Center for Educational Psychology and Early Childhood Education (CEPECE) and Centre for Language and Literacy Education (CLLE) recently jointly held the first session of a workshop series on submitting and publishing in SSCI journals in the social sciences, drawing around 16 graduate and undergraduate participants. The event was led by Prof. Nan Zhou, Associate Professor at the Center for Educational Psychology and Early Childhood Education and Associate Editor for the SSCI journals Journal of Applied Developmental Psychology. The workshop aimed to guide students through the international academic publishing process and share practical strategies for success.
Prof. Zhou outlined the structure of editorial teams, including the roles of the chief editor, associate editors, and reviewers. He explained the main stages from submission to publication—initial screening, peer review, revision, and final decision—emphasizing that the process typically spans a long time. Drawing on his editorial experience, he also discussed decision-making procedures and common revision expectations.
Prof. Zhou advised authors to prepare complete submission packages and to cite relevant literature by potential reviewers, as editorial systems often recommend reviewers based on citation networks. He encouraged authors to identify leading scholars via Web of Science prior to submission to strengthen manuscript relevance and visibility.
Highlighting the abstract as the paper’s “advertisement,” Prof. Zhou discussed how to structure it clearly around the research gap, methodology, main findings, and implications. He emphasized strict compliance with APA 7 formatting and ethical standards, including informed consent in online research and avoidance of self-plagiarism.
Prof. Zhou concluded by encouraging participants to follow journal guidelines carefully, present figures clearly, and approach writing and revision as reflective scholarly practice. The session ended with an interactive Q&A, where participants discussed reviewer selection, handling desk rejections, and ethical approval in digital data collection.
The event provided participants with practical insights into SSCI publishing and marked the first of six workshops scheduled for this academic year.
