Journal of Materials Processing Technology -Editorial policy
Following the change of editor-in-chief in June 2007,the JMPT has introduced this editorial policy. The intention of the policy is to ensure that reviewers are only asked to consider papers that have a high chance of eventual publication, and to clarify to authors the requirements for a JMPT paper.
On submitting a paper to JMPT, authors will be asked to confirm the following statements:
• The paper fits the published aims and scope of the JMPT and meets the formatting requirements set out in the “guide for authors”.
• The paper gives a clear and credible review of previous work, making a clear distinction between previous and new work, and setting out the context of the work. Typically a paper will have more than 10 references all of which must be publicly accessible, most of which will be from peer-reviewed journals, and will demonstrate awareness of international work. The journal will reject papers which use references in lists. In general, if a paper is referenced, the description of the paper should summarise what the cited authors claim and what evidence they provide to support their claim.
• The paper describes work that has reached a 'research threshold' such that a significant novel contribution has been made. This is likely to include novel theory applied to an existing process, or the application of existing theory to a novel process or the invention of new technologies or experimental procedures. The editors will reject papers that only describe small increments from previous work by the authors.
• The paper demonstrates transferable knowledge: it is not restricted to a particular product or a single item of machinery.
• The paper conform with all style requirements defined in the “Guide for Authors” on the journal's home page.
Authors who are unsure if their paper meets these requirements are encouraged to read “Writing a good paper for JPMT” on the JMPT website.
Please note that the JMPT does not accept multiple-part papers.
If the editors are satisfied that the paper meets these requirements it will be sent out for two single-blind peer-reviews (the authors will not know the identities of the reviewers). The reviewers will be asked to assess whether:
• The paper presents original work
• The methodology is scientifically sound, does not over-claim the significance of its contribution, and presents evidence which objectively supports the conclusions
• The paper references appropriate previous work accurately
Based on the reviewers comments, the editors will either accept the paper, ask the authors to revise it within 4 weeks, or reject it. The editors' decision is final.
Journal of Materials Processing Technology – Guide to writing a good paper
The “Guide for authors” describes the format and structure requirements for submitting a paper to the Journal of Materials Processing Technology (JMPT). This guide proposes a model for writing a good paper, and gives some advice on writing style.
A good paper in JMPT makes a contribution to knowledge by providing insights into the influence of a process on material in a way that will be useful to others in future. The knowledge may be coded as an equation, or formulated in some concise statements, and must always be supported by experimental or theoretical evidence that allows the reader to judge its value. Opinions are of very little value in a journal paper: claiming that a new theory is 'good' or 'successful' is unconvincing; however, providing evidence that allows a sceptical reader to evaluate the theory is valuable. Accordingly, we propose here a model of a good paper as a defence case in a court trial in which the authors are accused that their work has no value. In writing the paper, the authors must anticipate all of the arguments that the prosecution (the reviewers) may put to them, and respond with evidence. A 'standard' paper has six sections, and we define below the intention of each section, and the prosecution arguments that the authors should attempt to defend in their writing.
1. Introduction. The introduction establishes the need for the research work. What would we like to be able to do in practice that we don't know how to do at present?
Prosecution case:
• This research is not important
• The problem is too specific and clearly does not lead to transferable knowledge
2. Analysis of existing work. This section has two purposes: to summarise previous work in the area (what knowledge exists in the area and is relevant to the need of section 1), and to demonstrate that a gap in the knowledge exists (precisely what is the gap between the defined need and existing literature that this paper will attempt to fill?)
Prosecution case:
• The claimed knowledge gap does not exist – it has already been filled.
• You have failed to connect the stated need to previous work
• You haven't understood the existing work that you have quoted
• The paper only presents established textbook knowledge
• The evaluation of the previous work is not fair
3. Proposal. A postulated model, theory, technological innovation, experiment, operating method or framework of analysis that will in some way contribute to filling the gap. The paper then tests the hypothesis that the proposal fills the gap identified in section 2. The importance of treating the paper as a test of this hypothesis is that provided the proposal is novel and credible, the paper is valuable regardless of whether the hypothesis turns out to be true or false – both results are useful, and there is no need for authors to claim 'success'.
Prosecution case:
• The proposal is arbitrary
• You have made assumptions which you haven?t stated, or which are untested or which are un-testable
• You have over-simplified
• The proposal is too restrictive and makes too many assumptions
• The proposal clearly won't work
• The proposal is wrong – the derivation contains an error
• The proposal is incomplete – it cannot reasonably be tested.
4. Design of test and implementation. Given the above hypothesis, what is the most fair and objective way to test whether the proposal fills the knowledge gap? How can the hypothesis be proved or disproved? Typically this is achieved by comparison with experimental data, or with existing models, but it is important that the chosen test would be seen as valid even by someone initially sceptical about the proposal.
Prosecution case:
• The test does not prove anything
• The test is wrong
• The test is over simplified
• The test is false – the outcome will not prove anything because it assumes the proposal is true
5. Results and evaluation. The results should be presented as clearly and objectively as possible supported by a careful evaluation. The evaluation should be written in such a way that an informed reader seeing the same results would draw the same conclusions – and should not claim 'good agreement' unless this has been explicitly shown and the limits of the test are carefully defined.
Prosecution case:
• The results are too specific and apply only to one situation
• Your interpretation of the results is wrong
• You claim more than you have proved
6. Discussion and conclusions. To what extent does the proposal close the gap identified in section 2? Based on the experience of evaluating the proposal described in this paper, what extensions or related approaches would be worth investigating? What are the wider implications of the work: does this investigation suggest the use of other solutions to this problem? Are there other problems for which this solution might also be useful? Based on the work described in this paper, are there other proposals that might usefully be tested in future work?
Prosecution case:
• The work is incomplete – you haven't gone far enough
• You haven't understood the context of your proposal
• You have missed the implications of your evaluation
Abstract. Although the abstract appears first to the reader, it should be written after the paper is finished and is a concise summary of the entire paper. The best way to construct an abstract is with a one sentence summary of each of the above six sections.
Not all papers have six sections, as some of the sections would be very short if the above scheme were followed identically. However, most valuable papers could be organised in this way, and we commend it as a working template.
Review papers are written in quite a different way, and will be structured by the subject being discussed. A good review is not just a catalogue, but adds value to the readers by demonstrating a structure for knowledge in the area being described – that allows clear evaluation of where work has been largely completed, where opportunities for new work clearly exist, and where different approaches have been developed, a review should contrast them clearly and with fairness.
Style
• It is important to write the paper so that the reader finds it complete and compelling. You must assemble the information into a coherent narrative; don't leave the reader to assemble related ideas or evidence from different sections. To help achieve this: the introduction should motivate the reader to read the rest of the paper and demonstrate why the ensuing structure is logical; the first paragraph of each section should present a clear structure for the information contained in it; and, the first sentence of each paragraph should structure the rest of the paragraph. First paragraphs and first sentences generally do not include references as their purpose is to give direction to the reader, not to present new information. Each paragraph should have a single purpose.
• Paragraphs beginning “another”, “furthermore” etc. are worrying to the reader – they suggest that you haven't anticipated the structure of the section. If you find yourself beginning paragraphs in this way, go back to the first paragraph of the section and re-define the structure. As an example, the following opening sentence clearly shows the reader what to expect: “There are four possible means to increase safety in manufacture of light bulbs: product changes; process changes; changes in personnel policy; changes in infrastructure. Each of these is examined in turn, considering the cost of implementation, the range of skills required, and their likely benefits.”
• The correct way to cite previous work includes some description of what the authors did, and what the conclusion was – so the reader knows how seriously to take the information you claim from them. References in papers work best when the reference is used as the subject of the sentence. For example “Smith (2004) analysed 14 companies manufacturing light bulbs in Norwich and found that 12 of them failed basic Health and Safety requirements at least once per year” as opposed to “Safety is a concern in light bulb manufacture (Smith, 2004).” It is of almost no value to quote references in a list – precisely because this fails to give any indication of what each of the authors did, and how their conclusions differ.
• People reading papers have read a lot of them before – don't philosophise (don't attempt to show that your work has great significance outside of the context in which you pursued it) or claim that is more significant than it is. What readers like is clarity about the purpose of the work, clarity about how it fits into previous work, clarity about what was done and clear evaluation of the outcomes without any hint of “salesmanship.” Inexperienced writers often make statements of the type “the model and experiments showed perfect agreement” where actually the statement “the model matched the experiments well within normal operating conditions, but was never less than 20% inaccurate outside of this range” is both more honest and more useful.
• Long sentences are harder to understand than short ones.
• The clearest sentences are often the simplest. English is built around sentences that have the structure:
subject-verb-object. Lack of clarity often occurs when this order is ignored. It is surprisingly easy to write a sentence with a long sub-clause between the subject and verb, and sometimes the object of the main clause is missing altogether. If you realise that your writing is becoming unclear, it sometimes helps to see if that sentence or paragraph would be clearer if written in reverse order.
• Aim to be concise.
• Academic writing is formal. Avoid colloquialisms or 'chatty' phrases.
• The reader will examine your writing to see if you have provided evidence to support your claims. Your own opinion about the value of your claims is rarely valuable. Therefore, writing in the 3rd person is generally more effective than writing in the 1st person. The statement “we found that forces grew with displacement” is an opinion. The statement “The plot of measured forces against displacement shown in figure 1 shows a strong positive correlation” is evidence – so is more convincing.
• The most common failing in academic writing is claiming that the paper is more significant than it is. Be precise in describing the conclusions that may safely be drawn from the evidence you have provided – even if they appear to you to be small or insignificant. Leave it to the reader to assess the quality of your contribution – you don't need to “sell” it.
Journal of Materials Processing Technology – Guide to writing a good review.
The JMPT “Guide for authors” describes the format and structure requirements for submitting a paper to the journal. The “Guide to writing a good paper” proposes a model for writing a good paper, and gives some advice on writing style. The model described in that guide describes the authors as the defence lawyers in a court case in which the reviewers are arguing the case “this work is no good.” That seems to us to be a useful model for authors, and helpful for reviewers to think about whilst reading – but is probably not a useful way for reviewers to write their reports!
As joint editors-in-chief of JMPT, our top two priorities are raising the quality of papers in the journal and increasing the speed of publication. To support these objectives, we will attempt to send to reviewers papers which we think have a high chance of eventual publication: we have explained to authors the criteria for sending papers to review in our 'editorial policy'. Accordingly, we hope that most of your efforts as a reviewer will be to act as 'coach' to the authors – to help them to improve the description or content of their work. We would like to ask you to write your review in the spirit of offering sound advice to the authors based on evidence not opinion or emotion. Therefore we would ask you to avoid phrases such as “the review section is terrible” and prefer evidence based statements “the review section fails to acknowledge the three key papers in this area, which are by ...”
Following the six section basic structure we have proposed in our “guide to writing a good paper” we would like you to consider the following issues in reviewing the paper:
1. Introduction. Does the introduction establish a clear need for research work?
2. Analysis of existing work. Does the paper give a satisfactory summary of existing work in the area and demonstrate that a knowledge gap exists relative to the need established in section 1?
3. Proposal. Does the paper make a clear proposal of new transferable knowledge?
4. Design of test and implementation. Does the paper describe an appropriate objective test of the value of the proposed new knowledge?
5. Results and evaluation. Are the results presented clearly and objectively and are they supported by careful evaluation.
6. Discussion and conclusions. Do the authors correctly appreciate the value of their work and its implications for others?
Abstract. Is the abstract a clear summary of the paper?
Typically a reviewer's report will be between a half and one page of single spaced text. We retain the right to make final decisions about paper acceptance, but would value your opinions as to whether the paper should be accepted immediately, revised slightly, given a major rewrite or rejected.
Thank you for your work in reviewing for the JMPT. If you have any comments on our editorial policy or guides to good practice that you think may help us to improve the quality of JMPT papers further, we would be very grateful to hear from you.
