Author Guidelines

Author Guidelines for ASFI Research Journal

OBJECTIVE:

ASFI Research Journal is dedicated to publishing high-quality, original research that contributes to the advancement of knowledge within the African context. Authors are encouraged to submit manuscripts that adhere to the journal's standards of excellence, promoting scholarly discourse and contributing to the diversity of academic disciplines.

SUBMISSION PROCESS:

All manuscripts being submitted to ASFIRJ should not have been previously published or submitted for publication elsewhere except for abstracts in the proceedings of ASFI annual conference or other scientific meetings or symposia. Before initiating the submission process, authors should ensure that all submission materials have been prepared according to the specifications in the Author Guidelines. Once all materials are ready, manuscripts should be submitted online at: www.asfirj.org/submission.

Suggest Reviewers

During the submission of their manuscript, authors are requested to submit the names and email addresses of several potential reviewers. Reviewers who are colleagues, collaborators, or previous co-authors during the previous three years must not be suggested as this will constitute a potential conflict of interest. Authors should suggest reviewers from diverse expertise and attributes to ensure rigorous and balanced appraisal of their work. Suggested potential reviewers should exclude members of ASFIRJ's editorial team. Editors reserve the right whether or to invite the reviewers suggested by the authors.

Revision of Manuscripts

Revised manuscripts must be submitted via ASFIRJ submission portal. Authors must ensure that the revised manuscript adheres to ASFIRJ formats and requirements. The revised manuscript must include the following items:
(1) Responses to Reviewers’ Comments: This must include point-by-point responses to the comments and concerns raised by the reviewers, editor, and editorial office. The authors’ responses should clearly specify how they have addressed the concerns raised, including clarity on any changes made on the manuscript, tables, figures, and other parts of the manuscript.
(2) Marked Revised Manuscript: The revised main text of the manuscript should be done using the Microsoft Word’s Track Changes feature, which should show every alteration made to the manuscript. If the authors are unable to use the Microsoft Word's Track Changes feature, they should underline the texts that have been added to the manuscript and then strikethrough the texts that have been deleted. Changes made to the tables and figures should also be indicated. Authors should use a continuous line numbering throughout the Marked Manuscript.

Data Protection

The names, email addresses, affiliations, and other contact details ASFIRJ might require from submitting authors or reviewers will be used for the usual operations of the journal when necessary, sharing with relevant partners for the purpose of production and publication. ASFIRJ takes responsibility to protect all personal information and contact details collected from all users in the journal’s operation and ensures that necessary steps are taken to maintain the security, integrity, and privacy of all personal data collected and processed.

Preprint policy

ASFIRJ will consider for review and, if positively reviewed, accepts manuscripts previously published on preprint servers. Authors are also free to post the submitted version of a manuscript to a preprint server at any time during the review process. If and when the article is accepted and published in ASFIRJ, authors should update any pre-publication versions in the preprint servers with a link to the final published articles on ASFIRJ website.

Manuscript Organization

Most manuscripts submitted to ASFIRJ should be organized as follows, except where advised otherwise in each manuscript type described below.

• Manuscript Titles
• Authors
• Affiliations
• Abstract
• Introduction
• Methods (or Methods and Materials)
• Results
• Discussion
• Acknowledgments
• References
• Tables
• Figures
• Supporting Information Files are Uploaded Separately.

Manuscript Titles

Manuscript titles should be written in sentence case (only the first letter of the first word of the title, proper nouns, and other genus names should be capitalized). Authors should avoid the use of specialist abbreviations in the title if possible. For clinical trials, systematic reviews (with or without meta-analyses), the subtitle should indicate the respective study design.

Author Names and Affiliations

All authors included in any submission must meet the criteria for authorship as specified in the international authorship policy recommended by ICMJE here. All authors should have made substantial contributions to the submitted work and should be accountable for the work. According to ICMJE recommendations, authors must all four criteria as given below:

• Substantial contributions to conception and design, acquisition of data, or analysis and interpretation of data.
• Drafting the article or revising it critically for important intellectual content.
• Final approval of the version to be published.
• Agreement to be accountable for all aspects of the work in ensuring that questions related to the accuracy or integrity of any part of the work are appropriately investigated and resolved.

On the title page, write author names in the following order:

• First name
• Middle name (or initials, if used)
• Last name (surname, family name)

Names of author will be published exactly as they appear in the manuscript file. All authors should therefore ensure that names given in the manuscript files are correct. Anyone who contributed to the submitted work but do not meet the above criteria for authorship should be mentioned in the Acknowledgments.
All authors included in a submission must have an affiliation. Usually, the affiliation includes department, university, or organizational affiliation and its location, including city, and country. Authors with multiple affiliations should include them on the manuscript title page, but only the preferred or primary affiliation should be included in the manuscript submission system.

Corresponding Author

The author submitting the manuscript will be designated as the corresponding author in ASFIRJ submission system. The corresponding author will be the primary point of contact with ASFIRJ in all matters related to the submitted manuscript. He or she will be the only one among the manuscript authors who will be able to make any required changes to the manuscript during the review process. The corresponding author may wish to collate and include the ORCID ID of the authors in the manuscript file.

Changes to Authorship

Prior to submitting their manuscripts, authors should carefully check the authorship list of their manuscript and provide the complete list of authors at the time of the original submission. Any changes to the authorship list, including addition, deletion, and changes in the order of names in the authorship list must be made before the manuscript is accepted and these changes must be approved by the journal editors. If authors would like to make any of these changes, the corresponding author should send an official request in that regard to the editor.
The letter should include the following items: (a) the reason for the change in author list, and (b) written confirmation from all authors agreeing to the change.
If an author is removed or added, the removed and added authors must confirm the change. Except in exceptional circumstances, the editor will not consider any changes to the authors list after the manuscript has been accepted. In such exceptional circumstances, publication of the accepted paper will be put on hold until the editor makes a decision on the change. If the manuscript has already been published online, any requests for change in the authorship list will result in an erratum if approved by the editor.

Cover letter

Authors should note that the cover letter is usually the first part of the submitted manuscript that the editor reads and thus gives the first impression of the authors and their work. The cover letter must therefore be written with great attention. All submissions to ASFIRJ must be accompanied by a cover letter. Authors can adapt the following structure in writing their cover letter:

First paragraph:

• The title of the manuscript should be the title of the cover letter
• Give the rationale for the study and highlight the question the manuscript sought to answer

Second paragraph:

• Briefly present what was done in the study and how it was done
• Present the key results and why they are important

Third paragraph:

• Persuade the reasons why the readers of ASFIRJ should be interested in the work
• Take your cues from the journal’s aims and scope

Fourth paragraph:
All cover letters of works submitted to ASFIRJ should contain the following sentences:

• We confirm that this manuscript is original, has not been published elsewhere, and is not under consideration by another journal while being submitted to ASFIRJ.
• All authors report no conflict of interested to this submission, have read and approved the manuscript and agree with its submission to ASFIRJ.

Conflicts of Interest

All authors must disclose all financial relationships that involved the submitted work, including all sources of funding used to undertake their work, any commercial involvement that constitute a conflict of interest, any consultations, speakers' participation, stock or other equity ownership, patent arrangements, or employment. A statement of conflict of interest must be clearly stated in the manuscript file, after the Acknowledgments. It is the responsibility of the corresponding author collate each author’s statement and all authors should see and approve the complete disclosure before submission to ASFIRJ.

References

Authors are required to do due diligence to cite relevant and update-to-date references in their work.
All available references on a topic can be cited in the reference list and can include the following:
(1) published articles or manuscripts accepted for publication;
(2) papers on preprint servers that have citable DOI or preprint server’s URL.
The following sources are not accepted as references:
(1) unpublished work, including manuscripts not yet accepted in a journal;
(2) personal communications;
(3) retracted works.
The reference list must include full bibliographic details for all works cited in the work. References should be listed at the end of the manuscript and numbered in the order that they appear in the text, listing the first six authors, et al. In the text, the reference number should be cited as a superscript. Authors should not include citations in the abstracts. ASFIRJ follows the Vancouver reference style.

Tables

Tables should be placed at the end of the manuscript, after the reference list. Table titles should appear above each table with clear and descriptive information about the content of the table, usually starting with a label such as “Table 1”. In the manuscript text, tables should be cited in ascending numeric order upon first appearance (e.g., “Table 1”) immediately following the sentence or paragraph where the table is first cited. Tables can also be submitted as separate files if the authors wish to do so. Authors should place any explanatory or footnotes, and other text below the tables.

Figure captions

Any figure included in the manuscript should be placed at the end of the manuscript, immediately after the tables or reference list if tables are not included in the manuscript. Figure legends should appear below each figure with clear and descriptive information about the content of the figure. In the manuscript text, figures should be cited in ascending numeric order upon first appearance (e.g., “Figure 1”) immediately following the sentence or paragraph where the figure is first cited. Figures can also be submitted as separate files if the authors wish to do so. Any explanatory or footnotes should be placed after the figure legend.

GUIDELINES FOR SPECIFIC MANUSCRIPTS

• Original Papers
• Clinical Trials
• Editorial
• Research Letters
• Correspondences
• Reviews (Systematic Reviews and Meta-Analysis)
• Reviews (Expert Reviews)
• Protocols
• Perspectives
• Opinion
• Learning Corner
• Field Stories
• Proofs
• Appeal of Manuscript Decisions

Original Articles:

Original articles report new research findings or conceptual analyses that contribute significantly to a specific area of knowledge. These reports may include intervention or experimental studies (such as randomized trials), cohort studies, case-control studies, cross-sectional studies, surveys, cost-effectiveness analyses and decision analyses, studies of screening and diagnostic tests, and other observational studies. ASFIRJ welcomes high quality original articles from any field of research and discipline. Original submissions should comply with the following structure.
Title:The title should be informative with less than 200 characters.
Short title: Should be less than 70 characters.

ABSTRACT (structured abstract)

Methods:

• Design: Type of study
• Recruitment and data collection, including the inclusion and exclusion criteria (specifying aspects considered, e.g., study design, participants, interventions and outcomes, where appropriate) and primary data collection tool/approach employed.
• Main data analysis approaches and strategies

MAIN TEXT

Clinical Trials:

A clinical trial is any research study in which participants are prospectively assigned to one or more related interventions to evaluate the effects of the said interventions on prespecified outcomes.

Clinical trials should follow the International Committee of Medical Journal Editors (ICMJE) requirements. Clinical trials must be registered in a WHO-approved public trials registry before or at the onset of enrolment of study participants to be considered for publication. Authors should include the trial registry name, URL, and registration number at the end of the abstract of their manuscript.

Full details of clinical trial registration and the necessary requirements can be found on the International Committee of Medical Journal Editors (ICJME) website.
Please note that the aims given in the manuscript should be consistent with the aims in the clinical trial registry.

Reporting clinical trials should follow the relevant EQUATOR Network guidelines. All randomized controlled trials should include a completed CONSORT flow chart. The CONSORT checklist should be uploaded with submission as a supplementary file and TREND for non-randomized trials, and other specialized guidelines as appropriate.
The methodology section should contain details about randomization, patient and control assignments, and intervention. Primary and secondary outcome measures should be included in detail.

Editorials

ASFIRJ will publish editorials by invitation only. Editorials are commissioned by the Editorial board and after consultation with the Editors-in-Chief. Editorials
Title: Should be informative that establishes a link to the article that the Editorial is written for.
Text: Should be strictly limited to 1,000 words. There will not be any abstracts. References: Maximum 9 references are allowed.
Figures and tables: Maximum two display items, figures and/or tables. Figure legends should be concise and should not be more than 100 words.

Research Letters:

Research letters constitute novel or unexpected finding or observation or importance in a specific field and thus may have an immediate impact on the field. Research letters are considered as original papers, but are not extensive by nature to the extent of full original papers. Having said that, the review process of research letters is as rigorous as that of original paper. Research letters usually have no abstract and should begin with ‘To the Editor’. If an original paper submission is not considered significant enough to merit publication as a full article, ASFIRJ may ask authors to reformat it as a research letter. Supplementary information is not allowed for research letters.
Word count: 1,500 words
Maximum of 3 figures and/or tables
Maximum of 10 references

Correspondences:

Correspondences are letters written concerning recent publication in the journal. ASFIRJ encourages such correspondences as this enhances interactions between article authors and readers and other experts in the field. Correspondences must be received within one month of publication of the original paper. If the editor considers the correspondence acceptable, the authors of the original paper will be invited to respond, and the response will be published alongside the correspondence. ASFIRJ accepts two types of correspondence letters: (1) correspondences that concern recent papers published in ASFIRJ, and (2) correspondence that concern recent papers published in other journals other than ASFIRJ.
Word count: Not than 500 words.
Title: Have a short, relevant title that is different from the title of the original paper being discussed
Title page: Have a complete title page
References: Listed at the end of the letter with the journal article being discussed as the first reference
Graphics: Have no more than one graphic presentation (table or figure)
Begin with: "To the Editor:"

Systematic Reviews and Meta-Analysis:

ASFIRJ encourages the submission of systematic review and meta-analysis papers. Systematic reviews can be accompanied with or without meta-analyses, which is determined by the nature and homogeneity of quantitative estimates collected during the systematic review process. Systematic reviews (with or without meta-analyses) require a comprehensive systematic search of the literature undertaken in multiple databases, usually covering many years, and appraisal of the quality of included studies. Systematic reviews should address a specific question or issue that is relevant for practice or policy in relevant topic and should provide an evidence-based, balanced, and high quality review on a focused topic. Systematic reviews being submitted in ASFIRJ should be registered in appropriate platforms, e.g., PROSPERO or Open Science Framework, normally a priori before the research is conducted. Systematic reviews are published in ASFIRJ as original studies. All systematic review submissions should be accompanied by the relevant checklist, e.g., PRISMA, and follow EQUATOR Reporting Guidelines.
Title
The title should be informative with less than 120 characters. Titles should include “systematic review” if no meta-analysis was performed, but “systematic review and meta-analysis” if a systematic review was performed.
ABSTRACT
Background: Rationale for the review
Objective: Aim of the review
Methods:

• Design: Type of systematic review or meta-analysis, and methods for study appraisal (risk of bias assessment)
• Data sources and study selection: which databases were searched to identify studies
• Eligibility criteria for selecting studies: inclusion and exclusion criteria (specifying aspects considered, e.g., study design, participants, interventions and outcomes, where appropriate).

Results: Main findings
Conclusions: Main conclusions and their implications
Systematic review registration: registry and number
Maximum length: 300 words
MAIN TEXT
Introduction: Rationale, Objective(s)
Methods: Eligibility criteria, information sources, search strategy, selection process, data items, risk of bias, assessment, synthesis methods
Results: Study selection, study characteristics, risk of bias in studies, results of individual studies, results of syntheses
Discussion: Summary of key findings, strengths and limitations of the systematic review, comparison with previous studies on the topic, interpretation of the findings, implications of findings, conclusions
Maximum length: 4,500 words (excluding abstract, tables, figures, acknowledgments, references)

Review Articles:

Review articles present an update of the most recent developments in a particular field. They differ by the scope and level of analysis of the literature searches and the titles used from the systematic reviews. Although they do not usually require a rigorous literature search, they should rely on evidence and should be written by established experts in the field.
Abstract: 300 words (unstructured summary)
MAIN TEXT:
Less than 4,500 words not including abstract, figure legends and references (please supply a word count).
Additional unlimited online supporting information can be provided.
Up to 200 references in the Journal's style.
Figures and tables are important in review papers and up to 10 figures and/or tables (total) can be included in the text.

Protocols

Protocols are papers that report planned or ongoing research studies. Protocols represent a road-map document for a piece of research study and outlines the approaches authors will employ in addressing their research questions. It is nowadays common to publish study protocols prior to undertaking the research, in addition to registering them with relevant registration repositories. ASFIRJ encourages the submission of study protocols across all study types.
An important benefit of submitting a protocol, particularly at an early stage of the study, is that it provides the authors an opportunity to get feedback from peers in the topic area, which can be valuable in improving their work. Additionally, published protocols provide researchers and funders an opportunity to stay abreast with the status of studies in their field of interest. Published protocols can also help to prevent unwarranted duplication of studies, facilitate collaborations, increase transparency, help others to appreciate any deviations between the protocol and the completed study. ASFIRJ encourages the submission of protocols during early stage of the study. Protocols submitted when data collection for the study is completed will not be considered in ASFIRJ.
The EQUATOR Network (https://www.equator-network.org/) provides guidelines for structuring and reporting protocols of different study designs in the biomedical fields, which can also be adapted to other scientific fields. ASFIRJ encourages authors to follow these recommendations when drafting the protocols for their studies. We recommend that the protocol manuscripts should contain the following items:
ABSTRACT (structured abstract)
Background: Rationale for the planned or ongoing study
Objective: Aim of the study
Methods:
Design: Type of study Recruitment and data collection, including the inclusion and exclusion criteria (specifying aspects considered, e.g., study design, participants, interventions and outcomes, where appropriate) and primary data collection tool/approach employed. Main data analysis approaches and strategies
Conclusions: Main conclusions and their implications
Maximum length: 200 words.
MAIN TEXT
Introduction: What is the context, rationale, and aims of the study.
Methods: What will be done in the study, including all study procedures used, recruitment of study participants, methods of data collection, materials used in the study, statistical analyses performed, and issues of ethics.
Discussion: Potential implications of study when completed.
Maximum length: 2,000 words (excluding abstract, tables, figures, acknowledgments, references)
Keywords: up to 10, listed in alphabetical order.
Tables/Figures: up to 5 tables and/or figures.

Perspectives:

The ASFIRJ ‘Perspectives’ papers are article types that describe the author’s viewpoints in an area of scientific or research interest, from the lens of current developments, previous works, and personal experiences. They allow authors to share their perspectives and insights on various issues on a topic area, particularly within the research context in Africa. It is a place for authors to tell their story and share their perspectives for the benefits of colleagues and the larger scientific community. The content of this article type should include discussion of the prevailing (current) issues on the topic area; the advances and progresses being made on the topic area; and a persuasive and clear description and presentation of the author’s perspectives. Authors should include relevant references of previous works in the topic area. Authors can also include their own data to support their viewpoints. While the structure of ‘Perspectives’ papers are similar to the Narrative Review paper type, ‘Perspectives’ papers are usually shorter than and more often gives personal viewpoints or insights than does Narrative Reviews. On the other hand, Narrative Reviews take a comprehensive and critical survey of previous literature in the topic area. All ‘Perspectives’ papers are peer reviewed. We recommend that the ‘Perspectives’ manuscripts should contain the following items:
ABSTRACT (Unstructured abstract)
Should include the rationale for the ‘Perspectives’; the aim of the ‘Perspectives’; summary of the viewpoints shared in the ‘Perspectives’; and main conclusions and their implications
Maximum length: 250 words.
MAIN TEXT
Introduction: What is the context, rationale, and aims of the ‘Perspectives’.
Sub-sections relevant to the topic being discussed Discussion: Potential implications of the ‘Perspectives’.
Maximum length: 3,000 words (excluding abstract, tables, figures, acknowledgments, references)
Keywords: up to 10, listed in alphabetical order.
Tables/Figures: up to 3 tables and/or figures.

Opinion:

The ASFIRJ Opinion papers are short articles in which authors, in a reflective format, present their personal insights and viewpoints on recent discoveries, subjects, techniques in the scientific community in a topic area, issues in the society, particularly as they affect the African context. While the structure of the Opinion paper is similar to a ‘Perspectives’, Opinion papers are usually shorter and focused on presentation of personal viewpoints or insights rather than a reliance on previous works in the topic area. Opinion papers do not have abstracts. Authors should use sub-headings that make their presentation logical and convey the content of their message. Opinion papers have a maximum word count of 1,500 words and may contain one table and/or figure. All Opinion manuscripts are peer reviewed.

Learning Corner:

ASFI’s core mandate is capacity building - supporting African scientists in developing and sustaining their research competencies. To complement ASFI’s ongoing capacity building programs, a section of ASFIRJ is dedicated to publishing articles that have research capacity building as a focus. Such articles will be educational in scope, providing resources in their content that enable interested researchers to increase their experiences and capacities. The Learning Corner section of ASFIRJ will include articles on concepts, methodology, and tools used in specific topics or research areas. They should have abstracts of maximum 300 words. Authors should use sub-headings that make their presentation logical and convey the content of their message. Articles should have a maximum word count of 4,500 words and may contain up to 8 table and/or figure. All manuscripts submitted to the Learning Corner are peer reviewed.

Field Stories:

The scientific and research journey are full of various experiences that are encountered by scientists – whether in the wet lab, in the society, in social experiments, or in clinical theatres. Some of these experiences may be novel, surprising, exciting, strange, or even weird. Such experiences can be individual or collective. Often these experiences are not documented as part of the publishing of scientific experiments and findings. We believe that sharing such experiences to the scientific community can support active interactions, experience sharing, and learning among scientists. ASFIRJ is therefore dedicating the Field Stories section of the journal to allow authors tell the story of their experiences in the field. We would like to read the stories and what makes them novel/weird/strange experiences. Papers submitted as Field Stories do not have abstracts. Authors should use sub-headings that make their presentation logical and convey the content of their message. The papers have a maximum word count of 1,000 words and may contain one table and/or figure. Papers submitted as Field Stories are no peer reviewed.

Proofs:

After acceptance, all manuscripts undergo editorial check and proofreading to ensure that the journal standards and formatting requirements are met. We work to ensure that all articles are published on time and accurately. Once the proofs are ready, the corresponding authors will receive an e-mail with the manuscript proofs. The author-corrected proofs must be returned within 48 hours of receipt of the email. The corresponding author should use the proofs only to check the typesetting, editing, and correctness of the text, tables and figures. Substantial changes to the article as accepted for publication can only be done with the permission of the editor. Proofreading is responsibility of the authors. Therefore, corresponding authors should pay careful attention when checking the proofs before returning it to the journal, as the journal cannot guarantee any other subsequent corrections.

Appeal of Manuscript Decisions:

Authors have the right to appeal all decisions of the journal. All appeals will be reviewed by the editors and their decisions on such appeals are final. Authors appealing their decisions should submit a written appeal to the editorial office, providing detailed reasons for the appeal, plus point-by-point responses to the comments provided by the reviewers and/or editors. If the appeal is accepted, it does not mean that the paper is accepted, rather the paper will be reviewed again, either by the editorial board or sent back to the original or new peer reviewers.