ISSN 2422-619X
versión on-line

Instructions to authors

• Scope and policy
• Form and preparation of manuscripts
• Sending of manuscripts

{PSOCIAL} is an electronic, indexed and open access scientific journal, published semi-annually since 2014 by the Sociology department of the Faculty of Social Sciences of the University of Buenos Aires.

The purpose of the journal is to offer a space for discussion and debate for students, researchers and professionals in the field of social psychology. Its thematic scope is mainly oriented to the area of social psychology, although it is open to other related topics and approaches, mainly in relation to the intersection between philosophy, psychology and sociology.

Through a peer review process, and in accordance with international ethical guidelines, the journal publishes original articles, review articles, and theoretical or methodological contributions to the discipline, prioritizing research that has implications for the Ibero-American context.

Peer Review Process

The original manuscripts are submitted to {PSOCIAL} only through the open-source software for the management  OJS (Open Journal System) of peer-reviewed academic journals and follow the selection process detailed below:

1. If the manuscript does not comply with the format requirements indicated in the author guidelines, it will be returned to the authors, who may send it again within a maximum period of 15 days, once these deficiencies have been corrected.

2. Once admitted if it meets the initial formal requirements, the work, anonymised, will be subject to a prior selection: two members of the Editorial Board will review if it is a research paper, if its topic is appropriate to the field of interest of the journal and if it reaches a minimum scientific quality. The manuscript will pass this phase if at least one of these members of the Editorial Board gives a positive evaluation. In the event that both members issue a negative evaluation, the manuscript will be rejected and the authors will be notified.

3. Subsequently, the manuscripts will enter a double-blind peer review process: the manuscript will be sent to two referees, who will determine anonymously: a) publish without changes, b) publish when minor corrections have been made, c ) publish once a thorough review has been performed and d) reject. The reviewers are external to the publishing institution. 
   In case of discrepancy between both results, the manuscript will be sent to a third referee, whose decision will define its publication. The results of the process will be final. The manuscripts sent by academics of any institution will be submitted to the consideration of external referees.

4. The decision adopted in the Editorial Board will be notified to the author, together with a copy of the reports of the anonymous reviewers that support this decision. In case modifications are proposed, the authors must inform the journal if they agree to review the manuscript or not. If so, the authors must send the modified version to the jorunal together with a report explaining the changes made to the original version. In case of not accepting any of the modifications, the authors must justify it in the mentioned memory.

To withdraw the manuscript from the editorial process, the corresponding author must formally inform the reason for the manuscript's withdrawal and wait for the editor's response to continue sending the proposal to another journal.
The evaluation process will take place throughout the year and the evaluation time for a manuscript takes an average of 90 days.

Data Availability Policy

{PSOCIAL} promotes transparency and reproducibility of published research so that other researchers can replicate the studies described in their articles, either to corroborate or to refute the results obtained, in accordance with the provisions of the National Law 26,899 on open access institutional digital repositories. All the information and research data sent to this publication will be uploaded and made available in RDIUBA, the repository of the University of Buenos Aires, in order to increase compliance with the FAIR principles: Findable, Accessible, Interoperable and Reusable (the data must be able to be found, accessed, must be in systems capable of interoperation and must be able to be reused in other investigations). The following guidelines are also suggested:

• To favor the reproducibility of the results, authors may share without restrictions the data sets with which they have carried out their research. If there are limitations derived from ethical or legal causes, the authors must indicate how other researchers should access their data.

• Authors are encouraged to deposit data in RDIUBA, or in any other research data repository (such as  FigShare, Mendeley Data o Zenodo), prior to sending the contribution to the journal . Thus, when submitting the manuscript, only the URL where the research data is located should be indicated.

Self-archiving Policy

Self-archiving of the version published by {PSOCIAL} is allowed. Authors can disclose their research published by the media and share academic social networks such as Researchgate, Mendeley or Academia.edu, in the repositories of the institutions to which they belong and on portals, among other sites. During the editorial review process, the Journal will deliver the authors the post-print version which should NOT be disclosed by any means of dissemination since they are only for personal use and for final approval purposes. The journal will send the authors the published version in PDF and HTML to be shared, disseminated and disseminated by the media available on the web once the editorial process is complete. After the publication of the articles, the authors can make other types of independent or additional agreements for the non-exclusive dissemination of the version of the article published in this journal, provided that it is indicated that the work has been published by first time in this journal.

Ethical Principles

{PSOCIAL} adheres to both national and international codes of ethics, to the ethical principles of the Declaration of Helsinki, to the Guidelines for Ethical Behavior in Social Sciences and Humanities established by National Scientific and Technical Research Council (CONICET) (Res. No. 2857), to the Ethical Principles of Psychologists and Code of Conduct of the American Psychological Association (APA), to the Guidelines on Good Publication Practice of the Committee on Publication Ethics (COPE) and to the Publishing Ethics Resource Kit (PERK), developed by the Elsevier Publishing Group.

Emphasis is placed on the following criteria:

• Ethics Committee: if applicable, according to the type of study and the regulatory provisions of the research funding institutions, authors must explicitly state in the manuscript that the study has been approved by an ethics committee.

• Informed Consent: the authors must indicate in the method section that all the procedures in obtaining data carried out with the participants (tests, interviews, recordings, videos) have been carried out after obtaining informed consent. In the event that the participants are children or adolescents, the informed consent of the parents and / or guardians must be obtained. The journal will not publish manuscripts that have been carried out without the necessary permits or that have been illegally collected.

• Legislation in force: the authors must comply with the national and international laws that take place according to the type of research, being the authors' duty to specify such compliance in the manuscript.

Ethical responsibilities in the editorial process:

• Editors: editors must (1) supervise the publication processes following international ethical standards, (2) ensure that manuscripts are reviewed according to publication standards, (3) commit to provide clear information on the entire editorial process, the results of the peer review and the criteria used in it, and (4) provide information about the state of the review process in all moment.

• Authors: authors must (1) guarantee that the submission has not been previously published nor has it been sent simultaneously to another journal, (2) verify that the manuscript complies with the bibliographic and style requirements indicated in the rules for authors, (3) corroborate that the manuscript submitted complies with the established ethical standards, (5) indicate the source of funding and (5) declare conflicts of interest, if any.

• Reviewers: the reviewers must (1) communicate about the possible plagiarism detected in the manuscripts they review, (2) maintain confidentiality about the articles reviewed, (3) provide adequate grounds in case of rejecting manuscripts, (4) excuse themselves in case of conflicts of interest, and (5) use objective and rigorous evaluation systems within the established deadlines.

Conflicts of Interest

The editors of {PSOCIAL} undertake to avoid the existence of any conflict of interest between the actors involved in the production. All text sent will be evaluated for its intellectual content, preventing the authors' ethnic or national belonging, their gender, sexual orientation, religious beliefs, or political philosophy from interfering in the process. In the same way, those external evaluations that interpose any personal position to the quality of the work will be rejected.

Authors and evaluators are requested to state in advance the relevant conflicts of interest that they may have, so they can be taken into account when assigning evaluations. If any conflict arises after the publication of the contribution, if necessary, a retraction or the manifestation of the fact will be made.

“Conflict of interest” is understood as the situation in which there is a divergence between the personal interests of an individual and their responsibilities regarding the scientific activities that they carry out, whether as authors, reviewers, and members of the editorial committee, which may influence your critical judgment and the integrity of your actions. Conflicts of interest can be:

1. Economic: when the participant (author / reviewer / editor) has received or expects to receive money for the activities related to the research and its dissemination

2. Academic: when reviewers or editors adhere to a certain methodological or ideological trend in such a way that they may be biased to evaluate the work of others. For this reason, they are requested to manifest beforehand.

3. Personal or work relationships: when the participants (authors / reviewers / editors) have some kind of friendship, enmity or work relationship. To avoid this, editors should take into account the sources of funding and the affiliation of the authors, to choose evaluators who do not belong to those specific circles.

Plagiarism Policy

The policy of {PSOCIAL} is to publish original works, written by those who declare their authorship. They may not have been previously published in any printed or electronic medium, or be simultaneously evaluated in another journal. In order to respond to plagiarism practices -among them translations, fragmentation of results or "salami slicing", duplication, among others- the journal implements the following procedure based on the information provided by the Ethical Principles of Psychologists and Code of Conduct of the American Psychological Association (APA), to the Guidelines on Good Publication Practice of the Committee on Publication Ethics (COPE) and the Code of Ethics of the British Psychology Society:

1. At the time of submitting an article, the authors are asked to declare that the article has not been previously published or sent to other journals for evaluation. Furthermore, they are asked to declare that they are following the author guidelines, which establish that the articles to be submitted must be original.

2. All articles sent to the journal are reviewed using Plagius detection software,

3. When sending the manuscript to the peer reviewers, they are asked to pay attention to possible indicators of plagiarism, since they know the literature on the subject.

The journal considers the practices listed and explained below as plagiarism:

• Direct plagiarism. This type is incurred when: 

1. There is omission of authorship and what is taken from another text is not indicated with quotation marks.

2. Minimal changes are made to the text of another (sentence structure is modified, lower case is replaced by upper case or vice versa, synonyms are used, etc.) and it is presented as original.

• Plagiarism for the improper use of paraphrase, is done when:

1. Although authorship is noted, the original text is reproduced with a few changes that do not constitute paraphrases.

• Complex plagiarism using a reference, is committed when:

1. The original authorship reference exists, but the source pages are inaccurately noted.

2. I paraphrase that long texts are summarized, but with little or no indication that they correspond to paraphrases.

3. Absence of quotation marks in words and phrases of the original text that are reproduced verbatim.

• Plagiarism with single quotes, is performed when:

1. A textual quote continues to play after quotation marks have been closed or the previous phrases are omitted from the same quote.

• Paraphrasing as plagiarism occurs when:

1. There is paraphrasing and the original source reference is not noted.

2. The paraphrasing is continuous and extensive, no material is added to allow interaction or enrich the information, despite the source being mentioned.

3. Academic works - which require original thoughts and critical reflections on other people's points of view - become texts that do not exceed the repetition of other academic texts.

4. Paraphrased passages are not clearly identified as such.

• Paraphrasing as plagiarism is not considered plagiarism when:

1. It does not dominate over the work of the writer.

2. It is used to allow the author to interact critically with another person's points of view.

3. The argument of the original text is rewritten in different words.

• Self-plagiarism or recycling fraud is committed when:

1. The appearance of a job is changed and it is presented as if it were a different one.

2. The indication that the job is being recycled is ignored, that is, it is a previously published manuscript but with corrections or new additions.

• Self-plagiarism is not considered when:

1. The previous work is the basis for a new contribution, and key parts must be repeated to explain and defend the new arguments.

2. The author considers that what he has already said cannot be said in a better way for the new publication.

3. The repetition does not exceed 30% of the original work.

Authorship Contribution

Authors should indicate their substantial participation in the manuscript (e.g., manuscript design, data collection, statistical analysis, final manuscript revision, etc.). To determine and identify consistency in authorship and avoid mistakes such as unwarranted authorship. CRediT – Contributor Roles Taxonomy - is strongly encouraged.

Policies for Sanctioning Inappropriate Behavior

The set of inappropriate behaviors include the falsification of data, the manipulation of data in favor of results, the indiscriminate use of self-citations and unjustified authorship. If any of these malpractices are found in any manuscript, the editorial committee will evaluate the case and subject it to sanction according to the type of fault.

1. Minor Misdemeanors: minor misdemeanors correspond to inappropriate conduct that does not warrant a thorough investigation, where all parties involved have the right to reply, for example, the unjustified inclusion of authors, abuse of self-citations, among others that the Editorial Board considers.

2. Serious Offenses: these types of offenses require a thorough investigation involving superiors and employers of the objectively accused person for notification. In case of wrongful evidence, the journal may involve external experts (limited number of people to the consideration of the Editorial Board) for the final opinion and sanction (alteration of results, plagiarism, self-plagiarism, double submission of papers, among others that consider the committee). The author has the right to appeal this opinion.

In order to treat cases in which plagiarism is incurred, the journal will follow the following procedures:

1. In the case of minor offenses, the journal will send a notification to those involved about the misconduct, requesting an explanation about it so that this type of behavior is avoided in the future.

2. In the case of serious offenses, the journal can send a formal letter to the employing entity, financing entity or to the superior of those involved, referring to the case in question. According to the severity of this lack, the journal may publish an editorial on unethical conduct or remove the publications of the involved indefinitely.

Citation standards

Manuscripts must comply with the standards established by APA 7th. Edition (2020). It is suggested to attend to the need to include the minimum mandatory (M) and other recommended (R) elements that are combined to elaborate a standard citation in any standard style (e.g. APA, MLA, Chicago): (1) Author/s (M), (2) Author Identifier (R), Date (M), Title (M), Digital Object Identifier or DOI (M), Resource Type (M), Version and/or edition (M), Data Repository (R), Publication (R), Producer (R), Geographical Scope (R), Temporal Scope (R). As an example, the following models of frequent references can be followed:

Scientific Articles

Piedmont, R. L. (1999). Does Spirituality Represent the Sixth Factor of Personality? Spiritual Transcendence and the Five-Factor Model. Journal of Personality, 67(6), 985-1013. doi:10.1111/1467-6494.00080.

Book chapters

Piedmont, R. L. (2012). Overview and Development of Measure of Numinous Constructs: The Assessment of Spirituality and Religious Sentiments (ASPIRES) Scale. In L. J. Miller (Ed.), The Oxford Handbook of Psychology and Spirituality (pp. 104-122). Oxford University Press.

Books

Adorno, T. W., Frenkel-Brunswik, E., Levinson, D. J. & Sanford, R. N. (1950). The authoritarian personality. Harper

{PSOCIAL} accepts only original and unpublished works in Spanish, Portuguese and English.

The Jorunal has two sections.

1.  Articles

• The "articles" section includes empirical or theoretical research reports

• Length: between 5 and 12 pages (not counting notes and bibliography).

• Suggested structure:

• 10-20 word title

• Authors (affiliation and contact)

• Summary in Spanish and English of between 100-250 words

• 5 key words in Spanish and English

• Introduction with the objectives of the article

• Methodology

• Content (may include subtitles to separate sections)

• conclusion

• Bibliography

• The use of footnotes and illustrations is discouraged.

1. Reviews

• The “reviews” section includes critical notes on books published in the last 10 years on the subject.

• Length: between 2 and 5 pages (not counting notes and bibliography).

• Structure:

• Review title

• Authors (affiliation and contact)

• Bibliographic data of the reviewed book

• Content (suggested: thesis of the book, opinion of the review author, contributions to the field, reviews and open questions)

• The use of footnotes and illustrations is discouraged.

Submission Preparation Checklist

As part of the submission process, authors are required to check off their submission's compliance with all of the following items, and submissions may be returned to authors that do not adhere to these guidelines.

1. The submission has not been previously published and has not been submitted for consideration by any other journal (or an explanation has been provided in the Comments to the editor).

2. The submission file is in OpenOffice, Microsoft Word, RTF or WordPerfect format.

3. Text is spaced 1.5, 12-point font size, italics are used instead of underlines (except URLs), and all illustrations, figures, and tables are placed in the appropriate places in the text, rather than at the end.

4. The text meets the stylistic and bibliographic conditions included in Guidelines for the author, in About the magazine. In the case of sending the text to the peer evaluation section, follow the instructions included in Ensuring an anonymous evaluation.

Contact

The contact address for the editorial board is psocial@sociales.uba.ar. Originals should be uploaded to the OJS platform available at http://publicaciones.sociales.uba.ar/psocial.