New Journal to Accept in 2005

With an editor selected and a high volume of submissions expected at the beginning of 2005, Perspectives on Psychological Science - the newest journal of the American Psychological Society (formerly called by the working title of The Psychological Scientist) - is well on its way to a successful debut in early 2006.

APS Fellow Ed Diener, University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign, was recently named founding editor of Perspectives. Diener edited the Journal of Personality and Social Psychology from 1998-2003, and is also the current editor of the Journal of Happiness Studies. His research focuses on the measurement of subjective well-being.

Perspectives will become the fourth in a distinguished line of APS publications. Psychological Science, the Society's flagship journal, is consistently ranked in the top 10 for impact in the field. Current Directions in Psychological Science is also highly ranked and specially edited to be accessible to a wide range of educators and researchers from various disciplines. Psychological Science in the Public Interest addresses issues of national importance, making it a valuable, nationwide resource for policy makers and psychologists.

But a unique vision stands to differentiate Perspectives from the onset, with many of its ideas inspired by APS Immediate Past President Henry L. Roediger, III, Washington University in St. Louis. The journal plans to publish larger, more integrative review articles than currently appear in other psychological publications. Its goal is to achieve a voice as eclectic and engaging as the articles themselves, and it will feature:

• Broad integrative reviews. For example, a topic such as schizophrenia could be approached from a neurobiological, social learning, and therapeutic standpoint. Such articles could offer interlocking views of a single complex issue.
• Overview of a research program. These articles could permit a distinguished researcher to provide an overview of her or his research on a particular topic, bringing in data from other laboratories as necessary. The article would fall somewhere between a literature review and a summary report of one's research program, much as occurs in chapters in edited books.
• Standard literature review. These would be more standard literature reviews, in which the literature on a particular topic (e.g., the spacing effect in learning and memory) is summarized, with the author paying attention to integrative theoretical explanations of the effect and coming to reasoned conclusions that would be making more general points for the field.
• Meta-analytic reviews. Perspectives would be a repository for meta-analytic reviews, when this methodology lends itself to the topic at hand.
• Theoretical statements. Perspectives will be an appropriate outlet for major theoretical statements, which usually include reviews of relevant literature. The reporting of original data might be appropriate but is not required.
• Eclectic articles. The journal would also provide an outlet for nonstandard articles that might fall into the following categories: philosophy of science issues; opinion pieces about major issues in the field; autobiographical reflections of senior members of the field on some topic of interest (for example, how trends in the field have changed over the years); or even humorous essays and sketches (although this is a dangerous category!).
• Book reviews. As in the New York Review of Books, these would offer a scholar the chance to write an essay using books as the starting place.

In fact, Perspectives' innovative approach to content will be matched only by its exceptional submission process, which will contain both invited and submitted articles. The idea of commissioning pieces is to publish articles that can compete with chapters in edited volumes and perhaps even enhance the audience and impact of such work. All of these factors contribute the possibility of Perspectives becoming a one-stop venue for a variety of articles.

For submission information, please contact Ed Diener at perspect@cyrus.psych.uiuc.edu.