Submission

If you intend to submit an article to Abuse, please submit your paper via the submissions form below.

Authors acknowledge that by submitting to the review process Editor-in-Chief’s reserves the right to make minor editorial adjustments to the text without referring the material back to the author. This may be done to improve such things as syntax, diction, grammar, British spelling, or referencing. The theme or intent of the article will not be changed.

Please ensure the following is closely adhered to. Any omittance may risk the article being returned:

Please submit the full article, including abstract and keywords in one document.

Please place all tables/figures in the correct location before submitting the article.

Articles should be submitted as a word document.

Please submit a separate document with all author details, corresponding authors and biography for each author. Abuse operates a double blind peer review process.

Word Count

• Each paper should between 6,000 and 8,000 words, including all tables/figures and reference list.
• Each table and/or figure is the equivalent to 300 words.

Spelling

• British spelling is required. However, please do not change the spelling in quotes.

Font, margins and spacing

• Please use Time New Roman 12pt throughout except for the abstract, which should be 11pt.
• Margins should be set to 2.5mm (1 inch) top, bottom and sides. Spacing should be set to 1.1 lines throughout with 6pt following each paragraph but no hard returns between paragraphs.
• The first line of each paragraph should be indented except where the paragraph follows a heading or subheading, or a table or a figure (please do not indent these).
• There needs to be one space between words and two spaces between sentences. Do not add spaces at the end of paragraphs.
• The text should be justified, and all dot/bullet points or numbered points need to be left justified.
• Quotations that end in full stops or are separated by commas are to be shown like this ‘This is an example.’ Or ‘This is an example,’ Note that the punctuation appears inside the quotations. Only colons and semi colons appear outside like this: ‘This is an example’: or ‘This is an example’;.

Abstract and keywords

• Include an abstract of no more than 200 words at the beginning of your article. Follow your abstract with six key words separated by commas.
• Abuse does not use running heads. Please do not insert these in your manuscript.
• Provide your name and biography in a document separate from the article. Your biography should be no more than 60 words and should include your academic credentials and institutional affiliation as well as your current research interests.
• Please ensure you remove your name and any other identifying details from the electronic version of the article.
• Submit a separate document with all author details, corresponding authors and biography for each author. Please be clear on the authorship order if more than one author.

Headings
Please use headings in your paper.

• A heading should look like this: This is an example of a heading
• A sub-heading should look like this: This is an example of a subheading
• Third level headings should look like this: This is a third level heading

There should be no use of a sub-heading beyond the third level.

Footnotes

• Abuse uses footnotes if required. Please do not use end notes.

Italics and underlining

• Please avoid underlining, use italics instead where possible.
• Italicise the name or title of newspapers, books, journals and other publications.
• Italicise foreign expressions.
• Avoid italicising for emphasis.
• Do use italics for quotations.

Quotations

• Use double quotation marks for all direct quotations and place in italics.
• Place commas and full-stops inside closing quotation marks except when a parenthetical citation immediately follows the closing quotation marks.

In-text citations

• Make in-text citations as brief as possible; only include information that is needed to identify the source, i.e. the author’s surname and page number, with no punctuation between. Where multiple works by the same author are cited, a short title (usually one word) should be added.
• When referencing quotations or citations of the text being reviewed, use page number; for example (437).

Referencing

• To achieve a consistent style across all submissions, Abuse follows the APA style referencing, we are currently utilising the 7th edition of APA.

• Please include a reference section at the end of the manuscript that includes all references cited in the text. Please do not use a Bibliography.

Figures and tables

• Please keep the inclusion of these to the minimum, each table/figure is the equivalent to 300 words.

Ensuring the correct reporting of significant and non-significant results: A mandatory requirement for paper consideration.

We are expecting all authors to upload their blinded article to Statcheck to ensure they are reporting their significant/non-significant findings correctly and to attach proof of this with their submission. This can be a simple screenshot of the outcome page, pasted into a word document. We are committed to the correct reporting of scientific results and will not accept papers for which errors are noted and have not been corrected by authors. This approach also allows authors to correct any errors prior to submission. Statcheck can be accessed via:

http://statcheck.io/