with your primary field, they will have the expertise to evaluate your use of the method, which is an important overall contribution to improving your manuscript.

Who not to suggest

Do not suggest people you work closely with, or colleagues you’ve published with recently, as these are conflicts of interest.

You also cannot nominate students who’ve worked with you, or other close colleagues. Editors will check your (and their) recent publication lists. They want to know:

• Is it their field?
• Do they have time?
• Is there any conflict of interest?

Who to suggest

Nominate those working in the same field with whom you’ve had no conflict. Ideally, these are researchers who will likely provide an overall favorable view of your work.

This is why it’s a good idea to talk about your work pre-publication, to share it on preprint servers or send it out to colleagues internationally and ask them for feedback.

Receiving positive feedback on work yet to be published means you have a potential peer review nomination you can put into your inquiry letter when you write and ask for an update on your submission.

Assistant professors and earlier stage researchers are also better candidates, as they are actively building their reputations. They’ll have more time and energy for peer review than top researchers leading their own labs.

In sum: Patience is a virtue, but you don’t have to wait years

Three months is a good rough deadline for when you can get in touch with the journal. Hopefully, it’s worth the wait, because even Hollywood movies see the value of peer review in validating your study.

Be polite. Be courteous. Give something back to the editor and you’ll more than likely get a positive response. Check out our webinar “ Effective communication during the submission and publication process ” for practical tips.

The bottom line is: Don’t wait, communicate. The painful wait you’re going through may be something you can help resolve.

Get your free template for writing a manuscript submission inquiry letter below.

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Preparing your manuscript.

What are you submitting? The main manuscript document The title page How do I format my article? Sage Author Services

What are you submitting? 

Sage journals publish a variety of different article types, from original research, review articles, to commentaries and opinion pieces. Please view your chosen journal’s submission guidelines for information on what article types are published and what the individual requirements are for each. Below are general guidelines for submitting an original research article. 

Whatever kind of article you are submitting, remember that the language you use is important. We are committed to promoting equity throughout our publishing program, and we believe that using language is a simple and powerful way to ensure the communities we serve feel welcomed, respected, safe, and able to fully engage with the publishing process and our published content. Inclusive language considerations are especially important when discussing topics like age, appearance, disability, ethnicity, gender, gender identity, race, religion, sexual orientation, socioeconomic status, emigration status, and weight. We have produced an Inclusive Language Guide that recommends preferred terminology on these topics. We recognize that language is constantly evolving and we’re committed to ensuring that this guide is continuously updated to reflect changing practices. The guide isn't exhaustive, but we hope it serves as a helpful starting point.  

The main manuscript document 

Have a look at your chosen journal’s submission guidelines for information on what sections should be included in your manuscript. Generally there will be an Abstract, Introduction, Methodology, Results, Discussion, Conclusion, Acknowledgments, Statements and Declarations section, and References. Be sure to remove any identifying information from the main manuscript if you are submitting to a journal that has a double-anonymized peer review policy and instead include this on a separate title page. See the Sage Journal Author Gateway for detailed guidance on making an anonymous submission .   

Your article title, keywords, and abstract all contribute to its position in search engine results, directly affecting the number of people who see your work. For details of what you can do to influence this, visit How to help readers find your article online .

Title: Your manuscript’s title should be concise, descriptive, unambiguous, accurate, and reflect the precise contents of the manuscript. A descriptive title that includes the topic of the manuscript makes an article more findable in the major indexing services.  

Abstract: Your abstract should concisely state the purpose of the research, major findings, and conclusions. If your research includes clinical trials, the trial registry name and URL, and registration number must be included at the end of the abstract. Submissions that do not meet this requirement will not be considered. Please see your chosen journal’s guidelines for information on how to set out your abstract.  

Keywords: You will be asked to list a certain number of keywords after the abstract. Keywords should be as specific as possible to the research topic.   

Acknowledgements: If you are including an Acknowledgements section, this will be published at the end of your article. The Acknowledgments section should include all contributors who do not meet the criteria for authorship. Per ICMJE recommendations , it is best practice to obtain consent from non-author contributors who you are acknowledging in your manuscript.   

Writing assistance and third-party submissions: if you have received any writing or editing assistance from a third-party, for example a specialist communications company, this must be clearly stated in the Acknowledgements section and in the covering letter. Please see the Sage Author Gateway for what information to include in your Acknowledgements section. If your submission is being made on your behalf by someone who is not listed as an author, for example the third-party who provided writing/editing assistance, you must state this in the Acknowledgements and also in your covering letter. Please note that the journal editor reserves the right to not consider submissions made by a third party rather than by the author/s themselves.   

Author contributions statement: As part of our commitment to ensuring an ethical, transparent and fair peer review and publication process, some journals have adopted CRediT (Contributor Roles Taxonomy) . CRediT is a high-level taxonomy, including 14 roles, which is used to describe each author’s individual contributions to the work. Other journals may require you to list the contribution of each author as part of the submission process. If so, please include an Author Contributions heading within your submission after the Acknowledgements section. The information you give on submission will then show under the Author Contributions heading later at the proofing stage.  

Statements and declarations: You’ll be asked to provide various statements and declarations regarding the research you’re submitting. These will vary by journal so do make sure you read your chosen journal’s guidelines carefully to see what is required. Please include a section with the heading ‘Statements and Declarations’ at the end of your submitted article, after the Acknowledgements section (and Author Contributions section if applicable) including the relevant sub-headings listed below. If a declaration is not applicable to your submission, you must still include the heading and state ‘Not applicable’ underneath. Please note that you may be asked to justify why a declaration was not applicable to your submission by the Editorial Office.

• Ethical considerations: Please include your ethics approval statements under this heading, even if you have already included ethics approval information in your methods section. If ethical approval was not required, you need to state this. You can find information on what to say in your ethical statements as well as example statements on our Publication ethics and research integrity policies page    
• Consent to participate: Please include any participant consent information under this heading and state whether informed consent to participate was written or verbal. If the requirement for informed consent to participate has been waived by the relevant Ethics Committee or Institutional Review Board (i.e. where it has been deemed that consent would be impossible or impracticable to obtain), please state this. If this is not applicable to your manuscript, please state ‘Not applicable’ in this section. More information and example statements can be found on our Publication ethics and research integrity policies page   
• Consent for publication: Submissions containing any data from an individual person (including individual details, images or videos) must include a statement confirming that informed consent for publication was provided by the participant(s) or a legally authorized representative. Non-essential identifying details should be omitted.  Please do not submit the participant’s actual written informed consent with your article, as this in itself breaches the patient’s confidentiality. The Journal requests that you confirm to us, in writing, that you have obtained written informed consent to publish but the written consent itself should be held by the authors/investigators themselves, for example in a patient’s hospital record. The confirmatory letter may be uploaded with your submission as a separate file in addition to the statement confirming that consent to publish was obtained within the manuscript text. If this is not applicable to your manuscript, please state ‘Not applicable’ in this section. If you need one you can download this template participant consent form . 
• Declaration of conflicting interest: All journals require a declaration of conflicting interests from all authors so that a statement can be included in your article. For guidance on conflict of interest statements, see our policy on conflicting interest declarations and the ICMJE recommendations . If no conflict exists, your statement should read: The author(s) declared no potential conflicts of interest with respect to the research, authorship, and/or publication of this article.
• Funding statement: All articles need to include a funding statement, under a separate heading, even if you did not receive funding .  You’ll find guidance and examples on our Funding statements page .  
• Data availability statement: We are committed to helping ensure you reach as many readers as possible, always in a spirit of openness and transparency. We encourage you to share your research to a public repository and cite this data in your research (please note that this is a requirement for some journals). You will need to publish a data availability statement with your article under this heading. More information on how to write one can be found on the Sage Gateway: Research Data Sharing FAQs | SAGE Publications Ltd   

Artwork, figures, and other graphics: Illustrations, pictures and graphs, should be supplied in the highest quality and in an electronic format that helps us to publish your article in the best way possible. Please follow the guidelines below to enable us to prepare your artwork for the printed issue as well as the online version. 

• Format: TIFF, JPEG: Common format for pictures (containing no text or graphs). 
• EPS: Preferred format for graphs and line art (retains quality when enlarging/zooming in). 
• Placement: Figures/charts and tables created in MS Word should be included in the main text rather than at the end of the document. 
• Figures and other files created outside Word (i.e. Excel, PowerPoint, JPG, TIFF and EPS) should be submitted separately. Please add a placeholder note in the running text (i.e. “[insert Figure 1.]") 
• Resolution: Rasterized based files (i.e. with .tiff or .jpeg extension) require a resolution of at least 300 dpi (dots per inch). Line art should be supplied with a minimum resolution of 800 dpi. 
• Colour: Please note that images supplied in colour will be published in colour online and black and white in print (unless otherwise arranged). Therefore, it is important that you supply images that are comprehensible in black and white as well (i.e. by using colour with a distinctive pattern or dotted lines). The captions should reflect this by not using words indicating colour. If you have requested colour reproduction in the print version, we will advise you of any costs on receipt of your accepted article. 
• Dimension: Check that the artworks supplied match or exceed the dimensions of the journal. Images cannot be scaled up after origination 
• Fonts: The lettering used in the artwork should not vary too much in size and type (usually sans serif font as a default). 

Please ensure that you have obtained any necessary permission from copyright holders for reproducing any illustrations, tables, figures, or lengthy quotations previously published elsewhere. For further information including guidance on fair dealing for criticism and review, please see the Frequently Asked Questions page on the Sage Journal Author Gateway.   

References: Every in-text citation must have a corresponding citation in the reference list and vice versa. Corresponding citations must have identical spelling and year. Information about what reference style to use can be found in your chosen journal’s guidelines. 

Authors should update any references to preprints when a peer reviewed version is made available, to cite the published research. Citations to preprints are otherwise discouraged.  

Supplemental material Sage journals can host additional materials online (e.g. datasets, podcasts, videos, images etc.) alongside the full text of the article. Your supplemental material must be one of our accepted file types. For that list and more information please refer to our guidelines on submitting supplemental files .  

The title page  

You will also need to prepare a title page. This should include any information removed from the main manuscript document for the purposes of anonymity. The title page will not be sent to peer reviewers.  

Your title page should include:  

• Article title  
• The full list of authors including all names and affiliations. 
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How Much Research Is Being Written by Large Language Models?

New studies show a marked spike in LLM usage in academia, especially in computer science. What does this mean for researchers and reviewers?

In March of this year, a  tweet about an academic paper went viral for all the wrong reasons. The introduction section of the paper, published in  Elsevier’s  Surfaces and Interfaces , began with this line:  Certainly, here is a possible introduction for your topic. 

Look familiar? 

It should, if you are a user of ChatGPT and have applied its talents for the purpose of content generation. LLMs are being increasingly used to assist with writing tasks, but examples like this in academia are largely anecdotal and had not been quantified before now. 

“While this is an egregious example,” says  James Zou , associate professor of biomedical data science and, by courtesy, of computer science and of electrical engineering at Stanford, “in many cases, it’s less obvious, and that’s why we need to develop more granular and robust statistical methods to estimate the frequency and magnitude of LLM usage. At this particular moment, people want to know what content around us is written by AI. This is especially important in the context of research, for the papers we author and read and the reviews we get on our papers. That’s why we wanted to study how much of those have been written with the help of AI.”

In two papers looking at LLM use in scientific publishings, Zou and his team* found that 17.5% of computer science papers and 16.9% of peer review text had at least some content drafted by AI. The paper on LLM usage in peer reviews will be presented at the International Conference on Machine Learning.

Read  Mapping the Increasing Use of LLMs in Scientific Papers and  Monitoring AI-Modified Content at Scale: A Case Study on the Impact of ChatGPT on AI Conference Peer Reviews  

Here Zou discusses the findings and implications of this work, which was supported through a Stanford HAI Hoffman Yee Research Grant . 

How did you determine whether AI wrote sections of a paper or a review?

We first saw that there are these specific worlds – like commendable, innovative, meticulous, pivotal, intricate, realm, and showcasing – whose frequency in reviews sharply spiked, coinciding with the release of ChatGPT. Additionally, we know that these words are much more likely to be used by LLMs than by humans. The reason we know this is that we actually did an experiment where we took many papers, used LLMs to write reviews of them, and compared those reviews to reviews written by human reviewers on the same papers. Then we quantified which words are more likely to be used by LLMs vs. humans, and those are exactly the words listed. The fact that they are more likely to be used by an LLM and that they have also seen a sharp spike coinciding with the release of LLMs is strong evidence.

Some journals permit the use of LLMs in academic writing, as long as it’s noted, while others, including  Science and the ICML conference, prohibit it. How are the ethics perceived in academia?

This is an important and timely topic because the policies of various journals are changing very quickly. For example,  Science said in the beginning that they would not allow authors to use language models in their submissions, but they later changed their policy and said that people could use language models, but authors have to explicitly note where the language model is being used. All the journals are struggling with how to define this and what’s the right way going forward.

You observed an increase in usage of LLMs in academic writing, particularly in computer science papers (up to 17.5%). Math and  Nature family papers, meanwhile, used AI text about 6.3% of the time. What do you think accounts for the discrepancy between these disciplines? 

Artificial intelligence and computer science disciplines have seen an explosion in the number of papers submitted to conferences like ICLR and NeurIPS. And I think that’s really caused a strong burden, in many ways, to reviewers and to authors. So now it’s increasingly difficult to find qualified reviewers who have time to review all these papers. And some authors may feel more competition that they need to keep up and keep writing more and faster. 

You analyzed close to a million papers on arXiv, bioRxiv, and  Nature from January 2020 to February 2024. Do any of these journals include humanities papers or anything in the social sciences?  

We mostly wanted to focus more on CS and engineering and biomedical areas and interdisciplinary areas, like  Nature family journals, which also publish some social science papers. Availability mattered in this case. So, it’s relatively easy for us to get data from arXiv, bioRxiv, and  Nature . A lot of AI conferences also make reviews publicly available. That’s not the case for humanities journals.

Did any results surprise you?

A few months after ChatGPT’s launch, we started to see a rapid, linear increase in the usage pattern in academic writing. This tells us how quickly these LLM technologies diffuse into the community and become adopted by researchers. The most surprising finding is the magnitude and speed of the increase in language model usage. Nearly a fifth of papers and peer review text use LLM modification. We also found that peer reviews submitted closer to the deadline and those less likely to engage with author rebuttal were more likely to use LLMs. 

This suggests a couple of things. Perhaps some of these reviewers are not as engaged with reviewing these papers, and that’s why they are offloading some of the work to AI to help. This could be problematic if reviewers are not fully involved. As one of the pillars of the scientific process, it is still necessary to have human experts providing objective and rigorous evaluations. If this is being diluted, that’s not great for the scientific community.

What do your findings mean for the broader research community?

LLMs are transforming how we do research. It’s clear from our work that many papers we read are written with the help of LLMs. There needs to be more transparency, and people should state explicitly how LLMs are used and if they are used substantially. I don’t think it’s always a bad thing for people to use LLMs. In many areas, this can be very useful. For someone who is not a native English speaker, having the model polish their writing can be helpful. There are constructive ways for people to use LLMs in the research process; for example, in earlier stages of their draft. You could get useful feedback from a LLM in real time instead of waiting weeks or months to get external feedback. 

But I think it’s still very important for the human researchers to be accountable for everything that is submitted and presented. They should be able to say, “Yes, I will stand behind the statements that are written in this paper.”

*Collaborators include:  Weixin Liang ,  Yaohui Zhang ,  Zhengxuan Wu ,  Haley Lepp ,  Wenlong Ji ,  Xuandong Zhao ,  Hancheng Cao ,  Sheng Liu ,  Siyu He ,  Zhi Huang ,  Diyi Yang ,  Christopher Potts ,  Christopher D. Manning ,  Zachary Izzo ,  Yaohui Zhang ,  Lingjiao Chen ,  Haotian Ye , and Daniel A. McFarland .

Stanford HAI’s mission is to advance AI research, education, policy and practice to improve the human condition.  Learn more . 

More News Topics

A New Textiles Economy: Redesigning fashion’s future

Other available languages

Fashion is a vibrant industry that employs hundreds of millions, generates significant revenues, and touches almost everyone, everywhere.

Since the 20th century, clothing has increasingly been considered as disposable, and the industry has become highly globalised, with garments often designed in one country, manufactured in another, and sold worldwide at an ever-increasing pace. This trend has been further accentuated over the past 15 years by rising demand from a growing middle class across the globe with higher disposable income, and the emergence of the ‘fast fashion’ phenomenon, leading to a doubling in production over the same period.

Beyond laudable ongoing efforts, a new system for the textiles economy is needed and this report proposes a vision aligned with circular economy principles. In such a model, clothes, fabric, and fibres re-enter the economy after use and never end up as waste. Achieving a new textiles economy will demand unprecedented levels of alignment. A system-level change approach is required and one which will capture the opportunities missed by the current linear textiles system.

A New Textiles Economy: Redesigning fashion’s future is available in: English

To quote this report, please use the following reference: Ellen MacArthur Foundation, A new textiles economy: Redesigning fashion’s future (2017).

Supporting material

A New Textiles Economy: Summary of findings

Published on 28th November 2017

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