International Journal of Consumer Studies

Edited by:
Katherine Hughes

Print ISSN: 1470-6423
Online ISSN: 1470-6431
Frequency: Bi-monthly
Current Volume: 34 / 2010

TopAuthor Guidelines

Submission

Contributions to such a multidisciplinary journal should be written with clarity and precision and any specialized terms should be defined. For more information about the journal's editorial policy and style guidelines please click here and for further details of the journal's peer review process and its timescale please click here.

Guidelines for Submission to International Journal of Consumer Studies

International Journal of Consumer Studies has now adopted ScholarOne Manuscripts, for online manuscript submission and peer review. The new system brings with it a whole host of benefits including:
• Quick and easy submission
• Administration centralised and reduced
• Significant decrease in peer review times

From now on all submissions to the journal must be submitted online at http://mc.manuscriptcentral.com/ijc. Full instructions and support are available on the site and a user ID and password can be obtained on the first visit. If you require assistance then click the Get Help Now link which appears at the top right of every ScholarOne Manuscripts page. If you cannot submit online, please contact the Editor Katherine Hughes by telephone (44 (0)29 2088 6569) or by e-mail (katherine.hughes@btconnect.com).

All papers go through a process of double-blind peer review.

Articles will normally not exceed 5,000 words. The Journal also publishes research reviews, policy updates, development and practice articles and abstracts of conference papers. These are reviewed by at least one referee and usually do not exceed 2000 words. All articles should report original research that has not been published or submitted for publication elsewhere, in any form other than a simple abstract of 400 words or less. Papers presented at conferences are accepted provided that they have not been published in full in Conference Proceedings.

Contributions must be typewritten (double-spaced) on one side of the paper only. The text must be preceded by a short summary of the paper and should be divided into appropriate sections, e.g. Introduction, Methods, Results, Discussion, Conclusions, Acknowledgements and References. Four to six keywords should also be supplied for indexing purposes. A single page must give the title and short title (to be printed at the head of alternate pages), authors' names and department(s) in which the work was done. Please highlight the corresponding author, including the name, full postal address and e-mail address.

Please submit electronic figures. Authors are encouraged to visit our digital illustration guidelines for further information on preparing high resolution images. A separate sheet should contain all the captions for the figures. In the full-text online edition of the journal, figure legends may be truncated in abbreviated links to the full-screen version. Therefore, the first 100 characters of any legend should inform the reader of key aspects of the figure. Tables should be typed on separate sheets and numbered (with Arabic numbers) in order of appearance. The approximate position of figures and tables should be indicated.

References in Articles

We recommend the use of a tool such as EndNote or Reference Manager for reference management and formatting.

EndNote reference styles can be searched for here:
http://www.endnote.com/support/enstyles.asp

Reference Manager reference styles can be searched for here:
http://www.refman.com/support/rmstyles.asp

Authors should use the Harvard system for references, as illustrated below. Please ensure that references in the text exactly match those in the manuscript's reference list. If editing sections of text please ensure that any references that are affected are amended accordingly in the reference list. Only full articles which have been published or are in press may be included in the reference list. In the text, unpublished or submitted studies should be referred to as such (e.g. J.M. Smith, unpublished), or as a personal communication. It is the authors responsibility to obtain permission from colleagues to include their work as a personal communication. In the text, references should be inserted in parentheses in date order, as follows: (Drummond, 1995; Birch et al., 1996). The reference list should be in alphabetical order according to the first named author. Papers with two authors should follow those of the first named author, arranged in alphabetical order according to the name of the second author. Articles with more than two authors should follow those of the first named author in chronological order. The title of the article must be included. The names of all authors should be listed. The following provide examples:

Flowers, S. (1996) Software Failure: Management Failure, 3rd edn. John Wiley, Chichester, UK.

Sterman, J.D. (1992) Teaching takes off: flight simulation for management education. [WWW document]. URL http://web.mit.edu/jsterman/www/SDG/beergame.html (accessed on July 26th, 2006).

Stinchcombe, A. (1965) Social structure and organizations. In: Handbook of Organizations (ed. by J. March), pp. 142-193. Rand McNully, Chicago, IL, USA.

Yetton, P., Sharma, R. & Southon, G. (1999) Successful IS innovation: the contigent contribution of innovation characteristics and implementation process. Journal of Information Technology, 14, 53-68.

The editor and publisher recommend that citation of online published papers and other material should be done via a DOI (digital object identifier), which all reputable online published material should have - see http://www.doi.org/ for more information. If an author cites anything which does not have a DOI they run the risk of the cited material not being traceable.

The final version of the accepted manuscript should be submitted electronically, by e-mail as an attachment (preferably in Word format). Particular attention should be taken to ensure that any papers submitted conform to journal style.

Papers are accepted on the understanding that no substantial part has been or will be published elsewhere; they may be subject to editorial revison without notice.

Receipt of electronic articles will normally be acknowledged within three weeks - if authors have not received an acknowledgement within that time then they should contact the Editorial Office. Aside from this, the editor kindly requests that authors refrain from contacting the editorial office in less than 16 weeks from the date of submission regarding the progress of their manuscript as this time should be allowed for the peer review process to be completed.

Copyright Transfer Agreement

Papers are accepted on the understanding that they have not been and will not be published elsewhere. Authors will be required to sign a Copyright Transfer Agreement (CTA) for all papers accepted for publication, including abstracts. Signature of the CTA is a condition of publication and papers will not be passed to the publisher for production unless a signed form has been received. To assist authors the CTA is available from the editorial office. (US Federal Government employees need to complete the Author Warranty sections, although copyright in such cases does not need to be assigned). After submission authors will retain the right to publish their paper in various media/circumstances (please see the form for further details). To access this form please click here. Please return your completed form to: Katherine Hughes, PO Box 671, Caerphilly, CF83 1ET, UK.

Authors are themselves responsible for obtaining permission to reproduce copyright material from other sources.

NEW: Online production tracking is now available for your article through Wiley-Blackwell's Author Services

Author Services enables authors to track their article - once it has been accepted - through the production process to publication online and in print. Authors can check the status of their articles online and choose to receive automated e-mails at key stages of production. The author will receive an e-mail with a unique link that enables them to register and have their article automatically added to the system. Please ensure that a complete e-mail address is provided when submitting the manuscript. Visit http://authorservices.wiley.com/bauthor/ for more details on online production tracking and for a wealth of resources including FAQs and tips on article preparation, submission and more.

Proofs

When you receive the pdf proof of your article, please check, sign and return it to the Production Editor without delay. As the correcting of proofs is costly, we ask that whenever possible you limit corrections to typesetting errors.

The corresponding author will receive an email alert containing a link to a web site. A working email address must therefore be provided for the corresponding author. The proof can be downloaded as a PDF (portable document format) file from this site. Acrobat Reader will be required in order to read this file. This software can be downloaded (free of charge) from the following Web site: www.adobe.com/products/acrobat/readstep2.html.

This will enable the file to be opened, read on screen, and printed out in order for any corrections to be added. Further instructions will be sent with the proof. Hard copy proofs will be posted if no email address is available. Excessive changes made by the author in the proofs, excluding typesetting errors, will be charged separately.

Early View
The International Journal of Consumer Studies is covered by Wiley-Blackwell Publishing's Early View service. Early View articles are complete full-text articles published online in advance of their publication in a printed issue. Articles are therefore available as soon as they are ready, rather than having to wait for the next scheduled print issue. Early View articles are complete and final. They have been fully reviewed, revised and edited for publication, and the authors' final corrections have been incorporated. Because they are in final form, no changes can be made after online publication. The nature of Early View articles means that they do not yet have volume, issue or page numbers, so Early View articles cannot be cited in the traditional way. They are therefore given a Digital Object Identifier (DOI), which allows the article to be cited and tracked before it is allocated to an issue. After print publication, the DOI remains valid and can continue to be used to cite and access the article.

Offprints
A PDF offprint of the online published article will be provided free of charge to the corresponding author, and may be distributed subject to the Publisher's terms and conditions. Additional paper offprints may be ordered online at http://offprint.cosprinters.com. Please fill in the necessary details and ensure that you type information in all of the required fields. If you have queries about offprints please email offprint@cosprinters.com.

Electronic offprints are sent to the first author at his or her first email address on the title page of the paper, unless advised otherwise; therefore please ensure that the name, address and email of the receiving author are clearly indicated on the manuscript title page if he or she is not the first author of the paper.

Author material archive policy

Please note that unless specifically requested, Blackwell Publishing will dispose of all hardcopy or electronic material submitted 2 months after publication. If you require the return of any material submitted, please inform the editorial office or production editor as soon as possible if you have not yet done so.

Note to NIH grantees
Pursuant to NIH mandate, Wiley-Blackwell will post the accepted version of contributions authored by NIH grant-holders to PubMed Central upon acceptance. This accepted version will be made publicly available 12 months after publication. For further information, see www.wiley.com/go/nihmandate