Journal of Health Psychology
| David F Marks | London, UK |
Journal of Health Psychology is an international peer-reviewed journal that aims to support and help shape research in health psychology from around the world. It provides a platform for traditional empirical analyses as well as more qualitative and/or critically oriented approaches. It also addresses the social contexts in which psychological and health processes are embedded.
Studies published in this journal are required to obtain ethical approval from an Institutional Review Board. Such approval must include informed, signed consent by all research participants. Any manuscript not containing an explicit statement concerning ethical approval and informed consent will not be considered.
"I applaud its focus on the integration of research and practice. Reviews of the empirical literature and the opportunities for public debate should prove to be particularly useful" - Suzanne Bennett Johnson, University of Florida, Gainesville, USA
This journal is a member of the Committee on Publication Ethics (COPE).
All issues of the Journal of Health Psychology are available to browse online.
| Ronan Conroy | Royal College of Surgeons in Ireland, Ireland |
| James C. Coyne | University of Pennsylvania, USA |
| Seth Kalichman | University of Connecticut, USA |
| Hope Landrine | Center for Health Disparities Research, East Carolina University, USA |
| Kenneth A Wallston | Vanderbilt University, Nashville, USA |
| Carla Willig | City University, London, UK |
| Nancy E Adler | University of California, San Francisco, USA |
| Suzanne Bennett Johnson | University of Florida, Gainesville, USA |
| Peter M. Bentler | University of California, Los Angeles, USA |
| Glynis M. Breakwell | University of Bath, UK |
| Catherine Campbell | London School of Economics, London, UK |
| Kerry Chamberlain | Massey University, Albany, New Zealand |
| Cecilia G. Conaco | University of the Phillipines, Phillipines, Philippines |
| Carlo C DiClemente | University of Maryland, Baltimore County, USA |
| Emee Vida Estacio | Keele University, UK |
| Brian Evans | Middlesex University, UK |
| Uwe Flick | Professor of Qualitative Research in Social Science and Education, Free University, Berlin, Germany |
| Paul Flowers | Glasgow Caledonian University, UK |
| Ellen Goudsmit | Retired, University of East London, UK |
| Sarah Grogan | Manchester Metropolitan University, UK |
| Stevan E Hobfoll | Rush Medical College, USA |
| Cheryl L. Holt | University of Maryland, USA |
| David Ingledew | Bangor University, UK |
| Leonard A. Jason | DePaul University, USA |
| Ashraf Kagee | Stellenbosch University, South Africa |
| Evangelos C. Karademas | University of Crete, Greece |
| Elizabeth A. Klonoff | San Diego State University, USA |
| Feng Kong | Shaanxi Normal University, China |
| Gary L Kreps | George Mason University, USA |
| Christina Liossi | University of Southampton, UK |
| Abigail Locke | University of Huddersfield, UK |
| Luo Lu | National Taiwan University, Taiwan |
| Aleksandra Luszczynska | University of Social Sciences and Humanities, Poland and University of Colorado, USA |
| Antonia C. Lyons | Massey University, Wellington, New Zealand |
| Chris McManus | University College London, UK |
| Michael Murray | Keele University, UK |
| Paul Nussbaum | University of Pittsburgh, USA |
| Doug Oman | University of California, Berkeley, USA |
| Chandra Y. Osborn | Vanderbilt University, USA |
| James O. Prochaska | University of Rhode Island, Kingston, USA |
| Tina Rochelle | City University of Hong Kong, China |
| Jesus Rodriguez-Marin | Miguel Hernandez University, Alicante, Spain |
| Poul Rohleder | University of East London, UK |
| Jason Seacat | Western New England College, USA |
| Jonathan Smith | Birkbeck College, London, UK |
| Mark R. Somerfield | Johns Hopkins University, Baltimore, USA |
| Mary-Jane Paris Spink | Pontificia Catholic University, São Paulo, Brazil |
| Wendy Stainton-Rogers | The Open University, UK |
| Penny Standen | University Hospital, Nottingham, UK |
| Christine Stephens | Massey University, New Zealand |
| Stephen Sutton | University of Cambridge, UK |
| Catherine Marie Sykes | City University London, UK |
| Catherine S-K Tang | National University of Singapore, Singapore |
| Carl E. Thoresen | Stanford University, USA |
| Claudia Unikel-Santoncini | National Institute of Psychiatry, Mexico |
| Jan Vinck | Hasselt University, Belgium |
| Stephen M Weiss | Northern Kentuckty University, USA |
| Jelte M. Wicherts | Tilburg University, Netherlands |
| Richard A Winett | Virginia Polytechnic Institute, Blacksburg, USA |
| Xiaofei Xie | Peking University, China |
Manuscript Submission Guidelines: Journal of Health Psychology
This Journal is a member of the Committee on Publication Ethics
Please read the guidelines below then visit the Journal’s submission site http://mc.manuscriptcentral.com/jhealthpsychology to upload your manuscript. Please note that manuscripts not conforming to these guidelines may be returned.
Only manuscripts of sufficient quality that meet the aims and scope of Journal of Health Psychology will be reviewed.
There are no fees payable to submit or publish in this journal.
As part of the submission process you will be required to warrant that you are submitting your original work, that you have the rights in the work, that you are submitting the work for first publication in the Journal and that it is not being considered for publication elsewhere and has not already been published elsewhere, and that you have obtained and can supply all necessary permissions for the reproduction of any copyright works not owned by you.
- What do we publish?
1.1 Aims & Scope
1.2 Article types
1.3 Writing your paper - Editorial policies
2.1 Peer review policy
2.2 Authorship
2.3 Acknowledgements
2.4 Funding
2.5 Declaration of conflicting interests
2.6 Research ethics and patient consent
2.7 Reporting guidelines - Publishing policies
3.1 Publication ethics
3.2 Contributor's publishing agreement
3.3 Open access and author archiving - Preparing your manuscript
4.1 Formatting
4.2 Artwork, figures and other graphics
4.3 Supplementary material
4.4 Reference style
4.5 English language editing services - Submitting your manuscript
5.1 ORCID
5.2 Information required for completing your submission
5.3 Permissions - On acceptance and publication
6.1 SAGE Production
6.2 Online First publication
6.3 Access to your published article
6.4 Promoting your article - Further information
Before submitting your manuscript to Journal of Health Psychology, please ensure you have read the Aims & Scope.
The Editorial Board of the Journal of Health Psychology considers for publication:
(a) Reports of empirical studies likely to further our understanding of health psychology
(b) Critical reviews of the literature
(c) Theoretical contributions and commentaries
(d) Intervention studies
(e) Brief reports
(e) Signed editorials (about 1000 words) on significant issues.
Intervention studies
Publication guidelines for intervention studies are published in volume 15, number 1, pages 5-7.The journal normally publishes papers reporting intervention studies of up to 8,000 words allowing 500 words per table and figure.
The Journal of Health Psychology welcomes research reports regardless of the direction or strength of the results. However the JHP will only consider reports of clinical trials that have been pre-registered at http://www.clinicaltrials.gov/ or http://www.controlled-trials.com/
Please consult the Editorial concerning “Publication Guidelines for Intervention Studies in the Journal of Health Psychology” by David F. Marks J Health Psychol January 2010 vol. 15 no. 1 5-7: http://hpq.sagepub.com/content/15/1/5.full.pdf+html The criteria for publication include the application of the CONSORT, TREND and PRISMA statements.
Brief reports
The Journal also publishes Brief Reports of up to 3,000 words. Brief Reports should include an abstract of 100 words, and may include a table or figure in lieu of 500 words of the 3,000-word maximum.
Article length and house style
Articles should be as short as is consistent with clear presentation of subject matter. There is no absolute limit on length but 6,000 words, including footnotes and reference list, is a useful maximum. Longer articles will be considered at the discretion of the Editor. Tables and figures count as 500 words each which should be attached as separate pages at the end. “INSERT HERE” signs should be noted within the text. The title should indicate exactly, but as briefly as possible, the subject of the article. It is essential that your literature review is completely up to date. Please check recent issues of the Journal of Health Psychology and other key journals to ensure that any relevant papers are cited. Papers that fail to do this will be rejected. An Abstract should be at the start of the manuscript and not exceed 100 words (in spite of what is stated on the ScholarOne website) accompanied by five keywords should be selected from the list provided on the JHP ScholarOne website. References are not numbered but appear in alphabetical order by first author surname.
To enable blind, impartial review, all documentation must be anonymized. A common error is to include the author’s name in the Word document title, as in:
Smith (blind copy).doc
Such manuscripts will be rejected for re-submission in fully blinded fashion.
The SAGE Author Gateway has some general advice and on how to get published, plus links to further resources.
1.3.1 Make your article discoverable
When writing up your paper, think about how you can make it discoverable. The title, keywords and abstract are key to ensuring readers find your article through search engines such as Google. For information and guidance on how best to title your article, write your abstract and select your keywords, have a look at this page on the Gateway: How to Help Readers Find Your Article Online
Journal of Health Psychology operates a strictly blinded peer review process in which the reviewer’s name is withheld from the author and, the author’s name from the reviewer. The reviewer may at their own discretion opt to reveal their name to the author in their review but our standard policy practice is for both identities to remain concealed.
As part of the submission process you will be asked to provide the names of [X no.] peers who could be called upon to review your manuscript. Recommended reviewers should be experts in their fields and should be able to provide an objective assessment of the manuscript. Please be aware of any conflicts of interest when recommending reviewers. Examples of conflicts of interest include (but are not limited to) the below:
- The reviewer should have no prior knowledge of your submission
- The reviewer should not have recently collaborated with any of the authors
- Reviewer nominees from the same institution as any of the authors are not permitted
Please note that the Editors are not obliged to invite/reject any recommended/opposed reviewers to assess your manuscript.
All parties who have made a substantive contribution to the article should be listed as authors. Principal authorship, authorship order, and other publication credits should be based on the relative scientific or professional contributions of the individuals involved, regardless of their status. A student is usually listed as principal author on any multiple-authored publication that substantially derives from the student’s dissertation or thesis.
All contributors who do not meet the criteria for authorship should be listed in an Acknowledgements section. Examples of those who might be acknowledged include a person who provided purely technical help, or a department chair who provided only general support.
Any acknowledgements should appear first at the end of your article prior to your Declaration of Conflicting Interests (if applicable), any notes and your References.
Journal of Health Psychology requires all authors to acknowledge their funding in a consistent fashion under a separate heading. Please visit the Funding Acknowledgements page on the SAGE Journal Author Gateway to confirm the format of the acknowledgment text in the event of funding, or state that: This research received no specific grant from any funding agency in the public, commercial, or not-for-profit sectors.
2.5 Declaration of conflicting interests
Journal of Health Psychology It is the policy of <Journal> to require a declaration of conflicting interests from all authors enabling a statement to be carried within the paginated pages of all published articles.
Please ensure that a ‘Declaration of Conflicting Interests’ statement is included at the end of your manuscript, after any acknowledgements and prior to the references. If no conflict exists, please state that ‘The Author(s) declare(s) that there is no conflict of interest’. For guidance on conflict of interest statements, please see the ICMJE recommendations here
2.6 Research ethics and patient consent
Medical research involving human subjects must be conducted according to the World Medical Association Declaration of Helsinki
Submitted manuscripts should conform to the ICMJE Recommendations for the Conduct, Reporting, Editing, and Publication of Scholarly Work in Medical Journals, and all papers reporting animal and/or human studies must state in the methods section that the relevant Ethics Committee or Institutional Review Board provided (or waived) approval. Please ensure that you have provided the full name and institution of the review committee, in addition to the approval number.
For research articles, authors are also required to state in the methods section whether participants provided informed consent and whether the consent was written or verbal.
Information on informed consent to report individual cases or case series should be included in the manuscript text. A statement is required regarding whether written informed consent for patient information and images to be published was provided by the patient(s) or a legally authorized representative.
Please also refer to the ICMJE Recommendations for the Protection of Research Participants
Authors must follow the Guidelines to Reduce Bias in Language of the Publication Manual of the American Psychological Association (6th ed). These guidelines relate to level of specificity, labels, participation, gender, sexual orientation, racial and ethnic identity, disabilities and age. Authors should also be sensitive to issues of social class, religion and culture.
SAGE is committed to upholding the integrity of the academic record. We encourage authors to refer to the Committee on Publication Ethics’ International Standards for Authors and view the Publication Ethics page on the SAGE Author Gateway
3.1.1 Plagiarism
Journal of Health Psychology and SAGE take issues of copyright infringement, plagiarism or other breaches of best practice in publication very seriously. We seek to protect the rights of our authors and we always investigate claims of plagiarism or misuse of published articles. Equally, we seek to protect the reputation of the journal against malpractice. Submitted articles may be checked with duplication-checking software. Where an article, for example, is found to have plagiarised other work or included third-party copyright material without permission or with insufficient acknowledgement, or where the authorship of the article is contested, we reserve the right to take action including, but not limited to: publishing an erratum or corrigendum (correction); retracting the article; taking up the matter with the head of department or dean of the author's institution and/or relevant academic bodies or societies; or taking appropriate legal action.
3.1.2 Prior publication
If material has been previously published it is not generally acceptable for publication in a SAGE journal. However, there are certain circumstances where previously published material can be considered for publication. Please refer to the guidance on the SAGE Author Gateway or if in doubt, contact the Editor at the address given below.
3.2 Contributor's publishing agreement
Before publication, SAGE requires the author as the rights holder to sign a Journal Contributor’s Publishing Agreement. SAGE’s Journal Contributor’s Publishing Agreement is an exclusive licence agreement which means that the author retains copyright in the work but grants SAGE the sole and exclusive right and licence to publish for the full legal term of copyright. Exceptions may exist where an assignment of copyright is required or preferred by a proprietor other than SAGE. In this case copyright in the work will be assigned from the author to the society. For more information please visit the SAGE Author Gateway
3.3 Open access and author archiving
Journal of Health Psychology offers optional open access publishing via the SAGE Choice programme. For more information please visit the SAGE Choice website. For information on funding body compliance, and depositing your article in repositories, please visit SAGE Publishing Policies on our Journal Author Gateway.
4. Preparing your manuscript for submission
The preferred format for your manuscript is Word. LaTeX files are also accepted. Word and (La)Tex templates are available on the Manuscript Submission Guidelines page of our Author Gateway.
4.2 Artwork, figures and other graphics
For guidance on the preparation of illustrations, pictures and graphs in electronic format, please visit SAGE’s Manuscript Submission Guidelines
Figures supplied in colour will appear in colour online regardless of whether or not these illustrations are reproduced in colour in the printed version. For specifically requested colour reproduction in print, you will receive information regarding the costs from SAGE after receipt of your accepted article.
This journal is able to host additional materials online (e.g. datasets, podcasts, videos, images etc) alongside the full-text of the article. For more information please refer to our guidelines on submitting supplementary files
Journal of Health Psychology adheres to the SAGE Harvard reference style. View the SAGE Harvard guidelines to ensure your manuscript conforms to this reference style.
If you use EndNote to manage references, you can download the SAGE Harvard EndNote output file.
4.5 English language editing services
Authors seeking assistance with English language editing, translation, or figure and manuscript formatting to fit the journal’s specifications should consider using SAGE Language Services. Visit SAGE Language Services on our Journal Author Gateway for further information.
Journal of Health Psychology is hosted on SAGE Track, a web based online submission and peer review system powered by ScholarOne™ Manuscripts. Visit http://mc.manuscriptcentral.com/jhealthpsychology to login and submit your article online.
IMPORTANT: Please check whether you already have an account in the system before trying to create a new one. If you have reviewed or authored for the journal in the past year it is likely that you will have had an account created. For further guidance on submitting your manuscript online please visit ScholarOne Online Help.
As part of our commitment to ensuring an ethical, transparent and fair peer review process SAGE is a supporting member of ORCID, the Open Researcher and Contributor ID. ORCID provides a persistent digital identifier that distinguishes researchers from every other researcher and, through integration in key research workflows such as manuscript and grant submission, supports automated linkages between researchers and their professional activities ensuring that their work is recognised.
We encourage all authors to add their ORCIDs to their SAGE Track accounts and include their ORCIDs as part of the submission process. If you don’t already have one you can create one here
5.2 Information required for completing your submission
You will be asked to provide contact details and academic affiliations for all co-authors via the submission system and identify who is to be the corresponding author. These details must match what appears on your manuscript. At this stage please ensure you have included all the required statements and declarations and uploaded any additional supplementary files (including reporting guidelines where relevant).
Please also ensure that you have obtained any necessary permission from copyright holders for reproducing any illustrations, tables, figures or lengthy quotations previously published elsewhere. For further information including guidance on fair dealing for criticism and review, please see the Copyright and Permissions page on the SAGE Author Gateway
6. On acceptance and publication
Your SAGE Production Editor will keep you informed as to your article’s progress throughout the production process. Proofs will be sent by PDF to the corresponding author and should be returned promptly. Authors are reminded to check their proofs carefully to confirm that all author information, including names, affiliations, sequence and contact details are correct, and that Funding and Conflict of Interest statements, if any, are accurate. Please note that if there are any changes to the author list at this stage all authors will be required to complete and sign a form authorising the change.
Online First allows final articles (completed and approved articles awaiting assignment to a future issue) to be published online prior to their inclusion in a journal issue, which significantly reduces the lead time between submission and publication. Visit the SAGE Journals help page for more details, including how to cite Online First articles.
6.3 Access to your published article
SAGE provides authors with online access to their final article.
Publication is not the end of the process! You can help disseminate your paper and ensure it is as widely read and cited as possible. The SAGE Author Gateway has numerous resources to help you promote your work. Visit the Promote Your Article page on the Gateway for tips and advice. In addition, SAGE is partnered with Kudos, a free service that allows authors to explain, enrich, share, and measure the impact of their article. Find out how to maximise your article’s impact with Kudos.
Any correspondence, queries or additional requests for information on the manuscript submission process should be sent to the Journal of Health Psychology editorial office as follows:
David Marks PhD: editorjhp@gmail.com