International Journal of Cognitive Science

Contributions• Full theoretical and experimental papers on the study of the mind
• Brief articles reporting original empirical findings, major theoretical advances or crucial developments that warrant rapid communication to the scientific community
• Proposals for special issues on a new and important area in the field
• Discussions
• Books reviews


Submission and reviewing policies


Submission of an article implies that the work described has not been published previously (except in the form of an abstract or as part of a published lecture or academic thesis), that it is not under consideration for publication elsewhere, that its publication is approved by all Authors and tacitly or explicitly by the responsible authorities where the work was carried out, and that, if accepted, it will not be published elsewhere in the same form, in English or in any other language, without written consent of the Publisher.

The covering letter: Articles for submission should be accompanied by a covering letter which summarizes, in no more than a short paragraph, the novel empirical and/or theoretical contribution of the paper. Cognition aims to publish material that is highly innovative with respect to advancing theory, and this summary may be used to inform the triage process. Authors should also ensure that readers can quickly establish the advance afforded by the paper when reading its introduction and/or discussion sections.

Triage: Once a submitted manuscript has been allocated to an Editor, a decision will be taken either to send the paper out to review, or to reject the paper, perhaps with the recommendation to submit to a more specialist journal. This decision may normally take up to two weeks. Authors can check the status of their manuscript by logging on to EES; if the status of the manuscript is shown as "With Editor", the manuscript is either awaiting a triage decision or is awaiting assignment of reviewers. When the status changes to "Under Review", the manuscript is with reviewers. A substantial number of manuscripts are rejected without being sent to review, and only a small proportion of the manuscripts which are sent to review will eventually be accepted for publication in Cognition.

Statistical reporting: Please refer to the Editorial Policy to ensure that you conform with the journal's policy on the reporting of size of effect and goodness-of-fit measures.

We strive to return a decision on Full articles within three months on the advice of at least two reviewers, and on Brief articles within six to eight weeks. Delays can be incurred if reviewers are unable to return their reviews to us within the requested period, or if we need to find alternative reviewers. Replies will simply indicate acceptance or rejection - where revision is required, an article will be rejected but a new submission may be allowed.

Authors should refer to the Journal's Editorial Policy. Reviewers will be asked to take into account the Journal's Reviewing Policy.


Upon acceptance of an article, authors will be asked to transfer the copyright of the article to the Publisher (for more information on copyright see http://ees.elsevier.com/cognit). This transfer will ensure the widest possible dissemination of information.


No revisions or updates will be incorporated after the article has been accepted and sent to the Publisher (unless approved by the Editor-in-Chief).


Submission procedure
Online submission via the web will speed up the review processes. Step-by-step instructions are given on the website http://ees.elsevier.com/cognit


Please submit both Full articles and Brief articles online via the Elsevier Editorial System (EES) website http://ees.elsevier.com/cognit. Any questions prior to submission (e.g. appropriateness of manuscript) can be sent to "Cognition", Department of Psychology, University of York, Heslington, York Y010 5DD, UK or electronically to cognition@york.ac.uk.

Organisation of the article

Full articles need not be any specific length, but authors must confine themselves to the maximum required by the subject matter. Brief articles must be no more than three thousand words long excluding title, author affiliations, acknowledgments, bibliography and figures (this word limit must be strictly observed due to page limits - note that the 3,000 words does include the abstract). Please provide a word count on the title page.


The format and style of manuscripts should conform to the conventions specified in the Publication Manual of the American Psychological Association (1200 Seventeenth Street, NW, Washington, DC 20036 [Fifth Edition 2001]). Please note that for new submissions, you should include Figures and Tables in the main text (this is a departure from the normal recommendation) so as to facilitate reviewing. However, if your paper is accepted for publication, you should make sure that the finally submitted manuscript is in the following order: Title - Authors - Affiliation - Abstract - Keywords - Main text - Acknowledgement - Appendix - References - Figure legends - Tables


Electronic manuscripts
We accept most word-processing formats, but Word, or WordPerfect is preferred. Always keep a backup copy of the electronic file for reference and safety. Save your files using the default extension of the program used. It is important that the file be saved in the native format of the word processor used. The text should be in single-column format. Keep the layout of the text as simple as possible. Most formatting codes will be removed and replaced on processing the article. In particular, do not use the word processor's options to justify text or to hyphen-ate words. However, do use bold face, italics, subscripts, superscripts etc. as appropriate. Do not embed "graphically designed" equations or tables, but prepare these using the word processor's facility. When preparing tables, if you are using a table grid, use only one grid for each individual table and not a grid for each row. If no grid is used, use tabs, not spaces, to align columns. The electronic text should be prepared in a way very similar to that of conventional manuscripts (see also Elsevier's Quickguide: http://www.elsevier.com).

Illustrations. For specific enquires on the preparation of electronic artwork, please consult http://www.elsevier.com/artworkinstructions. Hardcopy figures must be supplied in professional-quality finished form, ready for reproduction. Original artwork is preferred. The APA Publication Manual gives detailed instructions on the proper preparation of drawings, including information on letter sizing and reduction factors. Colour illustrations are accepted but authors are charged US$272 for the first page and US$182 for each subsequent page thereafter.


Proofs. Elsevier will do everything possible to get your article corrected and published as quickly and accurately as possible, both online (Science Direct) and in print. Therefore it is important to ensure that all your corrections are sent back to Elsevier in one communication. Subsequent corrections will not be possible, so please ensure that your first sending is complete.


Offprints. 50 offprints of each article will be supplied free of charge to the authors. Additional offprints can be ordered from the publisher when returning corrected proofs at the prices shown on the offprint order form accompanying the proofs.


Author enquiries. Please visit Elsevier's Authors Home at http://www.elsevier.com/wps/find/authorshome.authors. This provides the facility to track accepted articles and set up e-mail alerts to inform you of when an article's status has changed, as well as detailed artwork guidelines, copyright information, frequently asked questions and more.


Special issues. Cognition occasionally publishes special issues devoted to a research area that has seen rapid recent progress, promising new approaches, and convergence among different disciplines. Each special issue is coordinated by a Guest Editor, who writes an introduction that describes the central questions in that area of research and allows readers in diverse fields, particularly graduate students, to understand the significance of the individual articles in the issue. Proposals for special issues may be submitted by individuals who are willing to serve as Guest Editor. The proposal should explain the topic and the rationale for dedicating a special issue to it at that moment, and a detailed list of likely authors and papers. The articles themselves should summarize the state of the art in a field, explore alternative theories, and present new data, theories, or critical and synthetic literature reviews. The special issue should represent diverse viewpoints while remaining focused on a cohesive topic. The issue should contain no more than five or six articles and be no more than 150 journal pages long. All proposals will be refereed. If a proposal is accepted, the Guest Editor can begin to solicit the papers in collaboration with the Editor-in-Chief. All papers must adhere to the standards of the journal and meet with the approval of three referees selected by the journal. The decision to accept or reject a submission to a special issue will be made by the Editor-in-Chief.



NIH voluntary posting policy
US National Institutes of Health (NIH) voluntary posting (" Public Access") policy
Elsevier facilitates author response to the NIH voluntary posting request (referred to as the NIH "Public Access Policy", see http://www.nih.gov/about/publicaccess/index.htm) by posting the peer-reviewed author's manuscript directly to PubMed Central on request from the author, 12 months after formal publication. Upon notification from Elsevier of acceptance, we will ask you to confirm via e-mail (by e-mailing us at NIHauthorrequest@elsevier.com) that your work has received NIH funding and that you intend to respond to the NIH policy request, along with your NIH award number to facilitate processing. Upon such confirmation, Elsevier will submit to PubMed Central on your behalf a version of your manuscript that will include peer-review comments, for posting 12 months after formal publication. This will ensure that you will have responded fully to the NIH request policy. There will be no need for you to post your manuscript directly with PubMed Central, and any such posting is prohibited.