Journal of Brain, Mind and Society

These guidelines explain how to prepare a manuscript for Journal of Brain, Mind and Society, the journal of the Masthishkam Foundation. Read them alongside the Aims and Scope and Journal Policies.

Submission of Manuscripts

Submit through the journal’s online submission system. The corresponding author should provide the manuscript files and declarations on behalf of all authors. For a presubmission enquiry, send the proposed title, article type and a short outline to pravin@indiabrainforum.org. An encouraging response or an invitation does not guarantee acceptance.

Article Types and Word Limits

 

Main-text limits exclude the abstract, references, tables, figure legends and supplementary material. Editors may allow a justified exception. Use only the tables, figures and references needed to support the paper. Student and early-career authors are welcome under the same article categories and assessment standards.

Manuscript Preparation

Submit an editable Word manuscript, a separate title page, and separate figure files. Use a readable 12-point font, double line spacing and margins of at least 2.5 cm. Number pages and lines continuously. Use British or American English consistently and explain specialist terms for readers outside your discipline.

Arrange the manuscript as title, abstract, four to six keywords, main text, declarations, acknowledgements, references, tables and figure legends. Include an abstract and keywords when required for the article type. Define abbreviations at first use and use SI units where applicable. Identify supplementary files in the text.

Cover Letter

Explain the question addressed, the main contribution and its relevance to Journal of Brain, Mind and Society. State the article type and confirm that all authors approve the submission and that the manuscript is not under consideration elsewhere. Disclose preprints, related publications and overlapping datasets. Explain any requested exception to the guidelines and any circumstances requiring an independent handling editor.

Title Page

·       Full manuscript title and article type; a short running title if helpful.

·       Each author’s full name, institutional affiliation and country; ORCID identifiers where available.

·       The corresponding author’s name, institutional or postal address and email address.

·       Separate abstract and main-text word counts, and the numbers of tables, figures and supplementary files.

·       Funding, competing interests and any journal or IBF roles held by the authors.

Abstract and Keywords

For original research, use Background, Methods, Results and Conclusions. Describe the design and principal findings, including numerical results and uncertainty where relevant. Systematic and scoping reviews should summarise the question, search and selection methods, findings and conclusions.

Conceptual papers, critical reviews, policy analyses and perspectives may use an unstructured abstract that states the problem, approach, central argument and implications. Consensus papers should identify how agreement was reached. Avoid citations and unexplained abbreviations. Select four to six searchable keywords; use recognised subject terms where appropriate.

Main Text

Original Research and Methods

Describe the question, study design, setting, participants or materials, procedures and analysis. Explain sampling, sample-size reasoning, exclusions, missing data and departures from the protocol. Report effect sizes and uncertainty where appropriate. Distinguish planned analyses from exploratory work. Discuss limitations and the populations or settings to which the findings may apply. Methods papers should demonstrate usefulness, validation and reproducibility.

Systematic and Scoping Reviews

Describe the protocol or registration, eligibility criteria, information sources, search dates, complete search strategies and study-selection process. Explain extraction, appraisal and synthesis methods appropriate to the review. Include a selection flow diagram and identify the limits of the evidence. Explain any decision not to appraise study quality.

Critical Reviews and Conceptual Analyses

Define the problem and key concepts, explain the selection of literature and develop a clear argument. Address substantial alternative explanations or objections. A critical review should explain how evidence was evaluated; a conceptual paper should make its assumptions and reasoning open to scrutiny.

Policy Analyses and Consensus Papers

Identify the policy question, jurisdiction and date of the information considered. Describe evidence selection, affected groups, available options, implementation requirements, costs and distributional consequences where relevant. Distinguish current law or policy from recommendations. Consensus papers should report participant selection, conflicts, evidence review, the agreement process and any unresolved disagreement.

Perspectives Editorials and Correspondence

Present a focused argument with appropriate evidence. Correspondence about a published article should identify that article and address its content. Claims involving new research require enough methodological detail for assessment. Editors may request submission under a research category.

Reporting Standards

Use the current reporting guideline appropriate to the study and provide its checklist where applicable. The EQUATOR Network helps authors identify suitable guidance. A completed checklist supports reporting; it does not establish study quality.

 

Use relevant extensions for AI, prediction models or other specialist designs. Educational, legal, philosophical and humanities papers should follow suitable disciplinary conventions and explain their approach. Measures of cognition, wellbeing, flourishing or brain capital should define the construct and address validity across the languages, cultures and populations studied.

Tables Figures and Images

Provide tables as editable text, number them in order of citation and give each a concise title. Explain abbreviations and statistical notation in footnotes. Avoid presenting the same results repeatedly in text, tables and figures.

Upload figures separately, preferably as TIFF, PNG, JPEG or an appropriate vector format. Supply photographs at about 300 dpi at their intended publication size and line drawings in vector format where possible. Labels must remain readable after reduction. Provide descriptive legends and brief alternative text for accessibility. Obtain permission for reused material when required and identify its source and licence. Image adjustments must not misrepresent the underlying data.

References

At first submission, any consistent reference style is acceptable. Cite sources accurately and provide complete bibliographic details, with DOIs or stable links where available. Include primary research and authoritative policy or legal sources when they support the claim. Seminal older work remains appropriate.

Accepted manuscripts will be standardised to a numbered reference style. Cite references in order of appearance. Clearly identify preprints, datasets and software, including relevant versions. For legislation and judgments, give the jurisdiction, date and official identifier. Check every reference and quotation against the source.

Ethics Consent and Trial Registration

Research involving people, identifiable human data or animals must report approval by the relevant ethics body, or an independently determined exemption, with the committee name and reference where applicable. Describe informed-consent arrangements, including approved waivers. Address appropriate protections for children and people who need support with communication or decision-making.

Obtain specific written consent for publication when a person could be identified from clinical details, images or narratives. Remove unnecessary identifiers. Keep signed consent forms securely and provide confirmation to the journal; do not include them in public supplementary files. State whether illustrative cases are real, composite or hypothetical.

Clinical trials must be registered in an eligible public registry at or before the first participant gives consent to enrol. Provide the registry, identifier, registration date and first-enrolment date. Explain retrospective registration or deviations. Behavioural and educational interventions fall within this requirement when they prospectively assign participants to interventions to evaluate health-related outcomes. For other study designs, report any protocol registration or preregistration used.

Authorship and Acknowledgements

Every author must make a substantial contribution to the conception or design, or the acquisition, analysis or interpretation of the work; draft or critically revise it; approve the final version; and accept accountability for its integrity. Give an author-contribution statement. CRediT roles may describe contributions, but do not replace authorship criteria.

Acknowledge other contributions with the contributors’ permission. Funding, seniority or general supervision alone does not qualify for authorship. Explain any requested authorship change and obtain written agreement from all affected authors. The corresponding author coordinates submission, revisions and approval of the final version.

Funding and Competing Interests

Declare all funding and the funder’s role in study design, data access, analysis, writing and the decision to submit. Each author must disclose relevant financial and nonfinancial interests, including advisory work, commercial relationships, advocacy roles and relationships with IBF or the journal. State explicitly when there is no funding or no competing interest to declare.

Data Code and Research Materials

Research articles must include a data-availability statement. Give repository links or explain a controlled-access route, access conditions or specific restrictions. Clinical-trial statements should say whether participant data will be shared and specify the data and documents, timing and access criteria where applicable. Share analysis code and materials where consent, law and third-party rights permit. Do not release identifiable neural or clinical data contrary to those safeguards.

Describe data provenance, quality checks and the permissions for reuse. Where data cannot be shared, explain how legitimate requests can be considered. Research involving multiple regions should describe local contributions and governance and address the cultural validity of shared measures.

Use of Artificial Intelligence

Disclose generative AI used to prepare manuscript content or perform substantive research tasks. Name the tool, version where available, and purpose in an AI-use statement and the cover letter. Describe analytical use in Methods, including human checks. Routine spelling and grammar correction need not be declared.

AI tools cannot be authors. Human authors remain responsible for accuracy, references, permissions and confidentiality. Cite the underlying verified sources, not AI output as primary evidence. Label synthetic data and generated images and explain their purpose. Do not present generated material as observed evidence. Do not upload confidential or identifiable information to external AI services without appropriate authority and safeguards.

Editorial Assessment and Peer Review

An editor first assesses scope, contribution, methods, ethical issues and completeness. Papers may be declined at this stage with reasons. The journal uses single-anonymous review: reviewers normally know the authors’ identities, while reviewers’ identities remain confidential unless disclosure is agreed.

Research, reviews, conceptual analyses, policy papers and perspectives normally receive at least two independent external reviews. Editorials and correspondence are assessed by two unconflicted editors; substantive new research requires external review. The assigned editor makes the decision and may seek additional methodological advice.

Papers by editors, IBF leaders or publisher representatives are handled by an independent editor with authority to reject. Invited papers and themed collections follow the same standards. Membership, sponsorship, institutional status and payment do not determine acceptance. Similarity or AI-detection scores alone do not establish misconduct.

Revisions and Proofs

Submit a point-by-point response explaining how each editorial and reviewer comment was addressed, with page or line references. Supply a clean revised manuscript and a version showing changes. Explain any suggestion not adopted. Request an extension if the stated revision deadline cannot be met.

After acceptance, the corresponding author checks copyedited proofs and confirms corrections with coauthors. Return proofs by the deadline stated by the editorial office. Substantial new analyses or changes in conclusions may require further editorial assessment.

Originality Preprints and Withdrawal

A manuscript must not be under consideration by another journal. Disclose related publications, theses, conference abstracts, preprints and overlapping datasets. Prior posting as a preprint or inclusion in a thesis does not automatically exclude a submission; explain the relationship and cite the earlier material.

Before publication, request withdrawal through the editorial office with a reason and the agreement of all authors. Obtain written confirmation that the submission has closed before submitting elsewhere. There is no withdrawal penalty. After publication, changes to the record follow the correction and retraction process.

Publication Charges and Open Access

Journal of Brain, Mind and Society will make its published articles freely available to read online. Submission and publication charges, any waivers and the applicable terms are being finalised. The complete fee policy will be available before submissions open.

The copyright and licensing policy and licence-to-publish agreement will also be available before submissions open. Authors must review the applicable terms and confirm that they have the rights and permissions needed to publish the work.

Appeals Complaints and Corrections

Authors may submit a reasoned appeal within 30 calendar days of a decision, identifying a material error, bias or procedural failure. An editor uninvolved in the original decision will assess the appeal. The Contact page will provide the confidential complaints route and an independent route for concerns involving the usual contact.

Authors should promptly report significant errors in published work. Corrections, expressions of concern or retractions will be issued where warranted and linked to the article. Concerns about research integrity may be raised at any time. Substantive changes to published articles will not be made silently.

Submission Checklist

·       The article fits the journal’s scope and the selected article category.

·       All authors approve the submission and the authorship and contribution statements.

·       The title page, manuscript, figures and supplementary files are complete.

·       Word limits, abstract, keywords, references and reporting guidance have been checked.

·       Ethics, consent, registration, funding, competing interests, data availability and AI use are declared, with explanations where not applicable.

·       Related work, preprints and any required permissions are disclosed.

·       The manuscript is not under consideration elsewhere.

Author Resources

EQUATOR reporting-guideline library

ICMJE recommendations for authors and contributors

ICMJE clinical-trial registration guidance

ICMJE guidance on AI use by authors

CRediT contributor roles

Contact

For enquiries while the journal is being established, contact Dr Pravin Thomas, Convener, Masthishkam Foundation, at pravin@indiabrainforum.org.