Submissions

Author Guidelines

Normative and style guide for submitting originals

Submission of originals

• Unpublished articles are accepted,not under review in another journal, on Communication and Journalism, in all modern Latin-derived languages and in English, both British and Anglo-American.

• To submit the article, the author(s) must register in the application and initiate a new submission. The text must strictly adhere to this template (Download). It is recommended to use LibreOffice Writer.

• A total of three files must be submitted. Firstly, two versions of the text: one that includes the name and two surnames of the author(s), their position and workplace, as well as their email address, and another anonymised version. Please ensure that all hidden data has been removed before submitting the manuscript.

• The third file must consist of a sworn declaration of authorship and originality, signed digitally by the first author of the article, along with a brief biography of each author, ranging from 3 to 4 lines. This biography should include their details, research interests, areas of expertise, academic teaching experience, and any other relevant information. The file containing the required guidelines can be downloaded via the following link (download third file).

• Publication is contingent upon acceptance by the Evaluation Committee, following a double-blind peer review process.

• It is the responsibility of the author(s) to ensure that the submission meets all the requirements set by the journal, including both the editorial line and publication guidelines. To assist with this, a checklist is provided to help verify compliance with each of the outlined criteria. Please make sure to check that all guidelines have been met (Download) (Compatible with Mac).

Presentation and structure of the manuscript

Although, by following the template, the manuscript will follow the format requested by the journal. Each of the parts to be included is detailed below:

• The first page should serve as the cover page, featuring a concise and informative title in both the original language and English, limited to a maximum of two lines. This should be followed by the author(s)' full name(s), email address(es), and affiliation(s), indicating the title of "Doctor" if applicable.

• On the same page, an abstract must be included, written in an impersonal style, not exceeding 150 words and formatted as a single paragraph. This should be followed by up to 5 keywords or short phrases that identify the content of the work for inclusion in repertoires and databases.

• Next, an English abstract should be provided, also limited to 150 words and a single paragraph, followed by a maximum of 5 keywords that match those in Spanish. The translation into English must be performed by an official translator or an expert with a high command of the language, ensuring a high linguistic standard. The use of automatic translation tools will not be accepted.

• Following this, a table of contents should be listed, enumerating each section. The table must correspond with the headings and subheadings of the text, with a maximum of three levels (1.------. 1.1.------. 1.1.1.------).

• The headings to be strictly included are the following:

1. Introduction and status of the issue: this section should cover the purpose of the study, the objectives intended to be achieved through the research, the theoretical framework, and a review of the most significant literature.

2. Methodology: you should specify the sample and sampling strategies chosen, the type of statistical analysis employed, the rationale behind these choices, and all information necessary to make this section highly precise, so that any reader can understand the development of the research.

3. Analysis and Results: the research findings will be presented using tables and figures, highlighting the most important and relevant discoveries without making value judgments and avoiding redundant data.

4. Discussion and Conclusions: without reiterating any data, this section should connect the findings with the authors' own contributions, mention the limitations of the research, prospects, and recommendations for future studies that could expand on the work, as well as linking the conclusions with the objectives of the study mentioned in the introduction.

5. Acknowledgements: this should only be included if there is any financial support or assistance. It should be stated at the end of the text of the article in the final version, while during the review process it must remain anonymised.

6. References: all bibliographic citations used in the research must be included, ensuring none are omitted and no additional uncited references are added. Both national and international references from prestigious journals will be valued, and APA 7th edition guidelines must be strictly followed (Download).

• In addition to these headings, authors may add as many headings and sub-headings as they deem appropriate, without exceeding three levels and each level must use the colour indicated in the template.

1. First level
1.1. Second level
1.1.1. Third level

• The pages following the table of contents should be dedicated to the article's main text. The length should range between 5,000 and 8,000 words, including the title, abstracts, descriptors, tables, and references.

• All visual elements other than tables, such as figures, illustrations, and graphs, should be numbered in the order of appearance and sent separately, with the sources used indicated for each one, in JPEG, PNG, TIFF, PICT, or EPS format, with a minimum resolution of 300 dots per inch (dpi). The responsibility for obtaining the necessary permissions for the reproduction of images subject to copyright lies with the author(s).

• Images in the article should be labelled using the term “Figure” (Figure 1, Figure 2, Figure 3, etc.).

• Tables should be numbered with Arabic numerals in the order in which they are mentioned in the text (Table 1, • Table 2, etc.), accompanied by a clear and precise title in the heading, and a note indicating the source. In no case will they be longer than one page vertically and their number will not exceed six between graphs and tables.

• Articles may include footnotes if absolutely necessary.

• Lists can be done either with numbers or with bullet points. Numbers should be used for sequential or chronological order and written with Arabic numerals followed by a full stop. Bullet points should be used when sequence is not relevant and should remain the same throughout the content.

• Bibliographic citations should be made within the text according to the Harvard system. Authors must ensure that all citations in the text correspond to the reference list and vice versa.

• The proposed references will include all sources cited in the text, be on a new page separate from the main text, and be alphabetically ordered following the guidelines of the 7th edition of the APA style (Download). Uppercase letters in titles should only be used for proper nouns and after a period or colon.

• Whenever documents have a DOI, it must be included in the references in the format: https://doi.org/10.xxxx/xxxxxx.

• When citing an electronic document that does not have a DOI, the URL should be included. Links should not be abbreviated, coloured, or underlined, and authors must ensure they direct correctly to the indicated site.

• The journal also accepts book reviews; in this case, the text should be between 800 and 1,200 words. You can download the full guidelines here (Download), and must adhere to this template (Download).

Writing style

• As a general rule, the basis of good Spanish will be the Diccionario de la Real Academia Española and the Diccionario Panhispánico de Dudas. Additionally, it is recommended to use a spell checker to verify the text before submitting it.

• Foreign words and the names of newspapers and magazines should be written in italics.

• The use of parentheses and brackets should follow the APA 7th edition guidelines for citations and references. In the rest of the text the grammatical rules of the Real Academia Española should be followed.

• The journal encourages the use of inclusive language in articles, adhering to the principles of gender equality, such as using generic expressions. For example, humankind instead of mankind.

• Before submitting the text, authors must ensure that they have not altered the styles of the template. The instructions to follow are:

1. Always copy and paste without formatting, then apply the formatting within the article document. (In LibreOffice Writer: Edit -> Paste Special -> Paste Unformatted Text)

2. Do not insert page breaks.

3. Do not use concatenation of blank spaces for formatting.

4. Do not use single line breaks for formatting.

5. Do not use empty paragraphs or paragraphs containing only blank spaces for formatting.

6. Do not modify the indentations, including those for bibliographic references.

Publishing standards

The journal Textual & Visual Media is inspired by the standards of conduct and good practice developed by the Committee on Publication Ethics (COPE), aimed at editors, reviewers and authors (available at http://publicationethics.org/resources/code-conduct).

Authors

• Authorship: authors should include those individuals who have made significant contributions to the design, development, and writing of the content.

• Conflict of interest: authors are required to explicitly declare that there are no conflicts of interest that could have influenced the results. They must disclose any funding from agencies and/or projects involved in the research.

• Originality: the article must be original, without including parts of other texts or previously published articles. Any plagiarism will result in the rejection of the article in question, as well as any future submissions from the author(s).

• Multiple and/or repetitive publications: submitting the same article simultaneously to two or more scientific journals is an ethically reprehensible practice.

• Sources: all sources and contributions used in the article must be properly indicated.

• Responsibility: authors accept responsibility for their texts and assume any legal consequences that may arise from their authorship.

Evaluators

• Commitment: evaluators are committed to assessing the consistency, scientific quality, rigour, and expository clarity of the text. Before accepting to review of a manuscript, evaluators must indicate whether the topic aligns with their area of expertise and disclose any potential conflicts of interest. Their report will be based on the review template provided by the journal, with appropriate comments.

• Confidentiality: each assigned manuscript must be treated as confidential. Therefore, these texts should not be discussed with others without the express consent of the editors.

• References: evaluators undertake to accurately identify and point out any essential bibliographic references missing from the text. They will also inform the editors of any similarities between the manuscript and other published articles.

• Deadlines: evaluators will issue their evaluations as promptly as possible to ensure adherence to submission and publication deadlines.

Editors

• Honesty: the editorial activities of Textual & Visual Media have no commercial or economic interests, therefore the acceptance or rejection of submitted manuscripts will be based solely on the principles of quality and rigour of their content. Editors will evaluate articles exclusively on the basis of the scientific merit of the submitted texts.

• Evaluators: the list of external evaluators will be periodically reviewed and updated. In cases where evaluations of a text are divergent, the editors commit to sending the manuscript to a third evaluator, whose decision will be final regarding the acceptance or rejection of the work.

• Confidentiality: editors ensure the confidentiality of received texts, as well as the anonymity of the authors and evaluators involved in the external review process, thereby preserving the intellectual integrity of the entire process.

• Adherence to deadlines: decisions regarding the publication of texts will be made within a timeframe that does not compromise their relevance, approximately one month for the initial acceptance or rejection of the manuscript, and an additional three months for final acceptance or rejection.

Fees

Textual & Visual Media is an open-access scientific journal that does not impose any fees or financial charges at any stage of the editorial process.

Promotion and dissemination of the article

With the aim of fostering a scientific community, one of the primary objectives of the journal, authors are required to actively participate in the dissemination of their work (and of the journal) in order to maximize the impact of both, thereby increasing citation numbers. To achieve this, they commit to promoting their article through:

1. Emails to their contact list.

2. Personal social media accounts and those of the Spanish Society of Journalism (Facebook, Instagram y Twitter).

3. Other academic social networks (ResearchGate, Academia.edu, Scielo...).

4. The institutional repository of their affiliated university.

5. Public repositories.

6. Personal or institutional websites or blogs.

7. Other platforms (Google Scholar, ORCID, ResearchID, ScopusID…).

In this regard, the impact of the scientific dissemination efforts will be considered when evaluating future submissions. Preference will be given to those with a higher citation index. Therefore, authors are strongly encouraged to actively engage in the promotion and dissemination of both their published article and the journal as a whole.