Editors of ASA journals and the Rose Series submit annual reports to provide insight to sociologists. These narrative reports can be found below. This table can also be referenced for a more detailed quantitative overview of submission processes. Reports from prior years can be found here.
Annual Reports for 2020
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Journal of Health and Social Behavior |
American Sociological Review
Despite the devastating impact of Covid-19 and resulting disruptions at home and in the workplace, sociologists managed to maintain high levels of scholarly productivity in 2020. Indeed, the number of submissions to American Sociological Review actually increased compared to 2019. Thanks to the important work performed by our staff, our editorial board, and hundreds of ad hoc reviewers, we were able to maintain an efficient review process focused on providing constructive feedback to authors, and we continued to publish cutting edge articles that will shape the field for decades to come.
2020 was also a year of transition for American Sociological Review. The current editors, Indiana University’s Art Alderson and Dina Okamoto, began their term on January 1, 2021. However, they started handling new submissions on August 1, 2020, and revised and resubmitted manuscripts on November 1, 2020. The transition process went off without a hitch and the journal continues to flourish in hands of the new editorial team.
Submissions. From January 1 through December 31, 2020, American Sociological Review (ASR) received 814 submissions, an increase over the 728 submissions received in 2019. Of those, 43 were accepted unconditionally, 35 conditionally accepted, and 74 were given invitations to revise and resubmit. Given the high standards at ASR, the vast majority of papers were rejected–417 were rejected after going through the peer-review process and another 230 were desk rejected. Two papers were withdrawn by the authors and decisions had yet to be reached (as of April 1, 2021) for an additional 13 papers. Among new (first) submissions to the journal, 438 (or 66.5 percent) were sent out for peer review. Among those that underwent the peer review process, 398 (83.8 percent) were rejected outright. 64 (13.5 percent) received an invitation to revise and resubmit, and 1 papers was accepted subject to minor revisions. Among the 109 submissions that were invited revisions, the majority were either accepted subject to minor revisions (31.2 percent) or accepted outright (39.4 percent). 10 papers received a second revise and resubmit decision, and only 19 were rejected outright. As of April 1, 2021, decisions were still pending for three papers. Importantly, only one paper was rejected after a second revision. One of our important goals while editing the journal has been to eliminate scenarios where authors submit multiple revisions—especially multiple revisions that do not lead to publication.
Using the traditional ASA indicator for the acceptance rate (the number of accepted manuscripts divided by the number of overall decisions, multiplied by 100), the acceptance rate for 2020 was 5.4 percent. If we instead calculate the acceptance rate as accepted papers divided by final decisions, multiplied by 100 (as suggested by England in the March 2009 issue of Footnotes), the acceptance rate was 6.3 percent.
Focus on an Efficient and High-Quality Review Process. We continued to focus on giving authors a timely decision with quality feedback. We are grateful to our board members as well as ad hoc reviewers for making it possible for us to reach that goal. Among first submissions, the average time from submission to decision was 6 weeks. Counting only papers that went through the peer review process, the average time from submission to decision was 8.8 weeks. Papers that receive a revise and resubmit decision typically take a little bit longer since we aim to reduce the need for multiple revisions by providing extensive feedback and direction for a successful first submission. It is at this stage that our board members can be particularly helpful. But even with this extra work, the average turnaround time for papers that received a revise and resubmit decision is 11.4 weeks.
These figures remained low but the turnaround time was slightly longer than in previous years. This, we feel, is understandable in light of the new time constraints that reviewers faced during the pandemic.
Visibility of Journal Content. ASR maintains its topmost rank among general-interest sociology journals according to all well-established quantitative measures of scholarly impact available. The journal impact factor (IF) score (published by Journal Citation Reports) rose for a fourth straight year to 6.37 using citation data from papers published in 2017 and 2018. The five-year impact score rose to 8.17. This is the first time since this metric has been recorded that ASR’s impact factor has been above 6.0 (and the first time that the five-year IF has been above 8.0). ASR also ranks as the top journal in sociology according to the Google Scholar h-index, with 59 articles published between 2015 and 2019 receiving at least the same number of citations. The median number of citations received for articles in this group, referred to as the h5-median, rose to 95, the highest score that has been recorded for ASR since this measure has been kept.
Articles published in 2020 received a substantial amount of media attention, scholarly engagement and consideration by policy stakeholders outside of academia. Most notably, the October issue paper “School Outcomes of Children Raised by Same-Sex Parents: Evidence from Administrative Panel Data,” by Deni Mazrekaj, Kristof De Witte, and Sofie Cabus has received an extraordinary amount of attention having been downloaded almost 53,000 times in the last six months. The paper also received extensive coverage from countless news outlets, magazines, social media, and blogs, both in the U.S. and internationally. It has also been cited in a Belgian policy document (which will probably not be the last time). Other papers from Volume 85 have made quite a splash. Jessica Calarco’s March issue paper “Avoiding Us versus Them: How Schools’ Dependence on Privileged ‘Helicopter’ Parents Influences Enforcement of Rules” has been mentioned in news stories by multiple news outlets of national scope, including CNN and The New York Times and Slate. The paper also received quite a lot of attention on social media. Finally, Sam Friedman Aaron Reeves’s April issue paper “From Aristocratic to Ordinary: Shifting Modes of Elite Distinction,” received quite a lot of international coverage, having been profiled in The Guardian and the Daily Mail. Papers published in ASR garner attention because they focus on some of the core issues of our time, including the January issue paper by Victor Rios, Greg Prieto, and Jonathan Ibarra entitled “Mano Suave–Mano Dura: Legitimacy Policing and Latino Stop-and-Frisk,” which was featured in the “Discoveries” section of the prominent blog The Society Pages.
The ASR twitter feed following continues its impressive year-to-year growth and now has become one of the primary ways in which thousands of scholars engage with and disseminate the work published in the journal. This year the account surpassed 7,000 followers, and now stands at 7,121 (as of April 10, 2021) up from 4,657 at about the same time last year. Updates in the form of new articles coming out “Online First” on the SAGE website as well as issue publication updates get a wide amount of engagement and attention in the form of dozens (and for the most impactful articles hundreds) of “likes” and retweets.
Editorial Board and Reviewers. ASR continues to benefit from a diverse and talented editorial board. In 2020 the board had 7 deputy editors and 64 regular board members. The total editorial board (including deputy editors) includes 55.0 percent women and 7.0 percent who did not identify as men or women. Our data indicate that 42.0 percent of board members represent racial and/or ethnic minorities. We also benefited from outstanding work of our managing editor, Mara Nelson Grynaviski, and our coordinating editors and editorial assistants Emmanuel Cannady, Lindsay Heldreth, Sara Skiles, Ya Su, and Lilly Watermoon. We also enjoyed working with the Indiana University team during the transition and acknowledge the important work performed in 2020 by the new editors (Art Alderson and Dina Okamoto) as well as their team of assistants Muna Adem, Nora Weber, and Helge-Johannes Marahrens.
As always, we are extraordinarily grateful for the outstanding work of ad hoc reviewers who have impressed us with their expertise, thoroughness, and a clear desire to help authors to improve their papers, even if those papers don’t end up in the pages of ASR.
Omar Lizardo and Rory McVeigh, Editors
City & Community
Introduction
In late August 2020, CUSS announced that Dr. Richard E. Ocejo would become the new Editor of City & Community. Dr. Deirdre Oakley’s term would end on December 31, 2020, giving the incoming and outgoing editors four months to transition the journal. While this was made a bit more complicated because the journal was also transitioning from Wiley to SAGE, by and large this transition went very smoothly. Dr. Ocejo and his editorial team are now successfully running the journal and I expect some exciting new contributions and innovations.
In fall of 2020 Dr. Ocejo made a number of changes to the Editorial Board while retaining the required number of existing members to maintain knowledge and experience overlap.
Manuscript Decisions for 2020
During 2020, 11 manuscripts were accepted or 8.7 percent; and 126 were rejected or 93 percent. The total number of manuscripts received was 136, down from 176 in 2019, with the acceptance rate decreasing by 13.6 percent. Several factors contributed to these decreases. First, I announced that I would not seek another two years as editor in November 2019. To ensure that the incoming editor would not be overburdened with already accepted articles as I was at the beginning of my term, ASA limited the number of manuscripts which could be accepted in 2020. Second, because the submission rate was high, a hold was placed on processing new manuscripts other than desk rejects between January 2020 and September 2020. All revisions continued to be processed. Authors submitting articles (other than desk rejects) were informed that the reviewing process would not begin until September 2020. They were given a choice to remain in the queue or to submit to another journal.
To our surprise 64 authors decided to remain in the queue. Dr. Ocejo and I reviewed these submissions. Of these 35 were deemed desk rejects and the authors were notified. The remaining 29 were sent out for review beginning in mid-October 2020. These authors were notified that their manuscripts were being sent out for review. There was a delay from the September reopening of the review process and when reviewers began to be invited due to the transition of the journal from Wiley to SAGE. There were several glitches at the start which Karen Edwards was able to work out with SAGE and Wiley. Since September 2020 approximately 35 additional original manuscripts have been submitted and processed. While the submission rate for the latter part of 2020 was not nearly has high as it was prior to the review process hold, new manuscripts were coming in on a regular basis.
In 2020, the journal reviewed 37 manuscripts, accepting 11 and rejecting 26. An additional 89 manuscripts were rejected without review.
Estimating the Future (Ideal) Acceptance Rate
The acceptance rate of 8.7 percent for 2020 was artificially deflated. I expect it has been steadily increasing during the present 2021 volume year. During my term, the ASA Publications Committee denied the journal permanent print page increases twice. However, they did approve several temporary print page increases. We view this experience as cautionary. I certainly did not know I would receive 40 accepted but unpublished manuscripts at the beginning of my term. Both Dr. Ocejo and I are both very mindful (as is ASA Publications Department) that this situation cannot happen again.
Due to formatting differences between Wiley and SAGE, the journal will be able to publish roughly 18 percent more in its allotted 384 print pages with SAGE than it did with Wiley. Dr. Ocejo and I had a number of discussions about what would be the ideal acceptance rate for City & Community given the number of annual print pages allotted. We both agreed that it should be between 16 and 18 percent. We understand that more discussions with CUSS leadership and the ASA Publications Department are ongoing. However, we are concerned that to continue at an 8.7 percent rate is far too low and would not be advantageous for the future health of the journal.
Ten Most Downloaded City & Community Articles in 2020
I am very pleased and excited to report that of the 10 most downloaded City & Community articles for 2020, five were from the 2020 volume year and one from the 2019 volume year. Three came from our September 2020 Symposium on COVID 19 and Systemic Racism, and one from the March 2020 special issue on Small Cities, guest edited by Richard Ocejo, Ervin Kosta and Alexa Mann. This bodes well for the journal and represents the increased quality and timeliness of the articles and essays we publish, a tradition which Dr. Ocejo is carrying on.
Conclusion
2020 was a year of transitions for City & Community. While there were a few unexpected glitches, it all worked out and the journal is in good health and good hands.
Deirdre Oakley, Editor
Contemporary Sociology
Books Considered: Due to Covid-19, Contemporary Sociology office has been working remotely starting March 2020. The editorial office of Contemporary Sociology received 331 books from publishers during 2020. The total number of books that the editor examined was 500 and 331 books were requested as e-books and a total of 262 books were selected for review.
Review Process: Due to Covid-19, campus closures as well as warehouse closures and publisher policies not to send physical books, Contemporary Sociology adapted to the new realities to ensure the timely completion of book reviews. The editor goes through new books and selects the books to be reviewed. All books selected for review are sent to the editorial board for reviewer suggestions. This process occurs every two months. All suggestions are ranked and logged. Based on the suggestions and advice of the editorial board, reviews and review essays are commissioned. The journal’s managing editor copyedits and formats all the work received electronically in preparation for publication. The copyedited materials are sent to SAGE for typesetting, and several sets of proofs are corrected prior to publication.
Production Lag: Once a book is reviewed, it is processed immediately. The length of the time reviewers take to submit the reviews is the larger part of the process. This year due to Covid-19, we have had many requests for extensions and higher drop-out rates due to illness, remote learning and caregiving responsibilities. The editorial office, on average, schedules reviews, articles, and review-essays for publication within 10 weeks after the materials arrive, and after consultation with the Editorial Board to ensure the diversity of reviewers. The production lag is the time between receipt of the review and the publication date. The production lag averages 4 months.
Items Published: 224 regular reviews published in Volume 48, plus 21 review-essays on 29 books, 5 In Retrospect reviews including a Pandemic Special focusing on Pandemic-focused essays and book reviews, 3 “Briefly Noted” reviews (250-500 words), 1 comment and 2 Editorial Essays. 256 total items were published, covering a total of 262 books.
Editorial Board Members and Reviewers: In 2020, there were 39 editorial board members. The editorial board was comprised of 29 women and 8 men. This included 12 minority and 3 international editorial board members.
Yasemin Besen-Cassino, Editor
Contexts
Contexts: Sociology for the Public aims to provide rigorous, yet accessible, social science articles to represent the most innovative and cutting-edge aspects of the discipline. In this report, we outline the magazine’s accomplishments from 2020.
Narrative: Due to the COVID-19 pandemic, civil unrest, and more awareness about police brutality and systemic racism, 2020 was a difficult year for most people. Contexts Magazine aimed to help people process the pandemic by providing sociological insights on the social, cultural, economic, and health underpinnings of the effects of COVID-19. We sent out a call for papers for a special issue to address a wide range of issues of public concern related to the pandemic.
We received over 200 submissions with authors from or topics on the following countries: Australia, Austria, Bangladesh, Brazil, Canada, China, Congo, Cuba, Denmark, Ecuador, Germany, Greece, India, Ireland, Italy, Jamaica, Netherlands, Singapore, South Korea, Sweden, Taiwan, Trinidad and Tobago, Turkey, United Kingdom, Venezuela, and the United States. We published several of these articles in an online series related to the pandemic. We then published a special issue on COVID-19 in the Fall 2020 issue of the printed magazine. Our other three issues focused on indigeneity and identity, gender and sexuality, and employment and income.
By the numbers: In 2020, Contexts received 261 submissions for our feature, peer-reviewed section and accepted 29 articles, for an acceptance rate of approximately 11 percent. In the magazine, we published 4 In Brief sections, 5 Q&As, 28 Feature articles, 6 Photo Essays, 10 Book Reviews, 12 Culture articles, 8 Trends articles, 5 Policy Briefs and 5 opinion pieces (“One Thing I Know”). We also kept track of our digital footprint. Beyond publishing 60 online articles related to COVID-19, we published 22 blogs on the website that including regular author submissions (11) and pieces from the graduate student team (11).
In terms of broader impact, we had 1,315,130 page views and article downloads from the Contexts.org and SAGE sites combined. This is a roughly 31% increase from 2019.
Gratitude: We are proud of the diversity and range of perspectives of our editorial board, section editors, reviewers, and contributors. We are thankful to our section editors as well as Simone Durham, Genesis Fuentes, and Laura Wise who work as our Corresponding and Managing Editors and came onboard during a difficult time. We could not do this important work without you.
Rashawn Ray and Fabio Rojas, Editors
Journal of Health and Social Behavior
The Journal of Health and Social Behavior has long been recognized as the flagship journal of American medical sociology. In 2020, JHSB published 32 articles and four open-access policy briefs across four issues. These articles included qualitative and quantitative studies of the US and other countries. The subject matter spanned the breadth of medical sociology and intersected with mainstream sociology, public health, public policy, and other fields. For each issue’s policy brief, I selected one paper with clear policy implications and asked the author(s) to craft a one-page summary directed at policymakers, media outlets, and the general public. These briefs appear prominently in each issue of JHSB and on the journal’s home page.
Journal Operations
In 2020, I completed my first year of a three-year term as the editor of JHSB. This year, JHSB received 501 new manuscripts, a substantial increase from the submissions received in 2019 (391). After initial review by the editorial team—either by me or in consultation with a deputy editor—63.7 percent were rejected without being sent out for peer reviewer. The average time between submission and desk-rejection was 1.8 weeks. Of the 182 (36.3 percent) papers sent out for peer review, 34.5 percent received a revise and resubmit decision. Overall, the average time between initial submission and first review decision was 11.7 weeks. This review period, which is noticeably longer than the review period recorded by my predecessors, is largely explained by the fact that I was primarily responsible for editing a dramatic increase in submissions during a pandemic.
For papers that were eventually accepted, production time (i.e., the time between a paper being accepted and appearing in print in an issue) was 3.4 months, which was a modest increase from the 2.8 months under the previous editors. JHSB’s production is still superior to many other journals.
Deputy Editors, Editorial Board, Peer Reviewers, and Journal Staff
JHSB’s operation depends on more than just the efforts of the editor. It requires contributions from a large group of individuals who are deserving of thanks.
The eight Deputy Editors (Monica Casper, William Cockerham, Robert J. Johnson, Hedwig Lee, Michael McFarland, Miles Taylor, Miranda Waggoner, and Ming Wen) were invaluable resources in helping me to adjudicate difficult decisions, managing rare conflict-of-interest submissions, and providing advice on the journal’s operations. The Deputy editors also occasionally acted as the editor for manuscripts that were squarely in their area of expertise.
I was also aided by the valuable contributions of the associate editors, on whom I relied for reviews and various consultations. I am especially grateful to Terrence D. Hill for his editorial advice and frequent manuscript reviews. The complete list of editorial board members is listed on the JHSB website (https://journals.sagepub.com/editorial-board/HSB).
To create opportunities and promote diversity in our editorial board, I continued to select editorial board members based on an open call for nominations. This process reduced network-based selection bias and allowed me to recruit from a wider pool of scholars. Overall, the editorial board composition remains diverse in terms of gender (65 percent women in 2020) and race-ethnicity (31 percent racial-ethnic minorities).
JHSB values its many supportive and attentive peer reviewers. I extend my sincerest thanks to the outgoing editorial board members, the new and continuing board members, and the many ad hoc peer reviewers who have generously contributed their time and expertise to JHSB.
Finally, I want to acknowledge our talented editorial office team: Managing Editor for Reviews R. Kyle Saunders; Managing Editor for Production Ryan Trettevik; Copyeditors Andrea Polonijo and Michaela Curran; and Editorial Assistants Benjamin Dowd-Arrow and Tim Arthur.
In closing, I thank Karen Edwards and Jamie Panzarella at ASA for their invaluable assistance and our readers for their support during this unusual year.
Amy M. Burdette, Editor
Journal of World-Systems Research
Volume 26, Number 1 (Winter/Spring 2020) had three research articles on diverse topics. The research article by Kelly Austin on “Opposing Observations and the Political-Economy of Malaria Vulnerability: A Community-Based Study in Bududa, Uganda” also included a short video of the author discussing her paper and her research to connect it to current events.
Volume 26, Number 2 was a special issue on “World-Systems Analysis in the Anthropocene,” guest edited by Leslie Sklair and Michael Murphy. It compiled 10 articles discussing the anthropocene in context of world-systems analysis from a different angles within a number of different disciplines, including economics, sociology, and literature.
Also included was a three-article symposium on reparations, “Symposium: Using World History to Inform Work for Reparations.”
Jackie G. Smith, Editor
Rose Series in Sociology
The ASA Rose Series in Sociology continues to publish highly visible, accessible books that offer synthetic analyses of substantive fields in sociology, challenge prevailing paradigms, and/or offer fresh views of enduring controversies. Each manuscript is evaluated through a meticulous review process and is chosen for its quality, sophistication, and policy relevance. Only a few selected volumes are added each year. The Russell Sage Foundation continues to publish the Series and our editors work closely with RSF’s Director of Publications, Suzanne Nichols. The Rose Series and Russell Sage Foundation provide a unique opportunity for each of our contracted authors to revise and refine their work at a day-long seminar before publication.
We were pleased to have a productive year despite the constraints and pressures faced by researchers and editors during the pandemic, reviewing four new manuscript proposals in 2020. One was accepted for publication: Horatio Alger Lives in Brooklyn, But Check His Papers by Rob Smith. Professor Smith presented his work-in-progress on April 22, 2021, at his RSF seminar.
We continued to work with the authors of five additional forthcoming manuscripts. Two book projects, one by Reginald Byron and Vincent Roscigno and a second by Jennie Brand, are working towards a full manuscript by the end of the year. Robert Crosnoe and Shannon Cavanagh are working towards a full manuscript by early 2021. Veronica Terriquez is working towards a full manuscript by fall 2021. In May 2020, RSF hosted a seminar featuring Meredith Greif’s manuscript Collateral Damages: Saving and Losing the City, which was well-attended. We expect a manuscript for peer-review by spring 2021.
We are grateful for the 25 members on our 2020 editorial board and would particularly like to thank outgoing members Elizabeth Armstrong, Peter Riley Bahr, Irene Bloemraad, Susan Brown, Pawan Dhingra, Cybelle Fox, Filiz Garip, Shannon Marie Gleeson, Rosanna Hertz, Nikki Jones, and Patrick Sharkey for their service. We brought on 12 new members who started January 2021:
- Rene Almeling, Yale University
- Laura Carpenter, Vanderbilt University
- Ernesto Castañeda, American University
- Cynthia Feliciano, Washington University in St. Louis
- Kimberly Kay Hoang, University of Chicago
- Jeff Manza, New York University
- Jooyoung Lee, University of Toronto
- Brea Perry, Indiana University-Bloomington
- Francesca Polletta, University of California-Irvine
- Brian Powell, Indiana University-Bloomington
- Rubén G. Rumbaut, University of California-Irvine
- Lesley Wood, York University
The Rose Series managing editor is Kyla Bender-Baird (CUNY-The Graduate Center).
Amy Adamczyk, Richard Alba, Lynn Chancer, Nancy Foner, Phil Kasinitz, and Leslie Paik, Editors
Social Psychology Quarterly
This report covers the final full calendar year of our term as editors (i.e., the period from the end of the covered part of our 2019 report until the end of our term as editors). In this report, we reflect on the status of the journal’s operation and our final year with the journal.
Volume 83, issue 4, was our last issue as editors. It was a special issue on “Social Networks and Social Psychology,” edited by Weihua An, Matthew Brashears, and Cathryn Johnson. It contained eight original research articles, reflecting the tremendous number of submissions that were received. Prior to issue 4, the research published in Volume 83 ran the gamut, reflecting a wide range of empirical social psychological research. We remain proud of our success in attracting a diverse selection of research in social psychology.
A Strange Year. Our total number of submissions declined considerably as compared to previous years. For instance, while we received 140 submissions in the 2020 year, we received 276 in 2019. We think there are two key explanations for this substantial drop. First, COVID-19 obviously ground much of work to a halt in 2020, both directly and as a result of competition with other tasks (e.g., home schooling children, shifting in-person instruction to online with minimal warning). In addition to COVID, we expect that authors were a bit more reluctant to submit their work to us in our final year. We expect that SPQ submissions will return to normal under the new editors at the University of Georgia, and as we begin (fingers crossed!) to return to normal life.
Editorial Board. We would like to thank our editorial board members and give major kudos to our Deputy Editors who were instrumental in identifying strong scientific contributions to the field, who served as Primary Manuscript Editors for multiple manuscripts, and who acted as Editor in Chief for submissions on which the Co-Editors had conflicts of interest: Jessica Collett, Monica Kirkpatrick-Johnson, and Douglas Maynard.
We maintained a board that had a good balance of subareas and methodological approaches within social psychology. Demographically, the 2020 editorial board had 39 members (including the Deputy Editors) with 15 minority individuals, 22 women, and one gender non-conforming/non-binary scholar.
Social Media. We maintained our social media presence. We used Facebook and Twitter to promote each issue of the journal, and specifically, asked authors to provide short “hooks” for their articles’ major findings, or an interesting research question, to induce reader engagement with the journal. We also provided authors with information on how to effectively boost their social media presence through the media departments at their institutions; several of our authors were very successful at garnering attention for their research.
Impact Factor. The five-year impact factor for the journal is currently 2.65.
Editorial Statistics. As noted above, during calendar year 2020, Social Psychology Quarterly received substantially fewer submissions than in past years. From January 1 through December 31, 2019, 276 manuscripts were submitted to the journal compared to 210 in 2018, and 205 in 2017. These numbers reflect new submissions (197 in 2019), as well as revisions.
Editorial Staff. Our editorial staff has provided exceptional support throughout our term. We wish to acknowledge and thank them. Dr. Laura Aufderheide Brashears’ expertise as the managing editor ensured each manuscript was processed effectively and in a timely fashion. Additionally, Gianna Mosser, with her long-time association with the journal as our copyeditor, ensured that each manuscript was clear and accessible to our readership.
Goodbyes. At the end of the summer of 2020, we handed over the reigns of SPQ to the incoming editors, Jody Clay-Warner, Dawn Robinson, and Justine Tinkler at the University of Georgia. We cannot imagine a better team for the journal.
Matthew E. Brashears and Brent Simpson, Editors
Society and Mental Health
2020 marks the tenth anniversary of Society and Mental Health. Since its inception, SMH has published papers covering the range of subjects relevant to the study of mental illness and health from a sociological perspective, including contributions to the study of the stress process, the general and specific causes and consequences of mental health and illness, mental illness and the life course, social construction and medicalization, mental illness and marginalized groups, and important contributions to theory. In keeping with the journal’s guiding principles, SMH has also devoted space for emerging issues in the sociology of mental health and illness, as well as articles on public policy, community mental health, and mental health reform.
During 2020, SMH published 15 articles and one paper by the 2019 Leonard Pearlin Award recipient, Robin Simon.
Journal Operations
There were some major changes in the editorial team in 2020. The KSU graduate student stipend covering the managing editor position expired in May 2020. Fortunately, the former managing editor, Gale Cassidy agreed to return to the role she has held at SMH from its inception under the editorship of William Avison to Elaine Wethington’s editorship prior to my appointment (with Tim Owens as co-editor) in January 2019. SMH is very fortunate to have such an experienced and able managing editor. As co-editors, Dr. Owens and I also appreciated the generosity of KSU in providing the funds which allowed us to offer valuable work experience to Leslie Wood, who did an outstanding job as managing editor. The SMH co-editor, Timothy Owens, resigned August 19, 2020. I continued in my second year as editor, with my term ending December 31, 2021.
In 2020, SMH received 170 new manuscripts, a significant increase from the 98 new manuscripts received in 2019. Of these, 120 (71 percent) were rejected without further review. Desk rejected decision time in 2020 averaged less than one week, compared with an average of four weeks in 2019.
Of the 50 papers sent out for peer review, 16 (32 percent) received an invitation to revise and resubmit and two (2) were accepted with minor changes. Of the peer-reviewed papers in 2020, 32 (64 percent) were rejected after receiving reviews. The average time to a decision for peer-reviewed papers was eight weeks in 2020, compared with over eleven weeks in 2019.
For papers accepted, production lag time is high (14.8 months) but has declined since the change in editorship in 2019. A considerable backlog representing 682 journal pages when the editorship transitioned has been an ongoing challenge but will be considerably reduced when the journal leadership is passed to the incoming editors, Alex Bierman and Scott Schieman, in January 2022.
Deputy Editors, Editorial Board, Peer Reviewers, and Journal Staff
The successful management of SMH depends on the work of many colleagues to whom I am most grateful. This includes the three Deputy Editors, Holly Foster, Eric Wright, and Chloe Bird and the invaluable contributions of the associate editors. The following associate editors ended their term on December 31, 2020: Kenneth Ferraro, Bridget Goosby, Janet Hankin, Stephani Hatch, Pamela Braboy Jackson, Robert J. Johnson, Verna M. Keith, Fred E. Markowitz, Sigrun Olafsdottir, Eliza K. Pavalko, Break Louise Perry, John Taylor, Robert Joseph Taylor, Kristen Turney, and David Warner. I am particularly appreciative of many of the individuals on this list who served years beyond the usual three-year term.
Incoming on the SMH board for January 1, 2021 are: Owen Whooley, David Takeuchi, Stacy De Coster, Sirry Alang, Karen Van Gundy, Deniz Yucel, and Sarah Burgard. Michael Hughes has also agreed to join the SMH board January 1, 2022. The SMH board is diverse, with 62 percent women and 32 percent men, and with 22 percent of the board representing ethnic minorities. This compares favorably with the 2019 board which was similar with respect to gender but with fewer ethnic minority members (<10 percent).
SMH also depends on a wide range of ad hoc reviewers who provide invaluable input. Without their assistance we would not have been able to advance the mission of SMH and publish the wide range of scholarship that reflects the diversity of scholarship on the sociology of mental health and illness. As the journal of the ASA Section on the Sociology of Mental Health, the editor of SMH works closely with the section leadership. I would particularly like to thank the 2020 section Chair, Pamela Braboy Jackson and the section Chair of the Publications Committee, Ning Hsieh for their advice and support during 2020.
I would also like to thank members of the SAGE production team including Peter Geraghty (Project Editor), Lauren Wilhelm (Production Editor), and Neha Jaiswal (Senior Project Editor). Finally, Karen Gray Edwards (ASA Director of Publications) with her many years of experience provided invaluable advice and assistance in 2020.
Susan Roxburgh, Editor
Sociological Methodology
The year 2020 marked the first full year for Sociological Methodology co-editors David Melamed and Mike Vuolo, located at the Ohio State University in Columbus, OH. Editors Melamed and Vuolo work alongside continuing managing editor Lisa Savage.
Volume 50 came out in Fall 2020 as intended. This is the final annual volume format for the journal. Beginning with Volume 51, the journal will transition to a bi-annual format, in line with other ASA journals. Volume 50 included a Symposium on Intergenerational Income Transmission, with two main papers and one comment and reply. In addition, the volume included three papers on methods for analyzing social network data, two papers on longitudinal methods and measurement, and one paper on treatment effects in the presence of self-selection. The editors’ prologue contains a brief overview of the articles in the volume, and includes an explanation for the shift to the multiple issue format and a sendoff to the annual volume format.
In addition to the shift to multiple issues per year, the editors made save other noteworthy changes. SM started social media accounts, which was new for the journal, in order to maximize reach and promote groundbreaking methodology. The journal also now has a short format article type. The philosophy of this submission type is that some important advancements in methodology do not require a full article to describe. Finally, the journal made substantial efforts to diversify the editorial board in terms of methodological approaches. The editors want SM to reflect the varying approaches to sociological research represented in the discipline and encourage submissions regardless of approach.
For the entire year of 2020, 66 manuscripts were considered, 49 of which were new submissions, and 17 were resubmissions. Of the 49 new submissions, 13 were rejected without peer review and 36 were placed into the review process. Of the 36 manuscripts reviewed, 21 were rejected and 12 were invited to resubmit a revised manuscript (2 were accepted subject to minor changes and 1 is still pending).
The acceptance rate based on all the submissions and resubmissions in 2020 was 24.2 percent. The average number of weeks to decision was 8.1, ranging from 1.0 weeks for papers rejected without peer review, to 10.2 weeks for papers rejected after review, to 11.6 weeks for papers invited to revise and resubmit, and an average of 10.6 weeks for papers accepted subject to minor changes.
Sociological Methodology continues to benefit from the ease of the ScholarOne online manuscript tracking system for all new and revised submissions. We currently have a relatively healthy flow of new and revised submissions.
Issue 1 of Volume 51 came out in February 2021 as first issue in the biannual format. In preparation for Volume 51(2), almost all of the manuscripts are in copyediting or production.
David Melamed and Mike Vuolo, Editors
Sociological Theory
We received 145 new submissions last year, and the general quality of the manuscripts coming in remained as high as ever. Across the four issues of 2020, we published, all in all, 17 outstanding papers.
As readers of these annual Editorial Reports know, one of my signature initiatives as editor was to encourage the publishing of papers of widely varying lengths. It’s been difficult to get authors to think in terms of writing shorter papers, even when their ideas and arguments clearly were best-suited for the short paper format. But some authors really took to the idea, and three of the papers we published in 2020—around 18 percent—were approximately 15 pages in length or shorter. Several longer ones came out, too, around in the 30 pages range, with the rest at standard length.
I wrote last year that, “in the future, this journal may need if anything to redouble its efforts to encourage authors to be concise—we want authors’ strongest ideas in the most streamlined fashion possible—even as it also continues to publish longer pieces as warranted.” This continues to hold true. There is no intellectually defensible reason why every paper has to be 20-25 pages long, and if we are to deal successfully with the increase we’ve been seeing in annual submissions, it’ll be especially important for us to make sure that papers that call for a shorter format be edited down and made more pointed and brief.
We continued in 2020 to publish Lewis Coser Award Lectures, another of my signature innovations. The Lewis Coser Award is given annually by the ASA Theory section to scholars deemed to have made outstanding contributions to theoretical agenda-setting in the discipline. Each award winner delivers a lecture at the annual conference of the ASA. Since I became editor, we have been publishing (with peer review) papers based on these annual lectures. The papers present core ideas and insights of leading theorists in sociology, and their publication has been well received by the sociological theory community.
During my years as editor, I’ve been concerned to publish papers in ST that reflect the full range of concerns of the ASA’s diverse membership. This has continued in 2020, with the publication of several papers on race and ethnicity as well as nation and empire. At the same time, we have continued to publish work across the many other areas of interest in present-day sociological theory, from the study of interaction-order dynamics to behavior economics, to work on cultural trauma, theories of hegemonic masculinity, the concept of commodity fetishism, expectation states theory, and the comparison and testing of different theoretical perspectives.
Meanwhile, the composition of our editorial board has continued to include a significant number of scholars of color (35 percent, a bit of a dip from earlier years but easily rectified) and a large proportion of women scholars (54 percent).
Nothing has delighted me more during my five years as editor than working with the outstanding editorial board members who have so graciously agreed to join the team and who have contributed so much to the decision-making process. My heartfelt gratitude to all of you. The journal has done well over the years, and in huge part that’s thanks to you.
In addition, many sociologists around the country and, indeed, throughout the world have reviewed papers for us in timely fashion and with great thoughtfulness and insight. They didn’t have to do it, and certainly paper reviewing is a time-consuming task. I am grateful to all these reviewers as well.
Every year I search for new ways to thank our managing editor, Joe Wiebe, for all his hard work and support. I can’t thank him enough. He’s been the managing editor of ST during two full editorships now—a 10-year run. Nobody is a better managing editor than Joe, and I am tremendously appreciative of everything he’s given to the journal over the years. ST remains in excellent hands with Joe continuing to serve in the role.
Finally, many thanks to Karen Edwards for all her help before and during my editorship. What a pleasure it’s been working with her. And so much fun.
Iddo Tavory is going to do an outstanding job as the new editor of ST. I wish him the very best. As I’m sure he’s learned already, it’s a difficult job but an immensely rewarding one. Good luck to you, Iddo—and a wistful farewell to ST!
Mustafa Emirbayer, Editor
Sociology of Education
Despite a pandemic, overall, the journal has been quite healthy. We continue to attract a diverse scholarship, attentive reviewers and have published work by a breadth of scholars. We want to thank all contributors and reviewers for their hard work during this year in the midst of challenging times.
Few other sub-areas of the discipline can match the breadth of sociology of education’s substantive areas, the diversity of its theoretical perspectives, or the variety of its high-quality methodological approaches. I have been pleased with our ability to showcase scholarship that is both quantitative and qualitative, international in nature, and related to current U.S. policy issues. My goal is that journal continue expand this research mission, engaging with educational issues broadly not just the sociology of schools.
Manuscript Flow: This report covers the manuscript activity of the journal from January 1, 2020, through December 31, 2020. As shown in the table below, we continue to receive a high number of manuscript submissions. This year, we received 256 original submissions and 22 revised submissions. The time from submission to decision has remained steady about 7 weeks.
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New Manuscripts |
Revised Manuscripts |
Weeks from Submission to Decision |
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|
|
|
|
|
|
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|
2012 2013 |
179 195 |
17 30 |
12 8 |
|
2014 |
211 |
34 |
5 |
|
2015 |
214 |
38 |
5 |
|
2016 |
237 |
32 |
5.5 |
|
2017 2018 |
195 264 |
44 50 |
9.2 9.0 |
|
2019 |
253 |
55 |
6.7 |
| 2020 | 256 | 22 | 7.3 |
The overall acceptance rate for SOE—the number of unconditionally accepted articles in 2020 (11) divided by the number of final decisions (252, which excludes “revise and resubmit” decisions)—was 4.3 percent. Among revised manuscripts, 95 percent were ultimately accepted. However, you calculate it, SOE’s acceptance rate remained low in 2020. However, we were able to acquire more pages and publish more articles per year. As a result, we have dealt with our backlog of manuscripts. Because we dealt with the backlog, we were able to increase our Revise and Resubmit rate in 2020 to 13.7 percent of new manuscripts from 5.7 percent in 2019. This will help increase the overall acceptance rate moving forward. SOE continues to get more than 200 new submissions a year but we feel that by acquiring more pages, we now have the structure in place to work to address the low acceptance rates we experienced in 2019 and 2020.
During 2020 the time from manuscript submission to the delivery of a decision email averaged approximately 7.0 weeks. This is fairly consistent with our timeframe in 2019. We really want to thank reviewers for their hard work in returning reviews on time during the pandemic. Our ability to keep timeframe for reviews at less than 2 months also reflects the work our editorial team has implemented to streamline the review process while not compromising the editorial review process. Our production lag (the time it takes for an accepted manuscript to actually appear in the journal) was 9.5 months in 2020. This was because of our backlog and this time will go down substantially for 2021 and beyond. We were able to put manuscripts online prior to their publication in a print issue.
Editorial Team: Thad Domina, Karoyln Tyson, and Jennifer C. Lee make a great editorial team as deputy editors. I couldn’t be more grateful. I have relied on each of them to advise on tough decisions, review in their area of expertise, and take manuscripts in which I had a conflict. I continue to provide the deputy editors with a report after each issue is finalized. This report outlines the manuscripts submitted by gender, rank, and methodological type. This report and their feedback at each issue has created consistent dialogue and feedback. They have been the strength of the journal.
I have also leaned heavily on SOE’s fantastic Editorial Board. My managing editor helps identify editorial board members to select for reviewers for each manuscript. I want to first thank the following outgoing members of the Editorial Board: Jeremy Fiel, Glenda Flores-Gonzalez, Lingxin Hao, Brandon Jackson, Mads Meier Jaeger, David Monaghan, Edward Morris, Hiroshi Ono, and Melissa Wooten.
I also appreciate the efforts of continuing Board members: Janice Aurini, Pamela Bennett, Steven Brint, Stephanie Conizales, Sean Corcoran, Patrick Denice, Linsey Nicole Edwards, Pat Rubio Goldsmith, Andrew Halpern-Manners, Amy Gill Lagenkamp, Yader Lanuza, Elizabeth Lee, Ann Owens, Emily Penner, Meredith Phillips, Natasha Quadlin, Douglas David Ready, Salvatore Saporito, Carolyn Sattin-Bajaj, Lauren Schudde, and April Sutton.
Finally, SOE welcomes several new members to the Board in 2020: Chase Billingham, ChangHwan Kim, Dennis Condron, Jordan Conwell, Renee Depalma Ungaro, Liliana Garces, Odis Johnson, Ranita Ray, and Kelly Welch.
In all, the Board includes 18 women, 16 men, and 12 minorities.
Finally, and perhaps most importantly: My Managing Editor, Amy Petts, has been an asset to the journal. I was pleased to have her on the team to help reduce the time to decision and add intellectually to the journal. Sherry Ye, and undergraduate at Purdue has continued to help grow the journal’s social media presence.
Reviewers and Reviewing: I sincerely thank the nearly 300 (it was 299) people who reviewed for SOE in 2020. As the number of submissions has grown, so too has our reviewer pool. The pool of reviewers is international, disciplinary diverse (schools of education, sociology, policy, etc.), and methodologically sophisticated. The average reviewer took 28 days with a minimum of 1 days and maximum of 109 among those who completed their reviews. I used two reviews to make decisions at times, rather than our typical three, to increase the speed of decision when it would not disrupt the intellectual process. I have been impressed with the speed at which reviewers (largely) respond and provide consistent and insightful reviews. The notes to me are often very helpful. I also would like to note that reviewers are critical but not callous. This helps the review process for the authors to revise and for me to make decisions.
Finally, I will continue the tradition and acknowledge five exceptional reviewers to whom we will give the “Revise and Resubmit” (Reviewer of the Year) Awards in August 2021.
This is my last year at SOE. I have been humbled and honored to serve the sociology of education intellectual community. The journal’s impact factor has increased over the last five years due to the amazing intellectual work of our authors. I am proud to have been able to help shepherd their amazing work forward. I am excited for the next phase in the journal too. I sincerely welcome John Diamond and Odis Johnson as then new editors. I look forward to working with them during the transition period July 1 to December 31.
Despite the uncertain in our world right now, SOE has been a steadfast for many. Reviewers have been kind to continue agreeing to review and authors are still submitting work. I hope the scientific community continues to increase our knowledge on educational issues as best we can during this time.
SOE welcomes submissions from across the broad substantive concerns of the field and is receptive to a wide array of theoretical perspectives and methodological approaches. Send your education-related manuscripts to SOE, and have your colleagues do the same.
Linda Renzulli, Editor
Sociology of Race and Ethnicity
Manuscript Submissions
We received over 240 submissions in 2020—our second year in a row of breaking previous records, and, indeed, 2020 submission numbers represent our highest number of submissions ever. This is up from 215 in 2019 and follows similar numbers seen in recent years (e.g., 208 in 2018 and 210 in 2017). The vast majority of these were original research manuscripts. SRE also publishes manuscripts within our peer-reviewed Pedagogy Section (edited by Hephzibah Strmic-Pawl) as well as individual and thematic Book Reviews (edited by Steve Garner). As mentioned above, we received thirteen (13) Pedagogy submissions in 2020 and Hepzibah Strmic-Pawl accepted three (3) of these.
In 2019 we achieved a 10.6 percent acceptance rate, the lowest ever, and we are extremely proud of this accomplishment, as we had been working toward it since the beginning—and particularly in the last year and some. This acceptance rate was almost half of 2018’s 21 percent, and the lowest SRE had ever achieved (our previous lowest ever rate of 19.9 percent was in 2016). By the end of the 2020 submission year, of the 186 final decisions that were made on both original and pedagogy submissions, twenty-nine (29) of these were Accept decisions, for a 11.3 percent acceptance rate, slightly up from 2019’s lowest ever rate. Despite this slight increase, we are working hard to maintain an acceptance rate at around the 11 percent level—in order to ideally hand off the journal to incoming co-editors James Michael Thomas and Brian Foster of the University of Mississippi at the end of 2021 with hopefully no more than two (2) issues worth of backlogged acceptances.
One of the key elements of any successful peer-reviewed journal is finding, securing, managing, and interpreting the peer reviews of submitted manuscripts. As of December 31, 2020, some 381 peer reviews were completed at SRE. In 2020 completion of reviews averaged 6.0 weeks for submitted manuscripts. Once these reviews were received, each of us (Brunsma or Embrick) rendered a decision. The average length of time from submission to first decision in 2020 was 11.7 weeks from original submission to a final decision. We are still working to decrease these times under review
It is also important to note that, as decided by SREM Publications Committee at ASA 2019, we sent all of our decisions to all reviewers beginning September 1, 2019; thus, 2020 represented the first full calendar year of this practice. We have had no repercussions here whatsoever and are proud to have this part of the SRE manuscript processing going forward as it enhances transparency and serves an important pedagogical function for the discipline.
International Recognition and Submissions
The creation of SRE was one that included its prominence as an international journal, both in terms of visibility and submissions from international scholars and/or with substantive international foci. In 2020 we had 49 such submissions (26.3 percent). This represents a significant increase from previous years (e.g., in 2019 we had 27 such submissions or 14.51 percent of total submissions), of which three were accepted for publication. This is one of the issues that SREM Publications has desired more attention—we believe, again, that the Impact Factor that was finally published for SRE in June of 2020 is already having an effect on the legibility of SRE as a potential outlet for international scholars and/or global sociologies of race and ethnicity.
The Impact Factor
This year, SAGE applied for the Impact Factor, having the required five years of data, and, to everyone’s delight and amazement our inaugural Impact Factor came in at 1.972 with a 5-year Impact Factor of 2.766! This is truly an amazing achievement—one that the entire SRE team, SREM Publications, and all of SREM should be deeply proud of. This was the shining moment of an otherwise difficult year of pandemic and systemic racism reckonings.
Editorial Board
Our editorial board is comprised of 18 Men (29 percent), 34 Women (55 percent), and 10 people who identify as gender nonconforming/Other/Unknown (17 percent). Our editorial board is also comprised of 27 scholars of color (54 percent).
David Brunsma and David Embrick, Editors
Socius
Review Process: Socius, an open access journal, is an outlet for innovative, rigorously-reviewed scholarship that spans sociology subfields and provides free and rapid access to users across the world. We aim to publish high-quality, peer-reviewed research online.
Socius received 295 total manuscripts in calendar year 2020. Of the 209 new submissions, we desk-rejected 66. Of the 143 reviewed new submissions, we accepted 3, offered 41 minor and 56 major revisions, and outright rejected 43. Our desk reject rate is higher than many print journals; however, two important objectives for Socius are a quick turnaround (from submission to publication) and limited rounds of revision – almost all of our revisions are subject to a single round. Both of these goals are intended to respect the time of authors and reviewers, to move promising papers through the review process more efficiently, and to avoid spending inordinate reviewer and editor time on manuscripts that are unlikely to be published. We have been very successful at this goal. The table below lists the time in review for each paper for all submitted manuscripts.
| Decision | Review Time |
|---|---|
| Accepted | 1.7 weeks |
| Revise and resubmit (minor) | 5.9 weeks |
| Revise and resubmit (major) | 6.9 weeks |
| Rejected immediately | 2.0 weeks |
| Rejected after review | 5.2 weeks |
We continue to work closely with reviewers to convey that our review process is intended to be slightly different from the traditional process: although we seek to review manuscripts thoroughly and with high standards, continuing to turn papers around quickly requires that reviewers complete reviews more efficiently than has become the case at many other journals. To accomplish this, we send potential reviewers a detailed invitation including information on our goals and evaluation criteria. We explain that we will not forward papers to be reviewed if the work is obviously not up to current social science standards of writing or analysis; we prefer short, clear evaluations of papers rather than development review; and we seek clear recommendations to authors and editors. We also explain that we use four criteria for review: accuracy, novelty, interest, and presentation (i.e., quality of writing and organizing). We have been pleased that our reviewers followed these guidelines and offered timely, high-quality, focused reviews.
The online format in which Socius is published means that papers are also not restricted by print page limits or traditional manuscript format. We can, for example, easily accommodate papers that do not follow the traditional structure (introduction, theory, methods, etc.), include multiple color figures, have various linked appendices, etc.
Visibility and Successes: We have continued to attract and publish high-quality papers and have provided authors and reviewers a straightforward publication experience. We have also continued to work with ASA media relations staff to publicize the journal and published articles. We note that Socius had the highest number of articles (7) with at least 10,000 downloads from the thirteen ASA journals in 2020 (17 total).
We have continued to build our special collection of Data Visualizations. During the past year we have published 14 visualizations. Our goal is to represent the growing field of visual social science and to give authors an opportunity to display important sociological findings in a creative, efficient, visual formation. We recommend that visualization submissions should include two parts. The main article will be a single figure (i.e. something that could be viewed on a single screen/page) and approximately 500 words (excluding caption and references) of expository text that highlights what is interesting and important about the figure. In addition, we recommend that authors should include a supplementary information file that contains details about the data and methods used to generate the figure.
During the past year the relatively quick publication process that is at the heart of Socius as well as the open science model up on which Socius rests have proved particularly important in disseminating timely information about how the pandemic and other major events shaping the moment, like the Black Lives Matter protests, renewed attention to racial violence, and the 2020 presidential election both reflected and reshaped the social world. We have collected COVID-19 related articles and data visualizations under a special collection featuring 24 articles to date.
Range of Submissions: The topics of manuscripts submitted to Socius has been wide-ranging reflecting the diverse ideas and issues studied by sociologists. We have received papers from nearly all sociological subfields and using various forms of argument and analysis. We hope that this substantive diversity continues to expand and encourage submissions drawn from the wide range of available sociological tools and topics.
Editorial Board, Reviewers, and Staff: We have a strong and diverse editorial board, and the journal has been well-received by reviewers as well allowing us to attract a strong pool. Having a three editor model has allowed us to expand and diversify our editorial board in terms of expertise, methodological approach and representation. Our board is more equitably gendered than it has been historically. We will continue to diversify the board across a range of measures. The Socius staff is fairly lean. We have three Editorial Associates, graduate students who give papers a first read, help to decide whether to review or desk reject papers, and identify possible reviewers as well as a Managing Editor who oversees the day to day operations of Socius.
Challenges: Of course, we still face important challenges. This past year, like many journals, our review process understandably slowed down somewhat as the editorial team, authors, and reviewers adjusted to new social conditions. Thanks to the hard work of reviewers and the editorial board this effect has been relatively modest. An ongoing challenge we have been working with is the impression that Socius is primarily a venue for quantitative, not qualitative papers. We are also hoping to expand comment sections and make it easier for authors to add supplementary material – all things that can be done in different scales and timeframes than is traditional. Finally, we are also exploring ways to simplify the manuscript submission process in Manuscript Central and to encourage more of our authors to share data and code used in analysis.
Aaron Gullickson, Ryan Light, and C.J. Pascoe, editors
Teaching Sociology
Teaching Sociology continues to be at the forefront of the scholarship of teaching and learning (SoTL) in sociology. We have extended our reach within the broader SoTL field by offering a total of 13 virtual webinars to raise awareness about publications in Teaching Sociology over the past year. These webinars were attended by over 650 individuals including editors of other notable SoTL publications, directors of centers for faculty development, and faculty of all ranks from graduate students to professor emeriti representing all institution types. Teaching Sociology was recognized in a conversation published in The Wabash Center Journal on Teaching in 2020 as a well-established journal which is consistently good with high quality scholarship.
Under the editorship of Michele Lee Kozimor and with deputy editor Barbara Prince, Teaching Sociology Volume 48 (2020) published 58 works, including conversations (2), articles (13), notes (5), as well as book, film, and podcast reviews (38).
The Teaching Sociology editorial team continues to work with the editorial team of the Teaching Resources and Innovations Library for Sociology (TRAILS) to create linkages between these two resources. Searches performed in TRAILS identify Teaching Sociology citations. A reciprocal arrangement began in Summer 2017, with citations for new TRAILS resources published in one-two page promotions in each issue of Teaching Sociology as an ongoing practice.
Manuscript Flow. In 2020, excluding reviews, 91 manuscripts were received (53 new manuscripts and 38 revised manuscripts). This total of manuscripts received does not include submissions to the guest edited special issue Teaching Sexualities. This volume is higher than the previous two years. For new submissions, 11.3 percent were rejected without peer review. Many rejections (40 percent) were accompanied with guidance from the editor to encourage future submission of a manuscript that would have greater prospects of receiving favorable reviews, often requiring new data collection or more rigorous assessment efforts. Of those manuscripts sent for peer review, 0 percent were accepted unconditionally, 25.5 percent were accepted conditional on minor changes, 42.6 percent rejected but invited to revise and resubmit, and 31.9 percent were rejected outright. Most manuscripts that were revised (97 percent) ultimately moved on a path toward publication after the first revision as either accepted or conditionally accepted. These statistics on acceptance and revision decisions are comparable to recent previous years.
The volume of submissions in 2020 was slightly higher than in previous years which is a remarkable accomplishment due to the recognized impact of COVID-19 on teaching loads and expectations. We hope to see this trend continue as more Teaching Sociology virtual webinars are planned for 2021 and we continue to hold workshops at national, regional, and local sociology meetings including the Alpha Kappa Delta Teaching and Learning Workshop Series.
Despite a wonderful set of reviewers and strong commitment from members of the editorial board, the COVID-19 pandemic had a significant effect on the mean time from submission to decision for 2020. The mean time from submission to first decision of all manuscripts submitted in 2020 was 57 days (8 weeks) with revised manuscripts just over 4 weeks. For new manuscripts that were rejected without peer review, decisions occurred within 6 days of receipt.
Editorial Board. There were 41 members on the Editorial Board comprised of 54 percent women, 39 percent men, 7 percent genderqueer/gender-nonconforming/other, and 22 percent were minorities. Individual members of the editorial board commonly performed 3-4 reviews in 2020.
The editor expresses gratitude to the American Sociological Association for its continued support of her work and the journal.
Michele Lee Kozimor, Editor
[email protected]
