About the journal
Aims and scope
Enlighten: Jurnal Bimbingan Konseling Islam collaborates with PABKI counseling models, therapeutic techniques, mental health within the Islamic context, religious and cultural influences, as well as case studies, historical perspectives, and the socio-economic impact of Islamic counseling. It is interdisciplinary and aims to bring together different approaches for a diverse readership. High-quality papers are welcomed across various aspects of Islamic Guidance and Counseling, including counseling planning and management, indigenous counseling methods, therapy and coaching, counseling applications in educational and clinical settings, studies in psychology and welfare, and research within religious institutions.
Journal of Affective Disorders is the companion title to the open access
Article types
The Journal primarily publishes:
Full-Length Research Papers
(up to 6000 words, excluding references and up to 6 tables/figures)
Review Articles and Meta-analyses
(up to 8000 words, excluding references and up to 10 tables/figures)
At the discretion of the accepting Editor-in-Chief, and/or based on reviewer feedback, authors may be allowed fewer or more than these guidelines.
About the journal
Aims and scope
Enlighten publishes papers focusing on Islamic Guidance and Counseling in a broad sense: counseling models, therapeutic techniques, mental health within the Islamic context, religious and cultural influences, as well as case studies, historical perspectives, and the socio-economic impact of Islamic counseling. This journal is interdisciplinary, aiming to integrate diverse approaches for a global readership. Enlighten also emphasizes the practical impact of research on real-world practices and society, enhancing the relevance of studies that can be applied in the field. High-quality papers are welcomed across various aspects of Islamic Guidance and Counseling, including counseling planning and management, indigenous counseling methods, therapy and coaching, counseling applications in educational and clinical settings, studies in psychology and welfare, and research within religious institutions. Additionally, Enlighten encourages contemporary topics, such as digitalization in Islamic counseling and the role of technology in Islamic therapy, to enrich studies that respond to modern developments.
Article types
The Journal primarily publishes:
Full-Length Research Papers
(up to 5000 words, excluding references and up to 6 tables/figures)
Review Articles and Meta-analyses
(up to 8000 words, excluding references and up to 10 tables/figures)
Peer review
This journal follows a double anonymized review process. Your submission will initially be assessed by our editors to determine suitability for publication in this journal. If your submission is deemed suitable, it will typically be sent to a minimum of two reviewers for an independent expert assessment of the scientific quality. The decision as to whether your article is accepted or rejected will be taken by our editors. Authors who wish to appeal the editorial decision for their manuscript may submit a formal appeal request in accordance with the procedure outlined in Enlighten Policy. Only one appeal per submission will be considered and the appeal decision will be final.
Read more about peer review.
Our editors are not involved in making decisions about papers which:
- they have written themselves.
- have been written by family members or colleagues.
- relate to products or services in which they have an interest.
Any such submissions will be subject to the journal's usual procedures and peer review will be handled independently of the editor involved and their research group. Read more about editor duties.
Special issues and article collections
The peer review process for special issues and article collections follows the same process as outlined above for regular submissions, except, a guest editor will send the submissions out to the reviewers and may recommend a decision to the journal editor. The journal editor oversees the peer review process of all special issues and article collections to ensure the high standards of publishing ethics and responsiveness are respected and is responsible for the final decision regarding acceptance or rejection of articles.
Open access
We refer you to our open access information page to learn about open access options for this journal.
Ethics and policies
Ethics in publishing
Authors must follow ethical guidelines stated in Enlighten Publishing Ethics Policy.
Submission declaration
When authors submit an article to an Enlighten it is implied that:
- the work described has not been published previously except in the form of a preprint, an abstract, a published lecture, academic thesis or registered report. See our policy on multiple, redundant or concurrent publication.
- the article is not under consideration for publication elsewhere.
- the article's publication is approved by all authors and tacitly or explicitly by the responsible authorities where the work was carried out.
- if accepted, the article will not be published elsewhere in the same form, in English or in any other language, including electronically, without the written consent of the copyright-holder.
To verify compliance with our journal publishing policies, we may check your manuscript with our screening tools.
Authorship
All authors should have made substantial contributions to all of the following:
- The conception and design of the study, or acquisition of data, or analysis and interpretation of data.
- Drafting the article or revising it critically for important intellectual content.
- Final approval of the version to be submitted.
All authors should agree to be accountable for all aspects of the work to ensure that the questions related to the accuracy or integrity of any part of the work are appropriately investigated and resolved.
Changes to authorship
The editors of this journal generally will not consider changes to authorship once a manuscript has been submitted. It is important that authors carefully consider the authorship list and order of authors and provide a definitive author list at original submission.
The policy of this journal around authorship changes:
- All authors must be listed in the manuscript and their details entered into the submission system.
- Any addition, deletion or rearrangement of author names in the authorship list should only be made prior to acceptance, and only if approved by the journal editor.
- Requests to change authorship should be made by the corresponding author, who must provide the reason for the request to the journal editor with written confirmation from all authors, including any authors being added or removed, that they agree with the addition, removal or rearrangement.
- Only in exceptional circumstances will the journal editor consider the addition, deletion or rearrangement of authors post acceptance.
- Publication of the manuscript may be paused while a change in authorship request is being considered.
- Any authorship change requests approved by the journal editor will result in a corrigendum if the manuscript has already been published.
- Any unauthorised authorship changes may result in the rejection of the article, or retraction, if the article has already been published.
Declaration of interests
All authors must disclose any financial and personal relationships with other people or organizations that could inappropriately influence or bias their work. Examples of potential competing interests include:
- Employment
- Consultancies
- Stock ownership
- Honoraria
- Paid expert testimony
- Patent applications or registrations
- Grants or any other funding
The Declaration of Interests tool should always be completed.
Authors with no competing interests to declare should select the option, "I have nothing to declare".
The resulting Word document containing your declaration should be uploaded at the "attach/upload files" step in the submission process. It is important that the Word document is saved in the .doc/.docx file format. Author signatures are not required.
We advise you to read our policy on conflict of interest statements, funding source declarations, author agreements/declarations and permission notes.
Funding sources
Authors must disclose any funding sources who provided financial support for the conduct of the research and/or preparation of the article. The role of sponsors, if any, should be declared in relation to the study design, collection, analysis and interpretation of data, writing of the report and decision to submit the article for publication. If funding sources had no such involvement this should be stated in your submission.
List funding sources in this standard way to facilitate compliance to funder's requirements:
Funding: This work was supported by the National Institutes of Health [grant numbers xxxx, yyyy]; the Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation, Seattle, WA [grant number zzzz]; and the United States Institutes of Peace [grant number aaaa].
It is not necessary to include detailed descriptions on the program or type of grants, scholarships and awards. When funding is from a block grant or other resources available to a university, college, or other research institution, submit the name of the institute or organization that provided the funding.
If no funding has been provided for the research, it is recommended to include the following sentence:
This research did not receive any specific grant from funding agencies in the public, commercial, or not-for-profit sectors.
Declaration of generative AI in scientific writing
Authors must declare the use of generative AI in scientific writing upon submission of the paper. The following guidance refers only to the writing process, and not to the use of AI tools to analyse and draw insights from data as part of the research process:
- Generative AI and AI-assisted technologies should only be used in the writing process to improve the readability and language of the manuscript.
- The technology must be applied with human oversight and control and authors should carefully review and edit the result, as AI can generate authoritative-sounding output that can be incorrect, incomplete or biased. Authors are ultimately responsible and accountable for the contents of the work.
- Authors must not list or cite AI and AI-assisted technologies as an author or co-author on the manuscript since authorship implies responsibilities and tasks that can only be attributed to and performed by humans.
The use of generative AI and AI-assisted technologies in scientific writing must be declared by adding a statement at the end of the manuscript when the paper is first submitted. The statement will appear in the published work and should be placed in a new section before the references list. An example:
- Title of new section: Declaration of generative AI and AI-assisted technologies in the writing process.
- Statement: During the preparation of this work the author(s) used [NAME TOOL / SERVICE] in order to [REASON]. After using this tool/service, the author(s) reviewed and edited the content as needed and take(s) full responsibility for the content of the published article.
The declaration does not apply to the use of basic tools, such as tools used to check grammar, spelling and references. If you have nothing to disclose, you do not need to add a statement.
Please read Enlighten author policy on the use of generative AI and AI-assisted technologies, which can be found in our GenAI Policies for journals.
Please note: to protect authors’ rights and the confidentiality of their research, this journal does not currently allow the use of generative AI or AI-assisted technologies such as ChatGPT or similar services by reviewers or editors in the peer review and manuscript evaluation process, as is stated in our GenAI Policies for journals. We are actively evaluating compliant AI tools and may revise this policy in the future.
Use of inclusive language
Inclusive language acknowledges diversity, conveys respect to all people, is sensitive to differences, and promotes equal opportunities. Authors should ensure their work uses inclusive language throughout and contains nothing which might imply one individual is superior to another on the grounds of:
- age
- gender
- race
- ethnicity
- culture
- sexual orientation
- disability or health condition
We recommend avoiding the use of descriptors about personal attributes unless they are relevant and valid. Write for gender neutrality with the use of plural nouns ("clinicians, patients/clients") as default. Wherever possible, avoid using "he, she," or "he/she."
No assumptions should be made about the beliefs of readers and writing should be free from bias, stereotypes, slang, reference to dominant culture and/or cultural assumptions.
These guidelines are meant as a point of reference to help you identify appropriate language but are by no means exhaustive or definitive.
Reporting sex- and gender-based analyses
There is no single, universally agreed-upon set of guidelines for defining sex and gender. We offer the following guidance:
- Sex and gender-based analyses (SGBA) should be integrated into research design when research involves or pertains to humans, animals or eukaryotic cells. This should be done in accordance with any requirements set by funders or sponsors and best practices within a field.
- Sex and/or gender dimensions of the research should be addressed within the article or declared as a limitation to the generalizability of the research.
- Definitions of sex and/or gender applied should be explicitly stated to enhance the precision, rigor and reproducibility of the research and to avoid ambiguity or conflation of terms and the constructs to which they refer.
We advise you to read the Sex and Gender Equity in Research (SAGER) guidelines and the SAGER checklist (PDF) on the EASE website, which offer systematic approaches to the use of sex and gender information in study design, data analysis, outcome reporting and research interpretation.
For further information we suggest reading the rationale behind and recommended use of the SAGER guidelines.
Definitions of sex and/or gender
We ask authors to define how sex and gender have been used in their research and publication. Some guidance:
- Sex generally refers to a set of biological attributes that are associated with physical and physiological features such as chromosomal genotype, hormonal levels, internal and external anatomy. A binary sex categorization (male/female) is usually designated at birth ("sex assigned at birth") and is in most cases based solely on the visible external anatomy of a newborn. In reality, sex categorizations include people who are intersex/have differences of sex development (DSD).
- Gender generally refers to socially constructed roles, behaviors and identities of women, men and gender-diverse people that occur in a historical and cultural context and may vary across societies and over time. Gender influences how people view themselves and each other, how they behave and interact and how power is distributed in society.
Jurisdictional claims
Elsevier respects the decisions taken by its authors as to how they choose to designate territories and identify their affiliations in their published content. Elsevier’s policy is to take a neutral position with respect to territorial disputes or jurisdictional claims, including, but not limited to, maps and institutional affiliations. For journals that Elsevier publishes on behalf of a third party owner, the owner may set its own policy on these issues.
- Maps: Readers should be able to locate any study areas shown within maps using common mapping platforms. Maps should only show the area actually studied and authors should not include a location map which displays a larger area than the bounding box of the study area. Authors should add a note clearly stating that "map lines delineate study areas and do not necessarily depict accepted national boundaries”. During the review process, Elsevier’s editors may request authors to change maps if these guidelines are not followed.
- Institutional affiliations: Authors should use either the full, standard title of their institution or the standard abbreviation of the institutional name so that the institutional name can be independently verified for research integrity purposes.
Writing and formatting
File format
We ask you to provide editable source files for your entire submission (including figures, tables and text graphics). Some guidelines:
- Save files in an editable format, using the extension .doc/.docx for Word files and .tex for LaTeX files. A PDF is not an acceptable source file.
- Lay out text in a single-column format.
- Use spell-check and grammar-check functions to avoid errors.
We advise you to read our Step-by-step guide to publishing with Elsevier.
Title page
You are required to include the following details in the title page information:
- Article title. Article titles should be concise and informative. Please avoid abbreviations and formulae, where possible, unless they are established and widely understood, e.g., DNA).
- Author names. Provide the given name(s) and family name(s) of each author. The order of authors should match the order in the submission system. Carefully check that all names are accurately spelled. If needed, you can add your name between parentheses in your own script after the English transliteration.
- Affiliations. Add affiliation addresses, referring to where the work was carried out, below the author names. Indicate affiliations using a lower-case superscript letter immediately after the author's name and in front of the corresponding address. Ensure that you provide the full postal address of each affiliation, including the country name and, if available, the email address of each author.
- Corresponding author. Clearly indicate who will handle correspondence for your article at all stages of the refereeing and publication process and also post-publication. This responsibility includes answering any future queries about your results, data, methodology and materials. It is important that the email address and contact details of your corresponding author are kept up to date during the submission and publication process.
- Present/permanent address. If an author has moved since the work described in your article was carried out, or the author was visiting during that time, a "present address" (or "permanent address") can be indicated by a footnote to the author's name. The address where the author carried out the work must be retained as their main affiliation address. Use superscript Arabic numerals for such footnotes.
Abstract
You are required to provide a concise and factual abstract which does not exceed 250 words. The abstract should briefly state the purpose of your research, principal results and major conclusions. Some guidelines:
- Abstracts must be able to stand alone as abstracts are often presented separately from the article.
- Avoid references. If any are essential to include, ensure that you cite the author(s) and year(s).
- Avoid non-standard or uncommon abbreviations. If any are essential to include, ensure they are defined within your abstract at first mention.
Keywords
You are required to provide 1 to 7 keywords for indexing purposes. Keywords should be written in English. Please try to avoid keywords consisting of multiple words (using "and" or "of").
We recommend that you only use abbreviations in keywords if they are firmly established in the field.
Graphical abstract
You are encouraged to provide a graphical abstract at submission.
The graphical abstract should summarize the contents of your article in a concise, pictorial form which is designed to capture the attention of a wide readership. A graphical abstract will help draw more attention to your online article and support readers in digesting your research. Some guidelines:
- Submit your graphical abstract as a separate file in the online submission system.
- Ensure the image is a minimum of 531 x 1328 pixels (h x w) or proportionally more and is readable at a size of 5 x 13 cm using a regular screen resolution of 96 dpi.
- Our preferred file types for graphical abstracts are TIFF, EPS, PDF or MS Office files.
We encourage you to view example graphical abstracts and read about the benefits of including them.
Math formulae
- Submit math equations as editable text, not as images.
- Present simple formulae in line with normal text, where possible.
- Use the solidus (/) instead of a horizontal line for small fractional terms such as X/Y.
- Present variables in italics.
- Denote powers of e by exp.
- Display equations separately from your text, numbering them consecutively in the order they are referred to within your text.
Tables
Tables must be submitted as editable text, not as images. Some guidelines:
- Place tables next to the relevant text or on a separate page(s) at the end of your article.
- Cite all tables in the manuscript text.
- Number tables consecutively according to their appearance in the text.
- Please provide captions along with the tables.
- Place any table notes below the table body.
- Avoid vertical rules and shading within table cells.
We recommend that you use tables sparingly, ensuring that any data presented in tables is not duplicating results described elsewhere in the article.
Figures, images and artwork
Figures, images, artwork, diagrams and other graphical media must be supplied as separate files along with the manuscript. We recommend that you read our detailed artwork and media instructions. Some excerpts:
When submitting artwork:
- Cite all images in the manuscript text.
- Number images according to the sequence they appear within your article.
- Submit each image as a separate file using a logical naming convention for your files (for example, Figure_1, Figure_2 etc).
- Please provide captions along with the artwork.
- Text graphics may be embedded in the text at the appropriate position. If you are working with LaTeX, text graphics may also be embedded in the file.
Artwork formats
When your artwork is finalized, "save as" or convert your electronic artwork to the formats listed below taking into account the given resolution requirements for line drawings, halftones, and line/halftone combinations:
- Vector drawings: Save as EPS or PDF files embedding the font or saving the text as "graphics."
- Color or grayscale photographs (halftones): Save as TIFF, JPG or PNG files using a minimum of 300 dpi (for single column: min. 1063 pixels, full page width: 2244 pixels).
- Bitmapped line drawings: Save as TIFF, JPG or PNG files using a minimum of 1000 dpi (for single column: min. 3543 pixels, full page width: 7480 pixels).
- Combinations bitmapped line/halftones (color or grayscale): Save as TIFF, JPG or PNG files using a minimum of 500 dpi (for single column: min. 1772 pixels, full page width: 3740 pixels).
Please do not submit:
- files that are too low in resolution (for example, files optimized for screen use such as GIF, BMP, PICT or WPG files).
- disproportionally large images compared to font size, as text may become unreadable.
Figure captions
All images must have a caption. A caption should consist of a brief title (not displayed on the figure itself) and a description of the image. We advise you to keep the amount of text in any image to a minimum, though any symbols and abbreviations used should be explained.
Provide captions in a separate file.
Color artwork
If you submit usable color figures with your accepted article, we will ensure that they appear in color online.
Please ensure that color images are accessible to all, including those with impaired color vision. Learn more about color and web accessibility.
For articles appearing in print, you will be sent information on costs to reproduce color in the printed version, after your accepted article has been sent to production. At this stage, please indicate if your preference is to have color only in the online version of your article or also in the printed version.
Generative AI and Figures, images and artwork
Please read our policy on the use of generative AI and AI-assisted tools in figures, images and artwork, which can be found in Elsevier’s GenAI Policies for Journals. This policy states:
- We do not permit the use of Generative AI or AI-assisted tools to create or alter images in submitted manuscripts.
- The only exception is if the use of AI or AI-assisted tools is part of the research design or methods (for example, in the field of biomedical imaging). If this is the case, such use must be described in a reproducible manner in the methods section, including the name of the model or tool, version and extension numbers, and manufacturer.
- The use of generative AI or AI-assisted tools in the production of artwork such as for graphical abstracts is not permitted. The use of generative AI in the production of cover art may in some cases be allowed, if the author obtains prior permission from the journal editor and publisher, can demonstrate that all necessary rights have been cleared for the use of the relevant material, and ensures that there is correct content attribution.
Supplementary material
We encourage the use of supplementary materials such as applications, images and sound clips to enhance research. Some guidelines:
- Cite all supplementary files in the manuscript text.
- Submit supplementary materials at the same time as your article. Be aware that all supplementary materials provided will appear online in the exact same file type as received. These files will not be formatted or typeset by the production team.
- Include a concise, descriptive caption for each supplementary file describing its content.
- Provide updated files if at any stage of the publication process you wish to make changes to submitted supplementary materials.
- Do not make annotations or corrections to a previous version of a supplementary file.
- Switch off the option to track changes in Microsoft Office files. If tracked changes are left on, they will appear in your published version.
We recommend you upload research data to a suitable specialist or generalist repository. Please read our guidelines on sharing research data for more information on depositing, sharing and using research data and other relevant research materials.
Video
This journal accepts video material and animation sequences to support and enhance your scientific research. We encourage you to include links to video or animation files within articles. Some guidelines:
- When including video or animation file links within your article, refer to the video or animation content by adding a note in your text where the file should be placed.
- Clearly label files ensuring the given file name is directly related to the file content.
- Provide files in one of our recommended file formats. Files should be within our preferred maximum file size of 150 MB per file, 1 GB in total.
- Provide "stills" for each of your files. These will be used as standard icons to personalize the link to your video data. You can choose any frame from your video or animation or make a separate image.
- Provide text (for both the electronic and the print version) to be placed in the portions of your article that refer to the video content. This is essential text, as video and animation files cannot be embedded in the print version of the journal.
We publish all video and animation files supplied in the electronic version of your article.
For more detailed instructions, we recommend that you read our guidelines on submitting video content to be included in the body of an article.
Research data
We are committed to supporting the storage of, access to and discovery of research data, and our research data policy sets out the principles guiding how we work with the research community to support a more efficient and transparent research process.
Research data refers to the results of observations or experimentation that validate research findings, which may also include software, code, models, algorithms, protocols, methods and other useful materials related to the project.
Please read our guidelines on sharing research data for more information on depositing, sharing and using research data and other relevant research materials.
For this journal, the following instructions from our research data guidelines apply.
Option B: Research data deposit, citation and linking
You are encouraged to:
- Deposit your research data in a relevant data repository.
- Cite and link to this dataset in your article.
- If this is not possible, make a statement explaining why research data cannot be shared.
Data statement
To foster transparency, you are encouraged to state the availability of any data at submission.
Ensuring data is available may be a requirement of your funding body or institution. If your data is unavailable to access or unsuitable to post, you can state the reason why (e.g., your research data includes sensitive or confidential information such as patient data) during the submission process. This statement will appear with your published article on ScienceDirect.
Read more about the importance and benefits of providing a data statement.
Article structure
Article sections
Divide your manuscript into clearly defined sections covering all essential elements using headings.
Glossary
Please provide definitions of field-specific terms used in your article, in a separate list.
Footnotes
We advise you to use footnotes sparingly. If you include footnotes in your article, ensure that they are numbered consecutively.
You may use system features that automatically build footnotes into text. Alternatively, you can indicate the position of footnotes within the text and present them in a separate section at the end of your article.
Acknowledgements
Include any individuals who provided you with help during your research, such as help with language, writing or proof reading, in the acknowledgements section. Acknowledgements should be placed in a separate section which appears directly before the reference list. Do not include acknowledgements on your title page, as a footnote to your title, or anywhere else in your article other than in the separate acknowledgements section.
Author contributions: CRediT
Corresponding authors are required to acknowledge co-author contributions using CRediT (Contributor Roles Taxonomy) roles:
- Conceptualization
- Data curation
- Formal analysis
- Funding acquisition
- Investigation
- Methodology
- Project administration
- Resources
- Software
- Supervision
- Validation
- Visualization
- Writing – original draft
- Writing – review and editing
Not all CRediT roles will apply to every manuscript and some authors may contribute through multiple roles.
We advise you to read more about CRediT and view an example of a CRediT author statement.
Funding sources
Authors must disclose any funding sources who provided financial support for the conduct of the research and/or preparation of the article. The role of sponsors, if any, should be declared in relation to the study design, collection, analysis and interpretation of data, writing of the report and decision to submit the article for publication. If funding sources had no such involvement this should be stated in your submission.
List funding sources in this standard way to facilitate compliance to funder's requirements:
Funding: This work was supported by the National Institutes of Health [grant numbers xxxx, yyyy]; the Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation, Seattle, WA [grant number zzzz]; and the United States Institutes of Peace [grant number aaaa].
It is not necessary to include detailed descriptions on the program or type of grants, scholarships and awards. When funding is from a block grant or other resources available to a university, college, or other research institution, submit the name of the institute or organization that provided the funding.
If no funding has been provided for the research, it is recommended to include the following sentence:
This research did not receive any specific grant from funding agencies in the public, commercial, or not-for-profit sectors.
Appendices
We ask you to use the following format for appendices:
- Identify individual appendices within your article using the format: A, B, etc.
- Give separate numbering to formulae and equations within appendices using formats such as Eq. (A.1), Eq. (A.2), etc. and in subsequent appendices, Eq. (B.1), Eq. (B. 2) etc. In a similar way, give separate numbering to tables and figures using formats such as Table A.1; Fig. A.1, etc.
References
References within text
Any references cited within your article should also be present in your reference list and vice versa. Some guidelines:
- References cited in your abstract must be given in full.
- We recommend that you do not include unpublished results and personal communications in your reference list, though you may mention them in the text of your article.
- Any unpublished results and personal communications included in your reference list must follow the standard reference style of the journal. In substitution of the publication date add "unpublished results" or "personal communication."
- References cited as "in press" imply that the item has been accepted for publication.
Linking to cited sources will increase the discoverability of your research.
Before submission, check that all data provided in your reference list are correct, including any references which have been copied. Providing correct reference data allows us to link to abstracting and indexing services such as Scopus, Crossref and PubMed. Any incorrect surnames, journal or book titles, publication years or pagination within your references may prevent link creation.
We encourage the use of Digital Object Identifiers (DOIs) as reference links as they provide a permanent link to the electronic article referenced.
Reference style
All citations in the text should refer to:
- Single author: the author's name (without initials, unless there is ambiguity) and the year of publication.
- Two authors: both authors' names and the year of publication.
- Three or more authors: first author's name followed by 'et al.' and the year of publication.
Citations can be made directly (or parenthetically). Groups of references can be listed either first alphabetically, then chronologically, or vice versa. Examples: "as demonstrated (Allan, 2020a, 2020b; Allan and Jones, 2019)" or "as demonstrated (Jones, 2019; Allan, 2020). Kramer et al. (2023) have recently shown".
The list of references should be arranged alphabetically and then chronologically if necessary. More than one reference from the same author(s) in the same year must be identified by the letters 'a', 'b', 'c', etc., placed after the year of publication.
Abbreviate journal names according to the List of Title Word Abbreviations (LTWA).
Examples:
Reference to a journal publication:
Van der Geer, J., Handgraaf, T., Lupton, R.A., (2020). The art of writing a scientific article. J. Sci. Commun. 163, 51–59. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.sc.2020.00372.
Reference to a journal publication with an article number:
Van der Geer, J., Handgraaf, T., Lupton, R.A., (2022). The art of writing a scientific article. Heliyon. 19, e00205. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.heliyon.2022.e00205.
Reference to a book:
Strunk Jr., W., White, E.B., (2000). The Elements of Style, fourth ed. Longman, New York.
Reference to a chapter in a book:
Mettam, G.R., Adams, L.B., (2023). How to prepare an electronic version of your article, in: Jones, B.S., Smith, R.Z. (Eds.), Introduction to the Electronic Age. E-Publishing Inc., New York, pp. 281–304.
Reference to a website:
Cancer Research UK, (2023). Cancer statistics reports for the UK. http://www.cancerresearchuk.org/aboutcancer/statistics/cancerstatsreport/ (accessed 13 March 2023).
Reference to a dataset:
Oguro, M., Imahiro, S., Saito, S., Nakashizuka, T., (2015). Mortality data for Japanese oak wilt disease and surrounding forest compositions [dataset]. Mendeley Data, v1. https://doi.org/10.17632/xwj98nb39r.1.
Reference to software:
Coon, E., Berndt, M., Jan, A., Svyatsky, D., Atchley, A., Kikinzon, E., Harp, D., Manzini, G., Shelef, E., Lipnikov, K., Garimella, R., Xu, C., Moulton, D., Karra, S., Painter, S., Jafarov, E., & Molins, S., (2020). Advanced Terrestrial Simulator (ATS) v0.88 (Version 0.88) [software]. Zenodo. https://doi.org/10.5281/zenodo.3727209.
Web references
When listing web references, as a minimum you should provide the full URL and the date when the reference was last accessed. Additional information (e.g. DOI, author names, dates or reference to a source publication) should also be provided, if known.
You can list web references separately under a new heading directly after your reference list or include them in your reference list.
Data references
We encourage you to cite underlying or relevant datasets within article text and to list data references in the reference list.
When citing data references, you should include:
- author name(s)
- dataset title
- data repository
- version (where available)
- year
- global persistent identifier
Add [dataset] immediately before your reference. This will help us to properly identify the dataset. The [dataset] identifier will not appear in your published article.
Preprint references
We ask you to mark preprints clearly. You should include the word "preprint" or the name of the preprint server as part of your reference and provide the preprint DOI.
Where a preprint has subsequently become available as a peer-reviewed publication, use the formal publication as your reference.
If there are preprints that are central to your work or that cover crucial developments in the topic, but they are not yet formally published, you may reference the preprint.
Reference management software
Most Elsevier journals have their reference template available in popular reference management software products. These include products that support Citation Style Language (CSL) such as Mendeley Reference Manager.
If you use a citation plug-in from these products, select the relevant journal template and all your citations and bibliographies will automatically be formatted in the journal style. We advise you to remove all field codes before submitting your manuscript to any reference management software product.
If a template is not available for this journal, follow the format given in examples in the reference style section of this Guide for Authors.
Submitting your manuscript
Submission checklist
Before completing the submission of your manuscript, we advise you to read our submission checklist:
- One author has been designated as the corresponding author and their full contact details (email address, full postal address and phone numbers) have been provided.
- All files have been uploaded, including keywords, figure captions and tables (including a title, description and footnotes) included.
- Spelling and grammar checks have been carried out.
- All references in the article text are cited in the reference list and vice versa.
- Permission has been obtained for the use of any copyrighted material from other sources, including the Web.
- For gold open access articles, all authors understand that they are responsible for payment of the article publishing charge (APC) if the manuscript is accepted. Payment of the APC may be covered by the corresponding author's institution, or the research funder.
Suggest reviewers
To support the peer review process, we ask you to provide names and institutional email addresses of several potential reviewers for their manuscript. Some guidelines:
- Reviewers should not be colleagues or have co-authored or collaborated with you during the last three years.
- Do not suggest reviewers with whom you have competing interests.
- Suggest reviewers who are located in different countries or regions from yourself. This helps to provide a broad and balanced assessment of your work and to ensure scientific rigor.
- Consider diversity in your reviewer suggestions, such as gender, race and ethnicity and career stage.
- Do not suggest members of our Editorial Board.
The journal editors will take the final decision on whether to invite your suggested reviewers.
After receiving a final decision
Publishing agreement
Authors will be asked to complete a publishing agreement after acceptance. The corresponding author will receive a link to the online agreement by email. We advise you to read Enlighten's policies related to copyright to learn more about our copyright policies and your, and your employer’s/institution’s, additional rights for subscription and gold open access articles.
License options
Authors will be offered open access user license options which will determine how you, and third parties, can reuse your gold open access article. We advise that you review these options and any funding body license requirements before selecting a license option.
Open access
We refer you to our open access information page to learn about open access options for this journal.
Permission for copyrighted works
If excerpts from other copyrighted works are included in your article, you must obtain written permission from the copyright owners and credit the source(s) within your article using Elsevier’s permission request and license form (Word).
Proof correction
To ensure a fast publication process we will ask you to provide proof corrections within two days.
Corresponding authors will be sent an email which includes a link to our online proofing system, allowing annotation and correction of proofs online. The environment is similar to Word. You can edit text, comment on figures and tables and answer questions raised by our copy editor. Our web-based proofing service ensures a faster and less error-prone process.
You can choose to annotate and upload your edits on the PDF version of your article, if preferred. We will provide you with proofing instructions and available alternative proofing methods in our email.
The purpose of the proof is to check the typesetting, editing, completeness and correctness of your article text, tables and figures. Significant changes to your article at the proofing stage will only be considered with approval of the journal editor.
Share Link
A customised Sharing Link, which grants free access in perpetuity to the final published version of your article on Enlighten, will be emailed to the corresponding author. The Sharing Link can be used to share your article on any communication channel, such as via email or social media.
For an additional fee, you will be given the option to order a printed paper. A link to the print order form will be sent via email when your article is accepted for publication.
The final published version of your open access article will be openly available on ScienceDirect and can be shared via the article DOI link.
Responsible sharing
We encourage you to share and promote your article to give additional visibility to your work, enabling your paper to contribute to scientific progress and foster the exchange of scientific developments within your field. Read more about how to responsibly share and promote your article.
Resources for authors
Enlighten Researcher Academy
If you would like help to improve your submission or navigate the publication process, support is available via Enlighten Researcher Academy.
Elsevier Researcher Academy offers free e-learning modules, webinars, downloadable guides and research writing and peer review process resources.
Language and editing services
We recommend that you write in American or British English but not a combination of both.
If you feel the English language in your manuscript requires editing to eliminate possible grammatical or spelling errors and to conform to correct scientific English, you may wish to use the English Language Editing service provided by Enlighten’s Author Services.
Getting help and support
Author support
We recommend that you visit our Journal Article Publishing Support Center if you have questions about the editorial process or require technical support for your submission.