Submission Guidelines and Information for Contributors

The Journal of Virtual Environments publishes research and theory which involves Virtual Environments either as objects of study, tools of study, or research sites. Social science, computer science, and applied contributions are welcome.

Types of Articles

Empirical Research

Empirical Research articles present data and results of scientific research conducted on or with Virtual Environments.

Theoretical Contributions

Theoretical Contribution articles may review research and present theoretical frameworks for understanding behavior in Virtual Environments, evaluate the relative merits of different theories, or suggest new procedures for conducting VE research.

Comments and Reviews

Comments are short, thought-provoking articles intended to bring out problems of general interest to Virtual Environment researchers, or to respond to articles in the Journal. Reviews present a critical synopsis of research published elsewhere (books or articles) which may be of interest to VE researchers. Comments and Reviews are limited to 1,000 words.

Preparation and Submission of Manuscripts

Manuscripts should be submitted by email to jove@www.brandeis.edu

Manuscripts submitted for review should be in ASCII text or HTML. The authors' names (and institutional affiliation, if any) should appear only at the top of the manuscript, along with the name and email address of the author who should be contacted about the manuscript, and a statement about the manuscript's publication status (see below).

Manuscripts should begin with an abstract of no more than 150 words, followed by the body of the paper, endnotes, references, and figure captions. Figures should be named sequentially (fig1.gif, fig2.gif, etc.) and submitted in uuencoded GIF or JPEG format.

Our style guide details the formatting of the manuscript. References may be formatted in the style of the American Anthropological Association, American Psychological Association, or the American Sociological Association. Investigations on human subjects should include a statement that informed consent was obtained and that the rights of the subjects were protected.

Review of Manuscripts

On receipt of manuscript, it is assigned to an Editor for review to insure that it follows the style and content guidelines described above. Manuscripts which do not will be returned to their authors.

Manuscripts approved by an Editor will be reviewed by the Editor and, in the case of Empirical Research and Theoretical Contribution manuscripts, two outside referees. Referees will be chosen for their expertise in the field to which the manuscript addresses itself. Referees will not know the names of the authors; authors will not know the names of the referees. Authors are encouraged to suggest appropriate referees for their manuscripts. Upon receiving the referees' comments, the editor will inform the author that the manuscript has been assigned to one of three categories:

Accepted

• An accepted manuscript will be published in the Journal.The author will be given an opportunity to make minor changes to address referee/Editor suggestions before publication.
  

Revise and Resubmit

• The editor invites a resubmission of the manuscript after revision to address the concerns of the referees/Editor. The resubmitted manuscript must be reviewed again.

Rejected

• A rejected manuscript will not be accepted for review again.
  
  

Copyright and Publication Elsewhere

Manuscripts which have already appeared in publication (print or electronic) elsewhere may not be submitted to
JOVE. The following circumstances are acceptable:

1. A manuscript that has been self-published (e.g. on the author's web site) may be submitted to JOVE.
2. A manuscript that has been presented at a conference as a poster,oral presentation, workshope, etc.) but has not appeared in publication may be submitted to JOVE.
3. A manuscript that has been accepted for publication or is under review elsewhere may be submitted to JOVE if both:
   • it would appear in JOVE before it would appear in the other venue
   • the other venue has given permission for the submission to JOVE
     
     

Submissions should include a statement that the manuscript has not appeared elsewhere and which of the above categories, if any, apply to the manuscript.

Work that is accepted for publication by the Journal may not be published elsewhere until it has appeared in the Journal. After its appearance in the Journal, the work may be published elsewhere, along with an author's note that it was originally published in the Journal of Virtual Enviroments, including the URL for the Journal.

The author of the manuscript retains copyright, but agrees to give the Journal the right of first publication.