How to get your research published John Paull Editor-in-Chief, Journal of Organics School of Land & Food, University of Tasmania, Australia j.paull@utas.edu.au Make it easy to say 'yes' The first rule to get your research published is to make life easy for the editor and the reviewers. The task for an author is ultimately a narrative task to succinctly and engagingly tell the story of what you did, why you did it, what you found, and why we should care and making it clear why the paper is within the scope of the journal. The more carefully and meticulously a paper is prepared including spelling, punctuation, grammar, structure, completeness and internal consistency the more likely it is to be published and the quicker it will appear in print. Sections A submitted paper should adhere to the style of the journal. In general this will be: Title, Abstract, Keywords, Introduction, Methods, Results, Conclusion, Acknowledgments (if any), References, and Appendices (if any). Where there are multiple subsections, a paper may benefit from numbering sections and subsections (e.g. Shiri, Faghiri, Pirmoradi, & Agahi, 2014). Title Titles may be lyrical, for example Silent Spring (Carson, 1962), or descriptive, for example A history of the organic agriculture movement in Australia (Paull, 2013a). For a research paper a descriptive title is usually preferred and most appropriate. Abstract The Abstract is your opportunity to present a mini-version of the full paper. The Abstract is presented as a single paragraph. Realize that many readers will not read past the Title, and those that do may not read past the Abstract. The Abstract should state some context for the research, what was done, what was found, and the 'so what'. Keywords Select six to twelve keywords that indicate the content of the paper. If a word is already in the title it should not also appear in the keywords. Introduction This is your opportunity to place your research in context. The structure of the Introduction will often be that of a funnel from broad to narrow. The context may be global, historic, geographic, economic and/or agronomic (for example). You, as the author, probably know the context in which your research sits so share it with the reader. The Introduction will often begin broadly and then narrow down to the specifics of the reported research. For example it may proceed from the global perspective to the geographically narrow and specific, or from an historical perspective to the present. Journal of Organics (JO), Volume 1 Number 1, 2014 ISSN 2204-1060 3 To introduce an acronym or an abbreviation, on the first occurrence you should define the term. For example, use 'International Federation of Organic Agriculture Movements (IFOAM)' on the first occurrence and just the acronym 'IFOAM' thereafter. Methods This is your opportunity to tell what you did. There should be sufficient detail so that another researcher can replicate your study. This is the place to state the experimental design, to describe the research instrument and how it was administered, the number of subjects, how they were selected, and how the data were analyzed. Results Tell us what you found. Consider presenting your results as tables and/or graphs if this will enhance the clarity or the reader experience. Check that graphic elements (e.g. pie charts) print satisfactorily in black and white they will appear in colour in the softcopy (digital) version of the Journal of Organics (JO) but need to also print satisfactorily in B&W for the hardcopy edition. Test that all graphics (e.g. JPEGs & GIFs) print crisply onto A4 size paper (as a rule of thumb, images that are 100KB to 200KB will usually print satisfactorily, smaller images may pixellate and larger images will just make your file fat; vector graphics scale without pixellation and do not have these issues). If your paper includes graphs, and/or other graphic elements they should be included in your paper as 'inline' images and not as 'floating' graphics. Please tightly crop any images (i.e. minimize white space gutters around the images). Where summary statistics are presented (such as means, averages) it is helpful to report an indication of their variability or significance (such as variances, standard deviations, confidence intervals (CIs) or least significant differences (LSDs)). If your Results section includes commentary as well as results then it is appropriate to label the section as 'Results and Discussion'. In any event, choose section titles that are appropriate to your research. Conclusion This is the 'so what' of the paper. Tell us the significance of the findings, why we should care, how it is interesting, and the implications of the results. Keep in mind that a reviewer may initially skip directly from your Abstract straight to your Conclusion. Acknowledgments This is an optional section. It is the place to acknowledge individuals and/or institutions that have facilitated the research, where applicable. References References need to adhere to the style of the journal. The Journal of Organics uses the name/date style of APA 6th (www.apastyle.org). It is most important that the style of references needs to be consistent within a paper, including consistency of punctuation. Keep in mind that some reviewers will start at your References. So authors are encouraged to pay very careful attention to the accuracy of their reference list and the completeness of each reference. All references in a Journal of Organics paper have the journal names stated in full (no abbreviations please). Authors will save themselves grief if they use citations management software, for example EndNote (www.endnote.com) or Zotero (www.zotero.org). This will ensure that: Journal of Organics (JO), Volume 1 Number 1, 2014 4 (a) all in-text citations appear in the reference list; (b) all entries in the reference list appear as in-text citations; and (c) the reference list is correctly alphabetized. In any event, authors need to check and double check that these three conditions are satisfied. Authors will improve the probability of acceptance if the reference list demonstrates that they are up to date with current related research. Reviewers will not take it kindly if all references are, for example, a decade or more older. Reviewers are asked "Is this paper relevant to Journal of Organics?". If the paper cites Journal of Organics papers then it is easier for reviewers to answer "yes". Remember that generally in your reference list (a) book titles and journal titles are capitalized (e.g. see Carson, 1962 & Paull, 2013a), while (b) the titles of journal papers and book chapters are not capitalized (e.g. see Shiri, 2014 & Paull, 2013a). Where there are two authors, the Journal of Organics prefers that the authors are conjoined with an ampersand for both the in-text citation as well as in the reference list, for example: (Vlahova & Popov, 2013). The Journal of Organics prefers that you cite open access papers (in preference to closed access papers). Where you have a choice of citing an open access source or a closed access source please preference the open access source. All papers published in Journal of Organics are open access and we think this approach is world's best open access practice, because it is: (a) free to the reader (no barriers); (b) free to the author; (c) copyright is retained by the author; and (d) the paper may be freely distributed under a declared licence (Paull, 2013b). Appendices Journal of Organics papers often do not include appendices, but this is the (optional) place for including subsidiary material that does not belong in the flow of the narrative but that supports the paper and may be of interest to the reader and that you wish to share. This is the place to include your research instrument if appropriate and desired. Submit as text and PDF files The Journal of Organics prefers that submitted papers and revisions are submitted as two files: (a) a text file (e.g. as .pages, .odt, or .doc); and (b) a PDF file. Reviewers Papers published in the Journal of Organics are double-blind peer reviewed this means that papers are anonymized (the author and the author affiliations are removed by the editor) before the paper is sent to reviewers. Authors may be proactive by proposing up to four potential qualified reviewers. Where reviewers are proposed, the name, email and affiliation of the reviewers should be submitted. Proposed reviewers must be at institutions different from those of the author/s. Authors submitting a paper can also be proactive and offer themselves as reviewers for the journal and nominate their areas of expertise. Never assume that a reviewer will read your paper in a linear manner so pay careful attention to the accuracy, adequacy and integrity of each section. Reviewer feedback is just that feedback. In general you should pay very careful attention to reviewer feedback. You should implement all reviewer suggestions that are appropriate and that will enhance your paper. You are entitled to disagree with reviewer Editorial ISSN 1177-425 5 feedback if you are of the opinion that following a reviewer suggestion would diminish your paper you can seek clarification or advice from the editor before submitting your revised paper, or you may explain to the editor the disagreement and the action you have taken when submitting your revision. Please do not label a revision as a "final revision" this will not fool the editor and is more likely to antagonize the editor. It is an editorial decision when and if a revision is "final", and, in any event, papers are subject to copyediting prior to publication. Plagiarism Plagiarism is a fatal flaw and will ensure that your paper is not published. Where you are quoting other's work this needs to be clearly indicated by quotation marks or by indenting the quotation, and in either case by citing the source. Spelling We prefer British spelling. What is essential is that your spelling is consistent. We uses standard English. If English is not your first language it is best to have your paper checked by a native English speaker before submission. Understood It is understood that submitted research is your original research, has not been published elsewhere, and is not submitted elsewhere. You retain the copyright, you assign the Journal of Organics a licence to publish your paper, and a CC-BY open access licence (Creative Commons, 2013) is assigned which means that you and others can republish your paper provided that you credit Journal of Organics as the original publisher. Research depository As soon as your paper is published, we recommend that you submit your paper to orgprints.org and to your institution's ePrints-type database (where available). Orgprints is the largest open access database of organics research. You will need to register to upload your paper, it is free. This will make your research more visible. Keep in mind that orgprints.org is also an excellent place to find references that are relevant to your organics research, to organic food and farming, and to the Journal of Organics. References Carson, R. (1962). Silent Spring (1964 ed.). London: Readers Union, Hamish Hamilton. Creative Commons. (2013). Explore the Creative Commons licenses: http://creativecommons.org/ choose/ Paull, J. (2013a). A history of the organic agriculture movement in Australia. In B. Mascitelli & A. Lobo (Eds.), Organics in the Global Food Chain (pp. 37-60). Ballarat: Connor Court. Paull, J. (2013b). Open access publishing: What is world's best practice? Journal of Organic Systems, 8(1), 2-4. Shiri, N., Faghiri, M., Pirmoradi, A., & Agahi, H. (2014). Attitudes of agricultural extension workers towards organic farming in Iran. Journal of Organic Systems, 9(1), 5-15. Vlahova, V., & Popov, V. (2013). Influence of the biofertiliser Seasol on yield of pepper (Capsicum annuum L.) cultivated under organic agriculture conditions. Journal of Organic Systems, 8(2), 6-17. 1 Journal of Organics (JO), Volume 1 Number 1, 2014 6 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 that the author/s and the Journal of Organics are credited.