| Special issue for junior researchers: The peer-review process as an opportunity for learning |
| Monday, 21 January 2013 00:00 |
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Call for papers closed
Coordinator: Dr. Alfredo Bautista Call open from: January 2013 Infancia y Aprendizaje invites junior researchers in the journal’s thematic areas to submit empirical manuscripts for the publication of a special issue that will be entitled “The peer-review process as an opportunity for learning”. The experience of submitting a manuscript to a peer-reviewed scientific journal constitutes a valuable learning opportunity for the author, regarding both the research topic addressed in the manuscript and the way in which the content is communicated and presented (organization and structure of ideas, stylistic and formatting aspects, etc.). Receiving detailed analyses, critical but at the same time constructive, from several experts in the research area represents an invaluable resource in the academic writing process. This provides authors with diverse and enriching perspectives on their own work, helping them to identify and overcome the manuscript’s main theoretical and/or empirical weaknesses, to construct more solid and compelling arguments, to polish the manuscript and improve its style, and oftentimes even to re-write it from more original or appropriate angles. This special issue has several purposes. First, to offer some of our readers -in particular, those who are newer to research- this opportunity for learning under carefully designed conditions, that allow maximizing both the quality of the review process and the final product, that is, the published manuscript. Among all manuscripts received in response to this call, we will select those that a) best fit the thematic and editorial line of Infancia y Aprendizaje and b) have the greatest potential to meet our quality standards. Only those manuscripts selected will be submitted to our customary peer-review process. Manuscripts will be reviewed by two to three specialists in the thematic area of the study. All documents produced during the peer-review process (including reports from the reviewers, letters to the author from the coordinator of the special issue, all submitted versions of the manuscript, and the reports of changes written by the author) will be made publically available to our readers on Infancia y Aprendizaje’s website (we will not publish anything related to the manuscripts not selected in the first screening process). Participating in this call requires acceptance of these conditions, including the publication and analysis of all the documents cited above. This leads us to the second purpose of this project, which continues in the line of several editorial analyses published in Infancia y Aprendizaje some years ago (see Sánchez, García & del Río, 2002; Scheuer, Bautista, Martín & Pozo, 2009). The goal this time is to make visible to our readers the “bowels” of the editorial process, from beginning to end, offering models that allow us to reflect upon our own practices as authors, and also as reviewers. We believe having access to these materials, including systematic analyses of them, will be tremendously helpful for researchers both junior and professional. The goal is for these materials to illustrate aspects such as: a) the kinds of comments, critiques, and recommendations given by reviewers and editors in response to certain types of arguments and/or procedures, both at the conceptual and formal/stylistic levels; b) the different ways to approach revisions suggested by the editorial team, not only regarding changes actually made in the manuscript but also how to report them, or counter-argue them, in the letter addressed to the editorial team; c) the potential of the peer-review process to foster the authors’ learning, in particular the improvement of skills for academic writing and communication. Finally, this special issue intends to disseminate Infancia y Aprendizaje among new generations of researchers in the thematic areas of the journal, providing them with a space to become protagonists, as authors, of our journal’s pages.
Submission deadline 30th June 2013 Publication year 2014 (issue to be determined) Authorship We will only accept manuscripts authored by a single person. Authors must be Masters or PhD students at the time of submission, or Doctoral graduates conferred their degrees after April 15, 2011. Authors must provide evidence of their current academic status (for example, a letter from the Masters or PhD program or from the academic advisor, or an electronic copy of the academic registrar or electronic copy of the doctoral diploma). In addition, authors are required to provide an updated list of prior publications. Applicants should not have prior experience directing/coordinating groups of researchers. Languages Accepted languages are Spanish and English. Anonymity In accordance with Infancia y Aprendizaje’s standard review process, manuscripts will be sent out for external review anonymously (that is, reviewers will not be given access to the author’s details). Submission guidelines: Manuscripts should not exceed a total of 8,500 words, including abstract, keywords, references, tables, and figures. Abstract and keywords must be submitted in English and in Spanish. Proposals will be submitted through the RECyT platform. The author must state that the manuscript is a proposal in response to this call for papers both in the first page of the manuscript and in the field “Author’s Comments”. Follow this link for an English version of Infancia y Aprendizaje’s guidelines for authors. Coordinator Dr. Alfredo Bautista References SÁNCHEZ, E., GARCÍA, J. N. & DEL RÍO, P. (2002). Escribir es re-escribir. Un análisis de contenidos de los informes realizados a los artículos no publicados en Infancia y Aprendizaje. Infancia y Aprendizaje, 25 (1), 5- 35. SCHEUER, N., BAUTISTA, A., MARTÍN, E. & POZO, J. I. (2009). “Tras una lectura atenta de su manuscrito...” Un análisis de los procesos de revisión en Infancia y Aprendizaje. Infancia y Aprendizaje, 32 (3), 243-264
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