Publishing an article : what editors want

Abstract

As editors of an academic journal, in recent times we have received unsolicited academic articles that have proved to be unacceptable because they did not comply with the necessary requirements. An analysis of the articles, reviewers' comments and opinions of other editors provides the basis of our presentation. The investigation showed that while it is claimed that there is no formalised structure to an academic article, there is a generally acceptable 'pattern' that editors require. The title and abstract should reflect what the article is about; there should always be an introduction that grabs the reader's attention and presents the nature of the problem. We found that most academic writing contains a section devoted to a review of the literature, to show that new research is built on a sound foundation. In addition, most articles report on actual research done to substantiate a new finding or theory. The discussion of the results of the research, new findings and the interpretation of the main findings are usually the focus of an article. This article presents some of the elements editors said were generally overlooked by contributors, and provides guidance to prospective writers on ways to achieve success in academic writing.