Submissions

Author Guidelines

Submission Components

A submission to the European Journal of Health Communication must include the following components as separate files:

• Title Page
• Manuscript

Additionally, we encourage authors to submit supplemental material.

Title Page

The title page must include the following information:

• Title
• Author information (name, affiliation, ORCID ID, biography, contribution statement)
• Declaration of conflicts of interest
• Ethical approval statement (if necessary)

More detailed specifications regarding the above listed points can be found in our Submission Preparation Guidelines.

Manuscript

When setting up the manuscript, please follow the points below:

• Page 1 of the manuscript must include the title, the abstract (maximum of 200 words), and 5 selected keywords.
• Page 2 starts with the main text.
• The manuscript and its contents must be formatted in strict accordance with our Submission Preparation Guidelines.

Supplemental Material

We strongly encourage authors to submit supplemental material that contributes to the understanding of their work. As an online journal, EJHC can publish all types of supplemental material. The idea of online supplements is to provide information that is not essential for the basic understanding of the article but nevertheless offers additional insight to instruments, measures, datasets, statistical models, etc.
Supplements will be published online as received from the author(s) without any conversion, testing, or reformatting. They will not be checked for typographical errors or functionality. The responsibility for the content and functionality remains entirely with the author(s).

Supplement files will be subjected to peer review along with the article itself. The number of supplement files is limited to 10. The file size should be kept as small as possible, not exceeding 10 MB in total. All file formats are accepted with the exception of executable files (e.g. .exe, .com, or .msi). Following the online instructions, submit the supplement files in a single zip file separate from the other files that are part of your submission.

Peer Review Process and Anonymisation

All articles undergo a double-blind peer review process. Therefore, the manuscript and all supplemental material that is subject to a peer-review must be anonymized.

To ensure anonymization, omit all directly identifying information (e.g. project identifiers). Whenever possible, references to your own works should stay visible in the text but it must be ensured that the wording does not explicitly link these references to the authors of the manuscript (e.g. rephrase sentences such as “In our previous study (Author Name, 2020), […]”). For a more comprehensive overview see our Submission Preparation Guidelines.

Article Types

During the submission process you will be asked to indicate the type of your manuscript. EJHC publishes the following types of articles:

• Original research papers report empirical studies (based on quantitative and/or qualitative methods) and range between 4,000 and 7,000 words (excluding abstract, notes, tables and figures, references, and supplements).
• Theoretical papers present innovative thoughts on existing theories and models for health communication, or present new theoretical considerations. The specifications are the same as for original research papers.
• Methodological papers focus on methodological issues relevant for the discipline (e.g., tracking health data). The specifications are the same as for original research papers.
• Review articles systematise the existing literature or present a meta-analysis of published results or multiple data sets. The specifications are the same as for original research papers.
• Living reviews are updated versions of review articles. They need to incorporate the research that has been published since its original/last publication and underline the development and its relevance to the field. The updated version will also be peer reviewed (single blind) and published as new article with its own DOI.
• Brief research reports focus on methods, such as the development of a new questionnaire, or they may feature small empirical studies. They contain up to 3,000 words, excluding abstract, notes, tables and figures, references, and supplements.

Plagiarism

Submitted articles may be checked with duplication-checking software, such as PlagScan Pro. Specifically, it will be checked whether the article has plagiarised other work or included third-party copyright material without permission or with insufficient acknowledgement.