Submission guidelines

Prior to submission, please carefully read and follow the submission guidelines detailed below. Manuscripts that do not conform to the submission guidelines may be returned without review.

Submissions are handled only through our Editorial Manager platformopens in new window, and the only official journal website is through APA. If you believe you interacted with a fraudulent website for this journal, please email APA Journalsopens in new window. Review our resource for authors for more information on identifying predatory journals.

To submit to the editorial office of Pim Cuijpers, please submit manuscripts electronically through the Manuscript Submission Portal.

Prepare manuscripts according to the Publication Manual of the American Psychological Association using the 7^th edition. Manuscripts may be copyedited for bias-free language (see Chapter 5 of the Publication Manual). APA Style and Grammar Guidelines for the 7^th edition are available.

Before submitting your manuscript, please make sure that you have reviewed the TOP Guidelines and have prepared your manuscript accordingly. You will be asked to verify that you have done so upon submission.

Submit Manuscriptopens in new window

General correspondence may be directed to the editorial office via emailopens in new window.

Journal of Consulting and Clinical Psychology^® is now using a software system to screen submitted content for similarity with other published content. The system compares the initial version of each submitted manuscript against a database of 40+ million scholarly documents, as well as content appearing on the open web. This allows APA to check submissions for potential overlap with material previously published in scholarly journals (e.g., lifted or republished material).

This journal uses a masked reviewing system for all submissions. The first page of the manuscript should omit the authors' names and affiliations but should include the title of the manuscript and the date it is submitted.

Footnotes containing information pertaining to the authors' identities or affiliations should not be included in the manuscript, but may be provided after a manuscript is accepted.

Make every effort to see that the manuscript itself contains no clues to the authors' identities, including grant numbers, names of institutions providing IRB approval, self-citations, and links to online repositories for data, materials, code, or preregistrations (e.g., Create a View-only Link for a Projectopens in new window).

Please ensure that the final version for production includes a byline and full author note for typesetting.

Keep a copy of the manuscript to guard against loss.

The cover letter accompanying the manuscript submission must include all authors' names and affiliations to avoid potential conflicts of interest in the review process. Addresses and phone numbers, as well as electronic mail addresses and fax numbers, if available, should be provided for all authors for possible use by the editorial office and later by the production office.

Full-length manuscripts should not exceed 35 pages total (including cover page, abstract, text, references, tables, and figures), with margins of at least 1 inch on all sides and a standard font (e.g., Times New Roman) of 12 points (no smaller). The entire paper (text, references, tables, etc.) must be double spaced.

Authors submitting manuscripts that report new data collection, especially randomized clinical trials (RCTs), should comply with the newly developed Journal Article Reporting Standards for Quantitative Research in Psychology: The APA Publications and Communications Board Task Force Report (PDF, 222KB)opens in new window (JARS; see American Psychologist, 2018, 73(1), 3–25 or Appendix in the APA Publication Manual).

For papers that exceed 35 pages, authors must justify the extended length in their cover letter (e.g., reporting of multiple studies), and in no case should the paper exceed 45 pages total. Papers that do not conform to these guidelines may be returned without review.

The references section should immediately follow a page break.

The Journal of Consulting and Clinical Psychology publishes Registered Reports (RRs). Registered Reports require a two-step review process.

The first step is the submission of the registration manuscript. This is a partial manuscript that includes hypotheses, rationale for the study, experimental design, and methods. The partial manuscript will be reviewed for significance and methodological approach.

If the partial manuscript is accepted, this amounts to provisional acceptance of the full report regardless of the outcome of the study. The full manuscript will be reviewed for adherence to the preregistered design (deviations should be reported in the manuscript).

In addition to full-length manuscripts, the JCCP will consider Brief Reports of research studies in clinical psychology. The Brief Report format may be appropriate for empirically sound studies that are limited in scope, contain novel or provocative findings that need further replication, or represent replications and extensions of prior published work. Replication submissions should include “A Replication of XX Study” in the subtitle of the manuscript as well as in the abstract.

Brief Reports are intended to permit the publication of soundly designed studies of specialized interest that cannot be accepted as regular articles because of lack of space.

Brief Reports must be prepared according to the following specifications: Use 12-point Times New Roman type and 1-inch (2.54-cm) margins, and do not exceed 265 lines of text including references. These limits do not include the title page, abstract, author note, footnotes, tables, or figures.

An author who submits a Brief Report must agree not to submit the full report to another journal of general circulation. The Brief Report should give a clear, condensed summary of the procedure of the study and as full an account of the results as space permits.

Viewpoint papers are brief papers about important topics related to consulting and clinical psychology and discuss new developments in research, innovations, weaknesses of the field, and current debates. The goal of Viewpoint papers is to provide a platform for important issues in the field, which are supported by empirical evidence but go beyond that. Viewpoint papers should be brief (no more than 130 lines, including references, no more than 10 references, no abstract, and no more than 3 authors).

JCCP now publishes papers that are commentaries of previously published articles in this journal. Two types of commentaries will be considered:

A Brief Comment would be written in response to a single article previously published in JCCP. The primary purpose would be to provide a meaningful insight, concern, alternative interpretation, clarification, or critical analysis. It is not intended to be pedestrian in nature (e.g., simply highlighting that a given study is statistically underpowered). Rather, its publication would provide for a richer and more comprehensive understanding of a methodological, conceptual, or professional issue that significantly adds to the literature.

Similar to a Brief Report, Brief Comments should not exceed 265 lines of text including references. This limit does not include the title page or author notes. No abstract is required for Brief Comments. The title of a Brief Comment should include a subtitle reflecting the actual title and year of publication of the article that engendered the comment. For example — "The Importance of Focusing on External Validity: A Brief Comment on Testing the Efficacy of Two Differing Types of Stress Management Interventions for the Treatment of Essential Hypertension (Jones & Smith, 2012)."

Brief Comments should be submitted in a timely manner, no later than 9 months after publication of the original article. Upon acceptance of a Brief Comment, the author(s) of the original paper would be invited to submit a response, whereupon, if acceptable, both the Brief Comment and Response would be published together. Such Responses to a Brief Comment should also not exceed 265 lines of text including references.

The purpose of this type of article is essentially similar to that of a Brief Comment (i.e., to provide a meaningful insight, concern, alternative interpretation, clarification, or critical analysis), but would be written in response to a series of articles previously published in JCCP or that involves a more extensive and far-reaching conceptual or methodological issue. An example might include describing and analyzing the limitations of a particular statistical or methodological procedure used in several studies previously published in JCCP, provided along with meaningful recommendations.

This type of article should not exceed approximately one half the length of the original paper (note that 1 journal page equals approximately 3–3.5 manuscript pages). Unless permission from the editor is received, no Extended Comment should exceed 20 manuscript pages inclusive of all references, tables, and figures. Abstracts of Extended Comments should be unstructured.

Similar to a Brief Comment, where and when appropriate, if such a paper is accepted, the author(s) of the original article(s) will be contacted to write a response, whereupon, if acceptable, both the Extended Comment and Response would be published together. This Invited Response should not exceed approximately one half the length of the Extended Comment.

The title of this type of article need not include a subtitle representing the original article(s). One important review criteria involves the timeliness of the topic and its potential contribution to the scientific literature base relevant to the scope of JCCP content.

Whereas the majority of papers published in JCCP will involve descriptions of quantitatively-based investigations, this journal also considers conceptual articles on topics of broad theoretical, methodological, or practical interest that advance the field of clinical psychology. Examples might include describing a new methodological or statistical procedure, delineating methods of enhancing dissemination of research findings from the lab to real-world settings, or advocating the need to increase the profession's research efforts regarding a traditionally underserved population.

Similar formatting guidelines for submitting a full-length research article would apply for these types of papers.

As of March 1, 2019 registration will be required for all clinical trials (studies designed to examine the efficacy or effectiveness of a treatment or preventive intervention) reporting primary outcome findings. Prospective registration (i.e., pre-registration) is required if recruitment began on or after March 1, 2019. Retrospective registration will be accepted only if recruitment began before this date.

Clinical trials must be registered at ClinicalTrials.gov or at another recognized registry. A complete list of acceptable trial registries can be found via the WHO International Clinical Trials Registry Platform. Differences between registered and reported methods or outcomes must be explained clearly and transparently in the manuscript.

Trial protocols, including statistical analysis plans, must be made available to readers. Both published and unpublished protocols are acceptable. Published protocols should be cited in the manuscript. Unpublished protocols may be provided in online-only supplements or made available by request. Use of the Standard Protocol Items: Recommendations for Intervention Trials (SPIRIT) checklist is recommended.

For secondary analyses of existing data sets, where primary analyses have already been published (or are in press), registration is not required. For such analyses, registration status must be made transparent in the manuscript, and authors must follow guidelines about data transparency provided on the JCCP website. The article(s) reporting the primary outcomes, and the findings, must be cited in the manuscript.

Manuscripts reporting long-term outcomes of studies for which the primary outcomes have already been published also will not require registration, but authors must follow the guidelines above for secondary analyses.

Authors must note registration status in their cover letter, in the manuscript, and in the submission portal.

Authors should review the APA Style Journal Article Reporting Standards (JARS) for quantitative, qualitative, and mixed methods. The standards offer ways to improve transparency in reporting to ensure that readers have the information necessary to evaluate the quality of the research and to facilitate collaboration and replication. The JARS: 

• recommend the division of hypotheses, analyses, and conclusions into primary, secondary, and exploratory groupings to allow for a full understanding of quantitative analyses presented in a manuscript and to enhance reproducibility; 
• offer modules for authors reporting on replications, clinical trials, longitudinal studies, and observational studies, as well as the analytic methods of structural equation modeling and Bayesian analysis; and 
• include guidelines on reporting on of study preregistration (including making protocols public); participant characteristics (including demographic characteristics; inclusion and exclusion criteria) psychometric characteristics of outcome measures and other variables, and planned data diagnostics and analytic strategy. 

JARS-Qual offers guidance to researchers using qualitative methods such as narrative data, grounded theory, phenomenological, critical, discursive, performative, ethnographic, consensual qualitative, case study, psychobiography, and thematic analysis approaches. 

The guidelines focus on transparency in methods reporting, recommending descriptions of how the researcher’s own perspective affected the study, as well as the contexts in which the research and analysis took place. 

Authors should also review the new Journal Article Reporting Standards for Race, Ethnicity, and Culture (JARS–REC). Meant for all authors, regardless of research topic, JARS–REC include standards for all stages of research and manuscript writing, on, for example: 

• Using the title, abstract, and keywords to identify race and ethnicity of participants without signaling Whiteness as default; 
• Discussing the applicability of the theoretical approach to populations for which it was not developed; 
• Addressing limits on generality, recognizing that generalizability is always constrained and is not the primary purpose of every study; and 
• Considering whether findings could be used or misused to cause harm. 

For more, see the Guidance for Authors sections of the table (PDF, 184KB)opens in new window. 

The title of a manuscript should be accurate, fully explanatory, and preferably no longer than 12 words. The title should reflect the content and population studied (e.g., "treatment of generalized anxiety disorders in adults").

If the paper reports a randomized clinical trial (RCT), this should be indicated in the title. Note that JARS criteria must be used for reporting purposes.

All manuscripts must include an abstract containing a maximum of 250 words typed on a separate page. After the abstract, please supply up to five keywords or brief phrases.

Manuscripts published in the Journal of Consulting and Clinical Psychology will include a structured abstract of up to 250 words.

For studies that report randomized clinical trials or meta-analyses, the abstract also must be consistent with the guidelines set forth by JARS or MARS guidelines, respectively. Thus, in preparing a manuscript, please ensure that it is consistent with the guidelines stated below.

Please include an Abstract of up to 250 words, presented in paragraph form. The Abstract should be typed on a separate page (page 2 of the manuscript), and must include each of the following sections:

• Objective: A brief statement of the purpose of the study
• Method: A detailed summary of the participants (N, age, gender, ethnicity) as well as descriptions of the study design, measures (including names of measures), and procedures
• Results: A detailed summary of the primary findings that clearly articulate comparison groups (if relevant), and that indicate significance or confidence intervals for the main findings
• Conclusions: A description of the research and clinical implications of the findings

The APA Publication Manual (7th ed.opens in new window) stipulates that "authorship encompasses…not only persons who do the writing but also those who have made substantial scientific contributions to a study." In the spirit of transparency and openness, this journal has adopted the Contributor Roles Taxonomyopens in new window (CRediT) to describe each author's individual contributions to the work. CRediT offers authors the opportunity to share an accurate and detailed description of their diverse contributions to a manuscript.

Submitting authors will be prompted to select one or more contributor roles for each author at initial submission. All authors should have reviewed and agreed to their individual contribution(s) before submission. If the manuscript is accepted for publication, an Author Contributions Statement will be generated during the typesetting process and published in the author note of the final article. It is not necessary for authors to provide a written Author Contributions Statement upon submission.

CRediT includes 14 contributor roles, as described below:

• Conceptualization: Ideas; formulation or evolution of overarching research goals and aims.
• Data curation: Management activities to annotate (produce metadata), scrub data and maintain research data (including software code, where it is necessary for interpreting the data itself) for initial use and later reuse.
• Formal analysis: Application of statistical, mathematical, computational, or other formal techniques to analyze or synthesize study data.
• Funding acquisition: Acquisition of the financial support for the project leading to this publication.
• Investigation: Conducting a research and investigation process, specifically performing the experiments, or data/evidence collection.
• Methodology: Development or design of methodology; creation of models.
• Project administration: Management and coordination responsibility for the research activity planning and execution.
• Resources: Provision of study materials, reagents, materials, patients, laboratory samples, animals, instrumentation, computing resources, or other analysis tools.
• Software: Programming, software development; designing computer programs; implementation of the computer code and supporting algorithms; testing of existing code components.
• Supervision: Oversight and leadership responsibility for the research activity planning and execution, including mentorship external to the core team.
• Validation: Verification, whether as a part of the activity or separate, of the overall replication/reproducibility of results/experiments and other research outputs.
• Visualization: Preparation, creation and/or presentation of the published work, specifically visualization/data presentation.
• Writing—original draft: Preparation, creation and/or presentation of the published work, specifically writing the initial draft (including substantive translation).
• Writing—review and editing: Preparation, creation and/or presentation of the published work by those from the original research group, specifically critical review, commentary or revision—including pre- or post-publication stages.

Authors can claim credit for more than one contributor role, and the same role can be attributed to more than one author. Not all roles will be applicable to any particular scholarly work.

Authors submitting manuscripts to the Journal of Consulting and Clinical Psychology are required to provide 2–3 brief sentences regarding the public health significance of the study or meta-analysis described in their paper. This description should be included within the manuscript on the abstract/keywords page. It should be written in language that is easily understood by both professionals and members of the lay public.

When an accepted paper is published, these sentences will be boxed beneath the abstract for easy accessibility. All such descriptions will also be published as part of the table of contents, as well as on the journal's web page. This new policy is in keeping with efforts to increase dissemination and usage by larger and diverse audiences.

Examples of these 2–3 sentences include the following:

• "This study strongly suggests that (description of a given psychosocial treatment) is an effective treatment for anxiety, but only if it is of mild to moderate severity. For persons with severe anxiety, additional treatments may be necessary."
• "When treating individuals of (name of a particular ethnic minority group) who are experiencing PTSD, this study demonstrated the importance of taking into account cultural factors, especially those that involve one's spiritual beliefs."
• "This study highlights the importance of directly including one's family in treatment when helping adults diagnosed with cancer overcome their depression."

To be maximally useful, these statements of public health significance should not simply be sentences lifted directly out of the manuscript.

They are meant to be informative and useful to any reader. They should provide a bottom-line, take-home message that is accurate and easily understood. In addition, they should be able to be translated into media-appropriate statements for use in press releases and on social media.

Prior to final acceptance and publication, all public health significance statements will be carefully reviewed to make sure they meet these standards. Authors will be expected to revise statements as necessary.

The Method section of each empirical report must contain a detailed description of the study participants, including (but not limited to) the following: age, gender, ethnicity, SES, clinical diagnoses and comorbidities (as appropriate), and any other relevant demographics.

In the Discussion section of the manuscript, authors should discuss the diversity of their study samples and the generalizability of their findings.

The Method section also must include a statement describing how informed consent was obtained from the participants (or their parents/guardians) and indicate that the study was conducted in compliance with an appropriate Internal Review Board.

The Method section of empirical reports must contain a sufficiently detailed description of the measures used so that the reader understands the item content, scoring procedures, and total scores or subscales. Evidence of reliability and validity with similar populations should be provided.

JCCP requires the statistical reporting of measures that convey clinical significance. Authors should report means and standard deviations for all continuous study variables and the effect sizes for the primary study findings. (If effect sizes are not available for a particular test, authors should convey this in their cover letter at the time of submission.)

JCCP also requires authors to report confidence intervals for any effect sizes involving principal outcomes (see Fidler et al., Journal of Consulting and Clinical Psychology , 2005, pp. 136–143 and Odgaard & Fowler, Journal of Consulting and Clinical Psychology , 2010, pp.287–297).

In addition, when reporting the results of interventions, authors should include indicators of clinically significant change. Authors may use one of several approaches that have been recommended for capturing clinical significance, including (but not limited to) the reliable change index (i.e., whether the amount of change displayed by a treated individual is large enough to be meaningful; see Jacobson et al., Journal of Consulting and Clinical Psychology, 1999), the extent to which dysfunctional individuals show movement into the functional distribution (see Jacobson & Truax, Journal of Consulting and Clinical Psychology, 1991), or other normative comparisons (see Kendall et al., Journal of Consulting and Clinical Psychology, 1999).

The special section of JCCP on "Clinical Significance" (Journal of Consulting and Clinical Psychology, 1999, pp. 283–339) contains detailed discussions of clinical significance and its measurement and should be a useful resource (see also Atkins et al., Journal of Consulting and Clinical Psychology, 2005, pp. 982–989).

Articles must include a discussion of the clinical implications of the study findings or analytic review. The discussion section should contain a clear statement of the extent of clinical application of the current assessment, prevention, or treatment methods. The extent of application to clinical practice may range from suggestions that the data are too preliminary to support widespread dissemination to descriptions of existing manuals available from the authors or archived materials that would allow full implementation at present.

APA endorses the Transparency and Openness Promotion (TOP) Guidelines by a community working group in conjunction with the Center for Open Science (Nosek et al. 2015opens in new window). Empirical research, including meta-analyses, submitted to the Journal of Consulting and Clinical Psychology must meet the “requirement” level for all aspects of research planning and reporting. Authors should include a subsection in the method section titled “Transparency and Openness.” This subsection should detail the efforts the authors have made to comply with the TOP guidelines. For example:

• We report how we determined our sample size, all data exclusions (if any), all manipulations, and all measures in the study, and we follow JARS (Appelbaum et al., 2018). All data, analysis code, and research materials are available at [stable link to repository]. Data were analyzed using R, version 4.0.0 (R Core Team, 2020) and the package ggplot, version 3.2.1 (Wickham, 2016). This study’s design and its analysis were not pre-registered.

Links to preregistrations and data, code, and materials should also be included in the author note.

Authors must state whether data, code, and study materials are posted to a trusted repository and, if so, how to access them, including their location and any limitations on use. Trusted repositories adhere to policies that make data discoverable, accessible, usable, and preserved for the long term. Trusted repositories also assign unique and persistent identifiers. Recommended repositories include APA’s repositoryopens in new window on the Open Science Framework (OSF), or authors can access a full list of other recommended repositoriesopens in new window. For clinical trials, it is recommended that intervention manuals are made available in a repository; at least it has to be specified where the intervention manual is available or note the legal or ethical reasons for not doing so.

In a subsection titled “Transparency and Openness” and at the end of the method section, specify whether and where the data and materials are available or note the legal or ethical reasons for not doing so. For submissions with quantitative or simulation analytic methods, state whether the study analysis code is posted to a trusted repository, and, if so, how to access it (or the legal or ethical reason why it is not available).

For example:

• All data have been made publicly available at the [trusted repository name] and can be accessed at [persistent URL or DOI].
• Materials and analysis code for this study are not available because [legal or ethical reason].
• The code behind this analysis/simulation has been made publicly available at the [trusted repository name] and can be accessed at [persistent URL or DOI].

For studies that are not clinical trials, preregistration is encouraged, but not required. Preregistration of studies and specific hypotheses can be a useful tool for making strong theoretical claims. Likewise, preregistration of analysis plans can be useful for distinguishing confirmatory and exploratory analyses. Investigators are encouraged to preregister their studies and analysis plans prior to conducting their research via a publicly accessible registry system (e.g., OSFopens in new window, ClinicalTrials.govopens in new window, or other trial registries in the WHO Registry Network). There are many available templates; for example, APA, the British Psychological Society, and the German Psychological Society partnered with the Leibniz Institute for Psychology and Center for Open Science to create Preregistration Standards for Quantitative Research in Psychologyopens in new window (Bosnjak et al., 2022).

Articles must state whether or not any work was preregistered and, if so, where to access the preregistration. Preregistrations must be available to reviewers; authors may submit a masked copy via stable link or supplemental material. Links in the Method section should be replaced with an identifiable copy on acceptance.

For example:

• This study’s design was preregistered prospectively, before data were collected; see [STABLE LINK OR DOI].
• This study’s design and hypotheses were preregistered after data had been collected but before analyses were undertaken; see [STABLE LINK OR DOI].
• This study’s analysis plan was preregistered; see [STABLE LINK OR DOI].
• This study was not preregistered.

In order to reduce the likelihood of duplicate or piecemeal publication, authors are required to provide, in their cover letter, a list of published, in press, and under review studies that come from the same dataset as the one in the submitted manuscript, as well as a narrative description of how the submitted manuscript differs from the others.

This narrative description should include how the manuscript differs (or does not) in terms of research question and variables studied.

Authors also are required to submit a masked version of the narrative description that can be provided to reviewers. Please add this as an appendix table on the last page of the submitted manuscript. Please base your description on the following examples, edited according to your specific data circumstances.

Do not provide the title of the manuscript, authors, or journal in which it was published. Do provide the names of the relevant variables (i.e., substitute the numbers in the examples below for actual names, such as depressive symptoms, therapeutic alliance, etc.).

Narrative Example: Multiple uses of data collected from the same sample

The data reported in this manuscript have been previously published and/or were collected as part of a larger data collection (at one or more points in time). Findings from the data collection have been reported in separate manuscripts. MS 1 (published) focuses on variables 1, 2, and 3; while MS 2 (in press) focuses on variables 4, 5, and 6. MS 3 (the current manuscript) focuses on variables 8, 9, and 15. MS 4 (soon to be submitted) will focus on variables 10, 12, and 14.

Narrative Example: Publicly available dataset

The data reported in this manuscript were obtained from publicly available data, [name of project, along with website link to project description]. A bibliography of journal articles, working papers, conference presentations, and dissertations using the [name of project] is available at [website link to bibliography list]. The variables and relationships examined in the present article have not been examined in any previous or current articles, or to the best of our knowledge in any papers that will be under review soon. [Alternatively, clarify any overlap of variables, as done in the narrative example above].

Upon submission of the manuscript, authors will be required to attest to the provision of the required information described above.

Finally, upon acceptance of a manuscript, authors will be required to provide, as part of the author note, a list of related published papers that come from the same dataset, unless such papers are clearly described and referenced in the manuscript (specifically noting that findings come from the same dataset).

Should your paper ultimately be accepted for publication, JCCP would like to encourage you to determine if posting materials and/or data is right for your study and, if so, to make your data and materials publicly available, if possible, by providing a link in your paper to a third-party repository.

Making your data and materials publicly available can increase the impact of your research, enabling future researchers to incorporate your work in model testing, replication projects, and meta-analyses, in addition to increasing the transparency of your research.

The APA's data sharing policy does not require public posting, so you are free to decide what is best for your project in terms of public data, materials, and conditions on their use. Note, however, that APA policy does require that authors make their data available to other researchers upon request.

Prepare manuscripts according to the Publication Manual of the American Psychological Association using the 7th edition. Manuscripts may be copyedited for bias-free language (see Chapter 5 of the Publication Manual).

Review APA's Journal Manuscript Preparation Guidelines before submitting your article.

Double-space all copy. Other formatting instructions, as well as instructions on preparing tables, figures, references, metrics, and abstracts, appear in the Manual. Additional guidance on APA Style is available on the APA Style website.

Below are additional instructions regarding the preparation of display equations, computer code, and tables.

We strongly encourage you to use MathType (third-party software) or Equation Editor 3.0 (built into pre-2007 versions of Word) to construct your equations, rather than the equation support that is built into Word 2007 and Word 2010. Equations composed with the built-in Word 2007/Word 2010 equation support are converted to low-resolution graphics when they enter the production process and must be rekeyed by the typesetter, which may introduce errors.

To construct your equations with MathType or Equation Editor 3.0:

• Go to the Text section of the Insert tab and select Object.
• Select MathType or Equation Editor 3.0 in the drop-down menu.

If you have an equation that has already been produced using Microsoft Word 2007 or 2010 and you have access to the full version of MathType 6.5 or later, you can convert this equation to MathType by clicking on MathType Insert Equation. Copy the equation from Microsoft Word and paste it into the MathType box. Verify that your equation is correct, click File, and then click Update. Your equation has now been inserted into your Word file as a MathType Equation.

Use Equation Editor 3.0 or MathType only for equations or for formulas that cannot be produced as Word text using the Times or Symbol font.

Because altering computer code in any way (e.g., indents, line spacing, line breaks, page breaks) during the typesetting process could alter its meaning, we treat computer code differently from the rest of your article in our production process. To that end, we request separate files for computer code.

In online supplemental material

We request that runnable source code be included as supplemental material to the article. For more information, visit Supplementing Your Article With Online Material.

In the text of the article

If you would like to include code in the text of your published manuscript, please submit a separate file with your code exactly as you want it to appear, using Courier New font with a type size of 8 points. We will make an image of each segment of code in your article that exceeds 40 characters in length. (Shorter snippets of code that appear in text will be typeset in Courier New and run in with the rest of the text.) If an appendix contains a mix of code and explanatory text, please submit a file that contains the entire appendix, with the code keyed in 8-point Courier New.

Use Word's insert table function when you create tables. Using spaces or tabs in your table will create problems when the table is typeset and may result in errors.

Authors who feel that their manuscript may benefit from additional academic writing or language editing support prior to submission are encouraged to seek out such services at their host institutions, engage with colleagues and subject matter experts, and/or consider several vendors that offer discounts to APA authors.

Please note that APA does not endorse or take responsibility for the service providers listed. It is strictly a referral service. Use of such service is not mandatory for publication in an APA journal. Use of one or more of these services does not guarantee selection for peer review, manuscript acceptance, or preference for publication in any APA journal.

APA can place supplemental materials online, available via the published article in the APA PsycArticles^® database.

List references in alphabetical order. Each listed reference should be cited in text, and each text citation should be listed in the references section.

Examples of basic reference formats:

Journal article

McCauley, S. M., & Christiansen, M. H. (2019). Language learning as language use: A cross-linguistic model of child language development. Psychological Review, 126(1), 1–51. https://doi.org/10.1037/rev0000126opens in new window

Authored book

Brown, L. S. (2018). Feminist therapy (2nd ed.). American Psychological Association. https://doi.org/10.1037/0000092-000opens in new window

Chapter in an edited book

Balsam, K. F., Martell, C. R., Jones. K. P., Safren, S. A. (2019). Affirmative cognitive behavior therapy with sexual and gender minority people. In G. Y. Iwamasa & P. A. Hays (Eds.), Culturally responsive cognitive behavior therapy: Practice and supervision (2nd ed., pp. 287–314). American Psychological Association. https://doi.org/10.1037/0000119-012opens in new window

Data set citation

Alegria, M., Jackson, J. S., Kessler, R. C., & Takeuchi, D. (2016). Collaborative Psychiatric Epidemiology Surveys (CPES), 2001–2003 [Data set]. Inter-university Consortium for Political and Social Research. https://doi.org/10.3886/ICPSR20240.v8opens in new window

Software/Code citation

Viechtbauer, W. (2010). Conducting meta-analyses in R with the metafor package.  Journal of Statistical Software, 36(3), 1–48. https://www.jstatsoft.org/v36/i03/opens in new window

Wickham, H. et al., (2019). Welcome to the tidyverse. Journal of Open Source Software, 4(43), 1686, https://doi.org/10.21105/joss.01686opens in new window

All data, program code, and other methods must be appropriately cited in the text and listed in the references section.

Tables should adhere to APA Styleopens in new window. Use Word’s Insert Table function to create tables, and do not insert tabs or extra spaces to align columns as this will create problems when the table is typeset.

Preferred formats for graphics files are TIFF and JPG, and preferred format for vector-based files is EPS. Graphics downloaded or saved from web pages are not acceptable for publication. Multipanel figures (i.e., figures with parts labeled a, b, c, d, etc.) should be assembled into one file. When possible, please place symbol legends below the figure instead of to the side.

Resolution 

• All color line art and halftones: 300 DPI 
• Black and white line tone and gray halftone images: 600 DPI 

Line weights 

• Adobe Photoshop images 
• Color (RGB, CMYK) images: 2 pixels 
• Grayscale images: 4 pixels 
• Adobe Illustrator Images 
• Stroke weight: 0.5 points 

APA offers authors the option to publish their figures online in color without the costs associated with print publication of color figures.

The same caption will appear on both the online (color) and print (black and white) versions. To ensure that the figure can be understood in both formats, authors should add alternative wording (e.g., “the red (dark gray) bars represent”) as needed.

Color figure fees

For authors who prefer their figures to be published in color both in print and online, original color figures can be printed in color at the editor's and publisher's discretion provided the author agrees to pay: 

• $900 for one figure 
• An additional $600 for the second figure 
• An additional $450 for each subsequent figure

We strongly encourage you to use MathType (third-party software) or Equation Editor 3.0 (built into pre-2007 versions of Word) to construct your equations, rather than the equation support that is built into Word 2007 and Word 2010. Equations composed with the built-in Word 2007/Word 2010 equation support are converted to low-resolution graphics when they enter the production process and must be rekeyed by the typesetter, which may introduce errors.

To construct your equations with MathType or Equation Editor 3.0:

• Go to the Text section of the Insert tab and select Object.
• Select MathType or Equation Editor 3.0 in the drop-down menu.

If you have an equation that has already been produced using Microsoft Word 2007 or 2010 and you have access to the full version of MathType 6.5 or later, you can convert this equation to MathType by clicking on MathType Insert Equation. Copy the equation from Microsoft Word and paste it into the MathType box. Verify that your equation is correct, click File, and then click Update. Your equation has now been inserted into your Word file as a MathType Equation.

Use Equation Editor 3.0 or MathType only for equations or for formulas that cannot be produced as Word text using the Times or Symbol font.

Because altering computer code in any way (e.g., indents, line spacing, line breaks, page breaks) during the typesetting process could alter its meaning, we treat computer code differently from the rest of the article in the production process. Supply separate files for computer code.

In online supplemental material

Runnable source code should be included as supplemental material to the article. For more information, visit supplementing your article with online material.

In the text of the article

If authors would like to include code in the text of the published article, submit a separate file with your code exactly as it should appear, using Courier New font with a type size of 8 points. An image will be made of each segment of code in your article that exceeds 40 characters in length. (Shorter snippets of code that appear in text will be typeset in Courier New and run in with the rest of the text.) If an appendix contains a mix of code and explanatory text, please submit a file that contains the entire appendix, with the code keyed in 8-point Courier New.

Authors of accepted papers must obtain and provide to the editor on final acceptance all necessary permissions to reproduce in print and electronic form any copyrighted work, including test materials (or portions thereof), photographs, and other graphic images (including those used as stimuli in experiments).

On advice of counsel, APA may decline to publish any image whose copyright status is unknown.

• Download Permissions Alert Form (PDF, 13KB)opens in new window

APA holds policies that apply to all journals published. These include policies on author contributorship and responsibilities of authors; author name changes after publication; the use of generative artificial intelligence; funder information and conflict-of-interest disclosures; duplicate publication; data publication and reuse; and preprints. Please also refer to individual journal submission guidance for specific practices and requirements for manuscript submission.

A key convention in the publication of research is the peer review process, in which the quality and potential contribution of each manuscript is evaluated by one's peers in the scientific community. Like other scientific journals, APA journals utilize a peer review process to guide manuscript selection and publication decisions.

In light of changing patterns of scientific knowledge dissemination, APA requires authors to provide information on prior dissemination of the data and narrative interpretations of the data/research appearing in the manuscript (e.g., if some or all were presented at a conference or meeting, posted on a listserv, shared on a website, including academic social networks like ResearchGate, etc.). This information (2–4 sentences) must be provided as part of the author note.

APA policy prohibits an author from submitting the same manuscript for concurrent consideration by two or more publications.

APA requires authors to reveal any possible conflict of interest in the conduct and reporting of research (e.g., financial interests in a test or procedure, funding by pharmaceutical companies for drug research).

APA Journals aims to address systemic inequities and bias, promote equitable opportunities for researchers, and foster an inclusive environment within the psychological research and scholarly publishing communities, representative of the wide array of people that psychology consists of and serves. Please refer to individual journal submission guidance for specific EDI practices and requirements for manuscript submission.

The APA Journals™ Program is committed to publishing transparent, rigorous research; improving reproducibility in science; and aiding research discovery. Open science practices vary across subfields and per editor discretion, and APA Publishing supports all efforts to improve openness and transparency, especially as they improve diversity, equity, and inclusion. Please refer to individual journal submission guidance for specific OS practices and requirements for manuscript submission.

The APA Journals Office supports authors’ choices on how to publish their work. We are committed to offering options that we believe comply with most funder and institutional requirements and support both self-archiving (“green”) and APC (paid for via an article processing charge and also known as “gold”) Open Access options. Submitting a manuscript for peer review is free of charge.

APA’s current policies on generative AI include:

• When a generative AI model is used in the drafting of a manuscript for an APA publication, the use of AI must be disclosed in the methods section and cited.
• AI cannot be named as an author on an APA scholarly publication.

APA policy prohibits an author from submitting the same manuscript for concurrent consideration by two or more publications. Preprints are allowed.

Authors of accepted papers must obtain and provide on final acceptance all necessary permissions to reproduce in print and electronic form any copyrighted work, including test materials (or portions thereof), photographs, and other graphic images (including those used as stimuli in experiments).

On advice of counsel, APA may decline to publish any image whose copyright status is unknown.

It is a violation of APA Ethical Principles to publish “as original data, data that have been previously published” (Standard 8.13).

APA Ethical Principles also state that “after research results are published, psychologists do not withhold the data on which their conclusions are based from other competent professionals who seek to verify the substantive claims through reanalysis and who intend to use such data only for that purpose, provided that the confidentiality of the participants can be protected and unless legal rights concerning proprietary data preclude their release” (Standard 8.14).

APA expects authors to make their data available if asked during the editorial process and for at least five years after the date of publication.

If the manuscript is accepted, the corresponding author is required to sign and submit a Certification of Compliance with APA Ethical Principles (PDF, 26KB).opens in new window

See APA’s Publishing Policies page for more information on publication policies, including information on author contributorship and responsibilities of authors, author name changes after publication, the use of generative artificial intelligence, funder information and conflict-of-interest disclosures, duplicate publication, data publication and reuse, and preprints.

Visit the Journals Publishing Resource Center for more resources for writing, reviewing, and editing articles for publishing in APA journals.