Notes for Contributors

How to submit to Sociological Research Online

Section A: Articles

Issues of Sociological Research Online are published quarterly in February, May, August and November. Articles which appear in Sociological Research Online are subject to the usual academic processes of anonymous peer reviewing.

Submission format

• Articles should be submitted in electronic form, as either a Microsoft Word file with separate illustrations in PNG, GIF or JPEG format (preferred) or as plain text with HTML tags to indicate headings and sub-headings, tables, quotations, and hyper-text links, using published articles as a guide. The submission should include a list of references (formatted as below). It is helpful, but not required, if you also submit an anonymised version of your article, suitable for sending to referees.

• Articles, which should be over 5000 but not normally exceed 8000 words, should be submitted electronically to socres@surrey.ac.uk, by e-mail, preferably as a Word document. Tables, figures, illustrations and references are excluded from the word count.

• An additional document should be included containing the author's name and biographical information.

• Simultaneous submissions to other print or electronic journals are not permitted.

• Articles may be written and published in either UK or US English as long as there is consistency within the article.

• Articles should have been corrected for errors and will be regarded as accurate. Authors are responsible for factual content.

• Authors should note that the policy of Sociological Research Online is that there is an at least four issue gap in articles published by the same author or joint authors. Where the author of an article published in the journal submits an article jointly with someone who has not published in Sociological Research Online in the previous four issues, there will be a gap of at least two issues; thereafter, the four issue rule comes into effect. There may be an exception made for authors who publish in Special Sections.

• Dates should be written: 1 January, 2010. Single quotation marks only (except for quotes within quotes). Bold, italic and underscore should be formatted as such in the word processed document. Hyperlinks to additional files should be clearly flagged in the text:
  **LINK "FILENAME": Hyperlink to another document

  Titles

  Article titles need to be clear and precise, providing keyword guidance about the contents of the article. This will ensure a greater hit rate for the journal - a benefit to author and journal alike.

  For example: 'Getting off my head, it's what I do: stoners and gibbers tell their story' may be an interesting and creative title, but it is not informative.
  A better alternative could be: 'Young people's alcohol and drug use: a qualitative account of binge drinking and drug use'.

  Articles with titles that the editors believe do not provide clear signposting to the content will be returned to the authors for reconsideration. For further information please see: http://www.uk.sagepub.com/authors/journal/readership.sp.

  Headings and Sections

  Every paragraph in an SRO article is numbered, to aid citing the paragraph in other articles. These numbers are applied when the article is formatted and do not need to be included in the file you submit. The numbering scheme consists of a major number, which is the number of the section, and then a minor number which is the number of the paragraph within the section.

  Articles should be divided by the author into sections, each with a section heading. Each section may also have sub-sections and sub-section headings. Ensure that it is clear which are section and which are sub-section headings in your submitted article. Do not number the sections, since any such numbering will be removed as part of the formatting process.

  Illustrations

  Figures (e.g. pictures, graphs, and diagrams) will be linked into the article at appropriate places. Please embed each Figure in the right position in the article (but do not forget to submit the graphic as a separate file as well). Captions should be provided as text. Do not put the caption on the graphic itself.

  Graphics should be scaled so that they are no more than 600 pixels wide. The height is not as important, but illustrations are typically about 300 pixels in height. If available, use colour (e.g. if you have several line plots on the same axes, get your software to draw each line with a different colour).

  Please provide all Figures both in place in your article file and separately as files in GIF, JPEG or PNG format.

  Tables should normally be provided as text (e.g. as a Microsoft Word table). Only when the table is exceptionally complicated or heavily formatted should you provide a table as a separate graphic.

  If possible, videos should be uploaded to YouTube. Please then send us the link and we can embed the video in an article webpage.

  Equations, formulae and mathematical symbols

  Please keep greek and special mathematical symbols to a minimum. Use ordinary, roman letters for variables except where it is traditional to use greek letters. If you do need to include greek letters and are using Microsoft Word, type them with the Symbol font. Please avoid using any symbols with a bar or tilde above them, as these are impossible to show in HTML.

  Citations and References

  It is helpful if authors can show relevance to the journal and awareness of how related issues have previously been dealt with in the journal. Authors are encouraged to consider previous publications found in SRO that relate to the submission they are preparing.

  References should use the Oxford style, that is:
  Citations in the text should be as author, date pairs in brackets, e.g. (Karpinski 1997). Note there is no comma between the author and the date. Multiple citations should be separated by a semi-colon, e.g. (Smith 2001; Jones 2002)

  Where there are two authors, both names should be referenced in the text, thus Zald & McCarthy (1979). Where there are three or more authors, only the name of the first should appear in the text followed by 'et al.', thus Maurice et al. (1986). The full list of authors should appear in the bibliography. URL's should be enclosed in <triangular brackets>.

  References at the end of the text should be in alphabetical order:

  For example:
  HASTIE, R (1986) Experimental evidence on group accuracy in Jablin F M, Putnam L L, Roberts K H and Porter L W (Eds.) Handbook of Organizational Communication: An Interdisciplinary Perspective, Beverly Hills, CA: Sage.

  KALAKOTA R and Whinston A B, (1996) Frontiers of Electronic Commerce. Reading, MA: Addison-Wesley Publishing Company, Inc.

  KARPINSKI R (1997) Extranets emerge as next challenge for marketers. Netmarketing, April 1997. pp. 1-4.

  PARIS, Heather (2003) '"Lifting up the little form": Victorian images of childhood and death 1870-1900', Sociological Research Online Vol. 8, Issue 3: <http://www.socresonline.org.uk/8/3/paris.html>

  SIGNORETTA, P. and Craglia, M. (2002) 'Joined-up Government in Practice: A case study of children's needs in Sheffield', Local Government Studies, Vol. 28, No. 1 pp. 59-76.

  Footnotes and Acknowledgements

  Footnotes should appear at the end of the text and before the References. These will be turned into hyperlinks. Only articles referenced in the text should be listed.

  Contributors should indicate sources of funding, where applicable, and any restrictions on publication placed on them by sponsors. It is the duty of the author(s) to clear copyright on empirical, visual and oral data.

  The Review Process

  Research articles will be refereed 'blind', that is, the referees will not be given the name of the author. Hence articles are anonymised by the journal by deleting the author's name and affiliation from the article text before being sent to referees. Please ensure that the body of the article does not include obvious 'give-aways' (e.g. "in previous work, I developed a similar model (Gilbert 1999)"). Any such clues to the referees will normally not be altered by the editorial team.

  Referees are asked to respond to the following questions:

  1. What is your overall assessment of the article?

  2. Please outline briefly and for the editor alone your reasons for reaching this assessment of the article.

  3. Please provide some constructively expressed feedback for the author, designed to help them revise or rewrite the article for this journal or another. Your comments can be anywhere between a paragraph and something much fuller, depending on what you think appropriate to the particular article.

  4. Has the author sufficiently taken advantage of the opportunities available through electronic publication (e.g. access to program code or data; colour illustrations; animations)? If not, have you any suggestions that could be forwarded to the author?

  Normally at least three referees are approached for an evaluation. Once the referees have commented, the editor will decide whether to accept the article as submitted, request minor revisions, request a major rewrite, or reject the article. Authors can expect to receive the editor's verdict about eight weeks after submission (longer if the period includes the summer or Christmas breaks, when referees are, understandably, slower in responding). The editor's emailed letter will normally include substantial excerpts from the referees' comments which can be helpful in revising and improving the article.

  * Checklist for Submissions

  When submitting an article, ensure that there is
  1. the main file, if possible in Microsoft Word '.doc', .docx or '.rtf' format. The file should include all Figures and Tables in their expected final positions, an abstract and a list of keywords
  2. in addition, the figures as GIF or JPG images, each in a separate file (do not include figure captions in the images). Figures should be scaled so that they are between about 400 and 800 pixels in height and width
  3. a file including a biography for each author (100 words or less), the authors' postal and email addresses and the authors' home pages

  Submitting your Article

  Articles to be considered for publication in Sociological Research Online should be emailed to the journal at socres@surrey.ac.uk.

  An acknowledgement of receipt will always be sent within a few days. If you do not get an acknowledgement, please enquire as email can fail to arrive.

  Articles are normally published in the next issue after acceptance.

Section B: Review Articles

• Sociological Research Online will publish review articles of up to 5000 words in length on suitable topics and areas of sociological work. Review articles are commissioned by the Editors in consultation with the Review Editors, and reviewers should seek to place their discussions in the broader context of current debates within the sub-discipline(s) represented by the reviewed publications. Review articles are subject to the same process of anonymised peer review as all other articles.

• Once commissioned, the style and layout of review articles should follow the guidelines for full articles, details of which are provided in these 'Notes for Contributors'.

• Unsolicited review articles will not be accepted, although suggestions for suitable topic areas for review articles are welcomed and should be sent to the Editorial Assistant.

Section C. Book Reviews

• Sociological Research Online publishes book reviews across the entire spectrum of sociological interests and concerns. The commissioning of book reviews is the responsibility of the two Review Editors. Publishers and distributors should send all books for review to Catherine Ternent, Sociological Research Online, Department of Sociology, University of Surrey, Guildford, GU2 7XH, UK.

• Unsolicited reviews will not be accepted. The Reviews Editors are however interested in hearing from sociologists who would like to become reviewers for the journal. People who wish to nominate themselves as book reviewers for Sociological Research Online should submit their details through the Editorial Assistant.

• Commissioned book reviews are not subject to a full review process in the same way as review articles. It should be noted, however, that the Review Editors reserve the right to edit book reviews before final acceptance.

• Reviews of books should be between 500 and 700 words in length. The Review Editors may edit reviews which exceed this word limit.

• Book reviews should be written so as to provide readers with an overview of the scope of the contents as well as a critical evaluation of the same. The evaluative content of reviews should, however, be constructively expressed; overly or destructively critical reviews will not be accepted.

• Book reviews should be prefaced with bibliographic information in the following form:

  Title of Book
  Author/s or Editor/s Personal then Surname/s
  Place: Publisher
  Year
  ISBN
  Price, hb or sb
  pp.

  With an example being:

  Narrating Our Pasts
  Elizabeth Tonkin
  Cambridge: Cambridge University Press
  ISBN 0 521 40133 X
  1992
  Stlg. 29.95, hb
  pp. xiv + 171

• Book reviews should employ a single line space between the bibliographic information and the start of the review. Each paragraph within the review should be separated by a single line space. New paragraphs should start left-aligned. The review should conclude with the full name and institutional affiliation of the reviewer, each on a separate line.

• Completed reviews can be submitted to the Editorial Assistant or the Review Editor who commissioned the review by email.

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