Submissions

Author Guidelines

Guidelines for authors-Submissions

ERJSSH is free of charge University of Gondar, Ethiopia, Publication Journal.

Please, submit your manuscript online to https://erjssh.uog.edu.et/index.php/ERJSSH/submissions. You may also seek some clarification via this website as all correspondences are done through internet. If the manuscript does not meet the requirements and/or the thematic scope of the Journal, the editors reserve the right to reject it.

Meritorious research articles, review articles, book reviews, case reports, systematic reviews, scoping reviews and other types of articles may be submitted.

Your submission will include:

• Two versions of the manuscript, one anonymous and one provided with the full names of the author(s) as well as contact information.

Submission of a manuscript for ERJSSH will imply that it is unpublished and not being considered for publication elsewhere.

Manuscript Preparation

Articles are to be written either in English or, in cases when the thematic requires it, in Amharic. The file format should be supported by Open Office and Microsoft Word and files should be submitted in doc/Docx, or also in RTF formats. Contributions may not exceed 25 typed pages, or 8,000 words, including tables, footnotes, and references.

Format and Style

Texts should include the following specifications: Times New Roman, 1.5-spaced throughout, 12-point font size, and margins of 2.5 cm on the left and right and authors have to follow in-text citation with APA style.

Contributors should seek clarity, brevity, and simplicity of expression and avoid long sentences and unduly lengthy or short paragraphs. Authors, particularly those whose first language is not English, may wish to have their English-language manuscripts checked by a native speaker before submission. This is optional but may help to ensure that the academic content of the paper is fully understood by the editors and reviewers.

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Spelling (in English) may follow either British or American conventions but must be consistent. The use of diacritical marks is not recommended although in specific cases, e.g. for articles in philology or linguistics, the use of diacritical marks will be accepted. Diacritical marks should be those supported by the Unicode system (see www.unicode.org).

For further information on how to prepare your manuscript see http://www.apastyle.org/manual/related/sample-experiment-paper-1.pdf

Abstracts and Blurb

The author is required to submit the article with an abstract of 140 to 200 words as well as 5 to 8 keywords.

The author is asked to attach a blurb including his/her academic career, affiliation, highest degree, mailing and e-mail addresses, and any desired acknowledgment to the Ethiopian Renaissance Journal of Social Sciences and Humanities (ERJSSH).

Tables, figures, and photos

All tabular materials, flow charts, etc. can be typed in the main file with same size and fonts as the text. All tables and figures must include an accompanying caption, including the title of the caption and sources.

Tables and figures should be numbered with Arabic numbers in the order of appearance in the text. They should be cited in the manuscript, for example, in Table 3 or Figure 3. The author should indicate where the tables and figures should be placed in the text, e.g.: Legends for tables and figures should be placed just above and below the image, respectively.

All graphs, diagrams, and drawings, are considered figures. The original drawings should not be larger than 16×12 cm. All drawings must be made with black drawing ink on tracing paper suitable for direct photocopy. Either the original or glossy prints are acceptable. Avoid any unnecessary use of colors. Photographs should be saved at 300 dpi and sent as tiff, jpg, or png files.

In tables and figures, the author(s) and year should be indicated. Contributors are responsible for obtaining permission to reproduce any material in which they do not hold copyright and for ensuring that the appropriate acknowledgments are included in their manuscript.

Informants and expert interviews

The authors of manuscripts including informants and expert interviews should be able, upon request, to produce documentation of prior informed consent about the interview to the ERJSSH editors. Authors are expected to provide all relevant information on the experts or informants (name, position, date, place of the interview, and other relevant information) if requested by the journal editors.

Informants and participants in surveys and focus group discussions are generally coded and anonymized. Authors shall submit empirical evidence thereof upon request by ERJSSH editors. 

Authorship of the Paper

The editorial committee of ERJSSH limits authorship to those who have made a significant contribution to the conception, design, execution, or interpretation of the reported study. All those who have made significant contributions should be listed as co-authors.

Where others have participated in certain substantive aspects of the research project, they should be acknowledged or listed as contributors. The corresponding author should ensure that all appropriate co-authors and no inappropriate co-authors are included in the paper and that all co-authors have seen and approved the final version of the paper and have agreed to its submission for publication.

Reporting standards

Authors of original research should present an accurate account of the work performed as well as an objective discussion of its significance. Underlying data should be represented accurately in the paper. A paper should contain sufficient detail and references to permit
others to replicate the work. Fraudulent or knowingly inaccurate statements constitute. 

Ethiopian Renaissance Journal of Social Sciences and Humanities (ERJSSH) unethical behavior is unacceptable.

Data Access and Retention

Authors may be asked to provide the raw data in connection with a paper for editorial review, should be prepared to provide public access to such data, and should in any event be prepared to retain such data for a reasonable time after publication.

Originality and Plagiarism
Authors should adhere to publication requirements and thus submitted works are original, not plagiarized, or not been published elsewhere or inaccurate statements which constitute unethical behavior. If an author has used the work and/or words of others, the original must be appropriately cited or quoted to accurately reflect individuals’ contributions to the stock of knowledge.

Multiple, Redundant, or Concurrent Publication

An author should not in general send manuscripts to ERJSSH describing the same research in more than one journal or primary publication. Submitting the same manuscript to more than one journal concurrently constitutes unethical publishing behavior and is unacceptable.

Fundamental errors in published works

When an author discovers a significant error or inaccuracy in his/her published work, the author must promptly notify the journal editor or publisher and cooperate with our editors to retract or correct the paper.

Disclosure and Conflict of Interest
Privileged information or ideas obtained through peer review must be kept confidential and not used for personal advantage. Reviewers do not consider manuscripts in which they have conflicts of interest resulting from competitive, collaborative, or other relationships or connections with any of the authors, companies, or institutions connected to the papers.

Copyright
Effective with initial submissions, authors must agree that if their manuscript is accepted, they will grant ERJSSH an exclusive, irrevocable license to publish their work while the copyright remains with the authors.

Authors of manuscripts, submitted at any time, need not contact the ERJSSH to request permission to reuse their material. Authors who granted the journal an exclusive license to publish and authors who transferred copyright to ERJSSH are allowed to do the following: 

1. Use all or part of the work in compilations or other publications of the Authors’
   own works (includes theses/dissertations), to use figures, photos, and tables created by them and contained in the work, to present the work orally in its entirety, and to make copies of all or part of the work for the Authors’ use for lectures, classroom instruction or similar uses. If the author is employed by an academic institution, that institution also may reproduce the article for teaching purposes.
2. Post the accepted manuscript version of the work, the “Paper in Press,” on the author’s web page, their personal or institutional repository, or their funding body’s archive provided that a link to the article in the Ethiopian Renaissance
   Journal of Social Sciences and Humanities is included.
3. Post a manuscript version of the work on not-for-profit preprint servers provided that the Authors retain distribution rights to the work, that ERJSSH formatted final files are not posted, and that a link to the article in the Ethiopian Renaissance Journal of Social Sciences and Humanities is included.
4. Reuse of ERJSSH content must include the following: This research was originally published in the Ethiopian Renaissance Journal of Social Sciences and Humanities, Author(s). Title. ERJSSH. Year; Vol: pp-pp. © Ethiopian Renaissance Journal of Social Sciences and Humanities, University of Gondar.

Ethics policy

Manuscript that has personal photographs/pictures cannot be published. In some rare cases, if the individuals from whom the pictures are taken give consents, it might be published by clearly verifying the consent.

Manuscript that can cause inter-religious or interethnic conflicts, unfairly targeting some groups, inciting violence or promoting injustice shall be rejected. All authors are expected to reasonably promote global welfare, equity and human rights.

 Manuscripts that are submitted to ERJSSH must be free from plagiarism, academic dishonesty and copy-like--inappropriate paraphrasing. Also, manuscripts submitted by multiple authors require that listed authors agree with the submission by approving the final version. Publishing without approval of all authors or republication of previously used data without acknowledgment will cause automatic rejection of the manuscripts. As well, if a manuscript has more than 20% AI (artificial intelligence) generated or paraphrased content(s), it would be rejected; manuscripts must be original and authors should be intimate with their manuscripts..

All authors submitting manuscripts must cooperate with editorial committee or external reviewers if an allegation of research misconduct involving manuscript is raised. If reviewing individuals make any finding concerning a manuscript, each author is required to respond to the details of the findings with supporting documents.

In case an allegation of a suspected violation is received for published articles, the editorial committee of ERJSSH shall request explanation from the corresponding author.  All authors are expected to maintain the original data of their manuscripts for a minimum of 3 years after the final publication date of their articles, in case they are required to provide the original data. If authors are unable to provide the original data upon request, the editors may ask authors to retract their articles, if not; the publisher shall annul the article. Provided that the author responds but the editor and the authors do not agree on a resolution or appropriate correction of the literature, the ERJSSH editorial committee will decide on the fate of the manuscript with advisory board of the ERJSSH.  Above all, any research which involves human subjects should obtain ethical clearance from the ethics review Board and informed consent and assent from participants.

All authors submitting their works must grant the Ethiopian Renaissance of Social Sciences and Humanities license to publish their works as described in this policy.

All Authors submitting articles to ERJSSH are requested to use the following guidelines for submission.

 Introduction/Background: 15%

• Is the content original, relevant, appropriate
  • Does the title reflect the content?
  • Does the abstract reflect the background, objectives, method, result, and conclusion
  • is the study rationale adequately described?
  • Are the study objectives clearly stated and defined
  • Are objectives/ questions/hypotheses clearly delineate and adequately describe what the author seeks to bring about as a result of his/her writing?

Literature Reviews: 15%

• Are reviewed literature relevant and recent?
• Does the literature provide clear support to key theoretical and methodological issues or questions being investigated?
• Does the review identify areas of controversy in the literature and shows the gap/s in the text?
• Is the conceptual /theoretical framework clearly articulated and serves as a tool to scaffold research, analyze the data, clearly set the constructs of the study, and help to make meaning of subsequent findings?

Methodology: 15%

• Is there convincing support from literature provided for the choice of a particular research design?
• Are data collections methods and procedures justified and provided as well as linked to the literature review?
• Is the source of data reliable and accurate?
•  Are the data collected from primary and secondary sources?
• Are the constructs of the study clear and appropriate?

Ethical Consideration 5%

• Check that ethics are adequately described
• Demand statements of each individual’s contribution to the research and publication
• Use checklists to prevent ghost authorship
• Ask all authors to sign an authorship declaration
• Specify authorship criteria in the instructions to authors
• Did the author plagiarize another publication?
• Is the research ethical and have the appropriate approvals/consent been obtained?
• Is there any indication that the data has been fabricated or inappropriately manipulated
• Have the authors declared all relevant competing interests?

Analysis, results, discussion, and conclusion

Analysis: 15%

• Are the methods of data analysis appropriate?
• Do the results answer the research questions?
• Are the results credible?
• Is statistical significance well documented (e.g., as confidence intervals or P-value for quantitative data)?
• Are the findings presented logically with appropriate displays and explanations?
• Are data interpretations clear?
• Are data interpretations logically linked to results, discussions, conclusions, and recommendations?
•  Do they have accuracy and consistency?

Discussion: 15%

• How well are the key findings stated?
• To what extent have differences or similarities with other studies been discussed
  and reasons for these given?
• Are the findings discussed in light of previous evidence?
• Are the implications of these findings clearly explained?
• Is the interpretation warranted by and sufficiently derived from and focused on
  the data and results?

Conclusion: 10%

• Do the results justify the conclusion(s)?
• Are conclusions are drawn logically from results and discussions and backed by
  relevant issues in the review?
• Do results re-enforce claims made in the discussion?
• Are discussions backed by relevant issues in the review?

Acknowledgment, recommendations, presentation, and language: 10%

• Are acknowledgments for sources used clearly shown in the text and the references
• Have the various sections of the research been identified and presented?
• Do recommendations refer back to the statement of the problem and relate to conclusions?
• Do recommendations suggest a new/interesting perspective on the existing debate?
• Are the languages used appropriate, clear, and to the standard?

At the end of the manuscript the author should acknowledge briefly:

1. Contributions that need acknowledging but do not justify authorship
2. Acknowledgments of technical help received by the author
3. Acknowledgments of financial and material support received by the author, specifying the nature of support; and
4. Study subjects and others who contributed to the design, data collection, and analysis of the study.

Disclaimer: Neither the editors nor the Editorial Board of the ERJSSH is responsible for authors’ expressed opinions, views, and the contents of the published manuscripts in the journal. The originality, proofreading of manuscripts and errors are the sole responsibility of the individual authors.

All manuscripts submitted for publication in the journal go under double-blind reviews for authenticity, ethical issues, and useful contributions.

References

References, citations, and the general style of manuscripts are to be prepared by the 7^th American Psychological Association (APA) Publication Manual (with a modification concerning Ethiopian and Eritrean names, see below). Citations and references in the text should be done by (author, year, p. and page number), e.g. (John, 1983, p. 13). In the case of Ethiopian or Eritrean names, both the personal name and the father’s name should be given and quoted in that order. For books published in Ethiopia and that follow the Ethiopian year, this has to be indicated by placing A.M. after the year, e.g.: Tesfaye Tafesse (2001 A.M., p. 129).

A complete list of references is to be provided at the end of the article as shown in the
following examples:

1. a) Journal:

Firestone, W. A. (1987). Meaning and Method: The Rhetoric of Quantitative and Qualitative Research. Educational Researcher, 16(7), 16-21.

1. b) Book:

Rapport, N., & Overing, J. (2000). Social and Cultural Anthropology: The Key Concepts. London: Rutledge (Special Indian Edition).

1. c) Edited Book:

Gibbs, J. T., & Huang, L. N. (Eds.). (2001). Children of color: Psychological interventions with culturally diverse youth. San Francisco, CA: Jossey-Bass.

1. d) Essay or chapter in edited books: Ospina, S. (2002). Qualitative Research. In G. Goethals, G. Sorensen & J. MacGregor(Eds.), Encyclopedia of Leadership (pp. 239-252). London: SAGE Publications.
2. e) Internet source:

Marshall, E. (2007). Chidi Amuta’s A Dialectical Theory of African Literature: Categories and Stringboards. Retrieved June 3, 2014, from HTTP:// www.rlwclarke.net/courses/ LITS3303/2009- 2010/ 04DAmuta, ADialecticalTheoryofAfricanLiterature.pdf
For further information on the APA style see the following websites: http://www.apastyle.org/