Journal scope statement
Traumatology® is a primary reference for professionals all over the world who study and treat people exposed to highly stressful and traumatic events, such as terrorist bombings, war disasters, fires, accidents, criminal and familial abuse, hostage-taking, hospitalization, major illness, abandonment, and sudden unemployment.
Whether you are a psychologist, medical or nursing professional, aid worker, social worker, or other disaster/trauma professional, Traumatology will help you better understand how to work with disaster victims and their families, as well as other caregivers.
Each unique issue offers original articles, reviews, field reports, brief reports, commentary, and media reviews on trauma research, treatment, prevention, education, training, medical, legal, policy and theoretical concerns.
Among the topics covered in recent issues are:
- post-tsunami training of helpers in Phuket, Thailand 2005
- helpful interventions on the Mississippi Gulf Coast
- Stockholm effects and psychological responses to captivity in hostages held by suicide terrorists
- sarin gas attack on the Tokyo subway system
- vicarious witnessing in European concentration camps: imagining the trauma of another
- the counting method: applying the rule of parsimony to the treatment of posttraumatic stress disorder
- adaptive coping in adolescent trauma survivors
- emotional release technique: a new desensitization method
- gender differences and acute stress reactions among rescue personnel
- neurological basis for the observed peripheral sensory modulation of emotional responses
- post-traumatic stress in youth experiencing illnesses and injuries
- post-traumatic growth and HIV bereavement
- post-traumatic growth following a cancer diagnosis
- psychological growth from a close brush with death
Equity, diversity, and inclusion
Traumatology supports equity, diversity, and inclusion (EDI) in its practices. More information on these initiatives is available under EDI Efforts.
Call for Papers
Editor's Choice
One article from each issue of Traumatology will be highlighted as an “Editor’s Choice” article. Selection is based on the recommendations of the associate editors, the paper’s potential impact to the field, the distinction of expanding the contributors to, or the focus of, the science, or its discussion of an important future direction for science. Editor's Choice articles are featured alongside articles from other APA published journals in a bi-weekly newsletter and are temporarily made freely available to newsletter subscribers.
Author and editor spotlights
Explore journal highlights: free article summaries, editor interviews and editorials, journal awards, mentorship opportunities, and more.
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.
Submission
To submit to the editorial office of Regardt J. Ferreira, please submit manuscripts electronically through the Manuscript Submission Portal in Word Document format (.doc).
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). APA Style and Grammar Guidelines for the 7th edition are available.
General correspondence may be directed to the editor's office.
In addition to addresses and phone numbers, please supply email addresses, as most communications will be by email. Fax numbers, if available, should also be provided for potential use by the editorial office and later by the production office.
Manuscript preparation
Review APA's Journal Manuscript Preparation Guidelines before submitting your article.
Formatting
Double-space all copy. Manuscripts should be 30 pages and under (not including references and tables/figures). 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.
Brief reports
Brief reports are articles that do not exceed 10 pages including the cover page, abstract, tables, figures, and references. A brief report is appropriate when there are preliminary findings, or findings from a small sample size, that may not be appropriate for a full research report. Please note that brief reports for Traumatology are by invitation only.
Display equations
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.
Computer code
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.
Tables
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.
Author contribution statements using CRediT
The APA Publication Manual (7th ed.) 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, Traumatology has adopted the Contributor Roles Taxonomy (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 asked to identify the contributions of all authors at initial submission according to this taxonomy. If the manuscript is accepted for publication, the CRediT designations will be published as an Author Contributions Statement in the author note of the final article. All authors should have reviewed and agreed to their individual contribution(s) before 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.
Academic writing and English language editing services
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.
Submitting supplemental materials
APA can place supplemental materials online, available via the published article in the PsycArticles® database. Please see Supplementing Your Article With Online Material for more details.
Abstract and keywords
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.
References
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/rev0000126
Authored book
Brown, L. S. (2018). Feminist therapy (2nd ed.). American Psychological Association. https://doi.org/10.1037/0000092-000
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/10.1037/0000119-012
Figures
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.
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
Permissions
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.
Publication policies
For full details on publication policies, including use of Artificial Intelligence tools, please see APA Publishing Policies.
APA policy prohibits an author from submitting the same manuscript for concurrent consideration by two or more publications.
See also APA Journals® Internet Posting Guidelines.
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).
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.
Ethical Principles
It is a violation of APA Ethical Principles to publish "as original data, data that have been previously published" (Standard 8.13).
In addition, APA Ethical Principles specify 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 adhere to these standards. Specifically, APA expects authors to have their data available throughout the editorial review process and for at least 5 years after the date of publication.
Authors are required to state in writing that they have complied with APA ethical standards in the treatment of their sample, human or animal, or to describe the details of treatment.
The APA Ethics Office provides the full Ethical Principles of Psychologists and Code of Conduct electronically on its website in HTML, PDF, and Word format. You may also request a copy by emailing or calling the APA Ethics Office (202-336-5930). You may also read "Ethical Principles," December 1992, American Psychologist, Vol. 47, pp. 1597–1611.
Other information
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.
Editor
Regardt J. Ferreira, PhD
Tulane University, United States
Associate editors
David L. Albright, PhD
The University of Alabama, United States
Frederick Buttell, PhD
Tulane University, United States
April L. Murphy, PhD
Western Kentucky University, United States
Editorial board members
Rick D. Allen, PhD
California Disaster Mental Health Coalition, United States
Melanie Arenson, PhD
University of Maryland at College Park, United States
Christal L. Badour, PhD
University of Kentucky, United States
Joan M. Blakey, PhD
University of Minnesota, United States
Sharon Bowland, PhD
University of Tennessee, United States
Dana C. Branson, PhD
Southeast Missouri State University, United States
Brian E. Bride, PhD
Georgia State University, United States
Patricia J. Brownell, PhD
Fordham University, United States
Clare E. B. Cannon, PhD
University of California, Davis, United States
James C. Caringi, PhD
University of Montana, United States
Shannon Cusack, PhD
Virginia Commonwealth University, United States
Dorte Mølgaard Christiansen, PhD
University of Southern Denmark, Denmark
Joseph Currier, PhD
University of South Alabama, United States
Douglas S. Faust, PhD
Private Practice, United States
Sandra Ferreira, PhD
University of the Free State, South Africa
Charles Figley, PhD
Tulane University, United States
Jennifer First, PhD
University of Tennessee, United States
Michael Fitzgerald, PhD
Oklahoma State University, United States
Samantha Francois, PhD
Clark University , United States
Steven M. Gorelick, PhD
Hunter College, City University of NY, United States
Melissa Hagan, PhD
San Francisco State University, United States
Tonya Hansel, PhD
Tulane University, United States
James Hawdon, PhD
Virginia Tech, United States
Karl Hedman, PhD
Jönköping University, Sweden
Audrey Honig, PhD
Los Angeles County Sheriffs Department, United States
Tim Hoyt, PhD
Defense Health Agency, United States
Xavier Justice, MACC, CPES, RCP
Green Cross Academy of Traumatology, United States
Kyle D. Killian, PhD
Capella University, United States
Eileen Klein, PhD
Ramapo College, United States
Steven Lancaster, PhD
Bethel University, United States
Amy Lesen, PhD
Dillard University, United States
Jessica Liddell, MPH, MSW
Tulane University, United States
Jennifer Lilly, PhD
Fordham University, United States
Tina M. Maschi, PhD
Fordham University Graduate School of Social Service, United States
Lynne McCormack, PhD
University of Newcastle, Australia
Justin T. McDaniel, PhD
Southern Illinois University, United States
Pamela Melton, PhD
Tulane University, United States
Kim S. Ménard, PhD
Penn State Altoona, United States
Cathy Miller, PhD
Texas A&M University-Corpus Christi, United States
Matthew Price, PhD
University of Vermont, United States
Anita Padmanabhanunni, PhD
University of the Western Cape, South Africa
Tara M. Powell, PhD
University of Illinois, United States
Grant J. Rich, PhD
Walden University, United States
Ami Rokach, PhD
York University, Canada
Len Sperry, MD, PhD
Florida Atlantic University, United States
Omar Sims, PhD
Cleveland Clinic – Lerner Research Institute
Olivia Tabaczyk, PhD
US Department of Veterans Affairs, United States
Maria Louison Vang, BSc, MSc, PhD
University of Southern Denmark and Ulster University, Northern Ireland
Alpo Vuorio, PhD
University of Helsinki: Helsingin Yliopisto, Finland
Rachel Ward,PhD
Palo Alto University, United States
Kayleigh Watters, PhD
Palo Alto University, United States
Marcela Weber, PhD
University of Arkansas for Medical Sciences, United States
Liyun Wu, PhD
Norfolk State University, United States
Abstracting and indexing services providing coverage of Traumatology®
- Mosby's Nursing Consult
- OCLC
- PILOTS
- PsycInfo
- SafetyLit
- SCOPUS
- COVID-19:
Special issue of APA’s journal of Traumatology, Vol. 27, No. 1, March 2021. The special issue includes fourteen articles detailing empirical and theoretical approaches seeking to gain a better understanding of how COVID-19 impacts our overall well-being, with a special focus on uncovering mental health disparities.
- Secondary Traumatic Stress, Compassion Fatigue, and Vicarious Trauma:
Special issue of the APA journal Traumatology, Vol. 23, No. 2, June 2017. Includes articles about secondary traumatic stress and compassion fatigue among mental heath, medical, and first-responder professionals.
- Resilience and Trauma:
Special issue of the APA journal Traumatology, Vol. 23, No. 1, March 2017. The articles are divided among three sections: Reflections on Trauma Resilience Living in Israel, Resilience in Specific Contexts, and Models and Mechanisms of Trauma. Resilience.
- Trauma, Aging, and Well-Being:
Special issue of the APA journal Traumatology, Vol. 21, No. 3, September 2015. The articles examine trauma, aging, coping resilience, and well-being from a human rights and social justice perspective.
Inclusive study designs
- Collaborative research models
- Diverse samples
Definitions and further details on inclusive study designs are available on the Journals EDI homepage.
Inclusive reporting standards
- Bias-free language and community-driven language guidelines (required)
- Reflexivity (recommended)
- Positionality statements (recommended)
- Data sharing and data availability statements (recommended)
- Impact statements (recommended)
- Year(s) of data collection (recommended)
- Participant sample descriptions (recommended)
- Sample justifications (recommended)
- Inclusive reference lists (recommended)
More information on this journal’s reporting standards is listed under the submission guidelines tab.
Pathways to authorship and editorship
Editorial fellowships
Editorial fellowships help early-career psychologists gain firsthand experience in scholarly publishing and editorial leadership roles. This journal offers an editorial fellowship program for early-career psychologists from historically excluded communities.
Reviewer mentoring
This journal offers a pathway for reviewers to obtain an editorial seat after reviewing a certain number of articles, allowing for the mentorship of younger scholars as feedback is provided on a regular basis.
Other EDI offerings
ORCID reviewer recognition
Open Research and Contributor ID (ORCID) Reviewer Recognition provides a visible and verifiable way for journals to publicly credit reviewers without compromising the confidentiality of the peer-review process. This journal has implemented the ORCID Reviewer Recognition feature in Editorial Manager, meaning that reviewers can be recognized for their contributions to the peer-review process.
Translated abstracts
Abstracts which are translated into multiple languages provide accessibility and discoverability for a global community of scholars.
Masked peer review
This journal offers masked peer review (where both the authors’ and reviewers’ identities are not known to the other). Research has shown that masked peer review can help reduce implicit bias against traditionally female names or early-career scientists with smaller publication records (Budden et al., 2008; Darling, 2015).
This journal is available online only.
Announcement
Editorial
- Advancing trauma and resilience research
March 2019
