Sage Journals Information

Your manuscript will undergo an initial evaluation to check that it conforms to the submission requirements. If it doesn’t, it will be returned to you for amendments prior to peer review. Manuscripts may be desk rejected without peer review at this point if they are out of scope for the journal or otherwise unsuitable.   

After passing the initial evaluation, your manuscript will then be sent for peer review. Details of how the peer review process works for the journal you are submitting to can be found on the journal submission guidelines. If your journal uses an online submission system you can log in at any time to check the status of your manuscript. The journal editor will notify you when a decision has been reached. 

• For resources to help prepare your manuscript for submission, see Publishing guidance & support
• To learn more about the types of peer review, see What is peer review?
• For help on how to respond to peer review comments, see Response to reviewers template

Upon submission, the journal editor will first look at your manuscript to:

• Check that it meets the aims & scope of the journal
• Ensure that it complies with the submission guidelines
• Conduct a brief scientific/methods check

After the initial check, one of three things may happen:

• Unsubmit: If the paper contains errors that are minor and can be easily rectified, the editor may request the author fix formatting or missing information before re-submitting.
• Desk reject: The paper is rejected before making it to the peer review stage. This means the editor thinks it is unlikely that the paper will proceed to publication in that journal. Depending on the reason for the desk reject, an author may want to find a different journal to submit to or rewrite the paper and submit again.
• Editor invites reviewers: If the paper passes the editor check, then an invitation will go out to one or more reviewers until a reviewer accepts the paper for peer review. Most journals require at least two external peer reviewers on a manuscript. 

How to avoid a desk reject:

• Choose the right journal, see Choosing a journal.
• Receive support with writing and formatting: Learn more about Sage Author Services
• Carefully check the submissions guidelines on the journal’s home page on Sage Journals.

The time spent in review is unique to each paper, ranging from a few weeks to several months, depending on submission quality and reviewer availability. Log in to the manuscript submission site to check the status of your paper.

Once the review is complete, reviewers usually make one of three recommendations to the editor about the submission:

• Reject the paper
• Accept as is (this is rare)
• Recommends revisions, either major or minor

Note that the editor will make the final decision to accept or reject, based on the reviewer’s recommendation and their own feedback. Rejection is a normal part of academia and rates can be very high, so if your paper is rejected know you are not alone. Carefully consider the reviewer’s comments in order to determine what your options may be for rewriting or resubmitting your paper.

Learn more about what reviewers look for

Sage does not permit the use of author-suggested (recommended) reviewers at any stage of the submission process, be that through the web-based submission system or other communication. 

Reviewers should be experts in their fields and should be able to provide an objective assessment of the manuscript. Our policy is that reviewers should not be assigned to a paper if: 

• The reviewer is based at the same institution as any of the co-authors. 
• The reviewer is based at the funding body of the paper. 
• The author has recommended the reviewer. 
• The reviewer has provided a personal (e.g. Gmail/Yahoo/Hotmail) email account and an institutional email account cannot be found after performing a basic Google search (name, department and institution). 

Please note that the journal’s editors are not obliged to invite any recommended/opposed reviewers to assess your manuscript.

• Add each individual comment from reviewers and editors to the first column 
• If you are responding to more than two reviewers, copy and paste one of the tables and edit the first column to read ‘Reviewer 3 Comment’, for example 
• Highlight the changes made in a copy of your revised manuscript 
• Add page numbers to the highlighted version of your revised manuscript  
• Describe what you have changed in the Author Response column 
• State the page number where each change can be found 
• If you feel unable to address a comment or implement a suggestion, state why 
• IMPORTANT for journals with double-anonymized peer review: Use Document Inspector to remove all personal information 
• When submitting your revised manuscript, upload this form under the View and Respond to Decision Letter step 
• Upload two copies of your revised manuscript under the File Upload step: 
  • One clean copy, using the file designation ‘Main Document’ 
  • One copy with changes highlighted, using the file designation ‘Main Document’ 

• Consider reviewer and editor comments carefully - don’t rush!  
• Submit your revision on time  
• Be positive and constructive 
• Keep your comments clear and concise 
• Comprehensive updates and responses to reviewer and editor comments will minimize the need for future revisions 

• Communication: We are conscious of, and understand, how keen authors are to see their work published. Sage production staff maintain regular communication with journal editors and authors throughout the production process. In addition, email messages are automatically sent out to the corresponding author at key points along the workflow to confirm that their article has been received in production and to inform them of their article’s progress.
• Planning promotion of your article: If you think your article may be suitable for promotion, please flag this to the journal editor or your production contact at Sage as early as possible in the publishing process. We have a variety of different promotional channels at our disposal to ensure your article reaches the widest possible audience. See Promoting your article & building your network for more information.
• Proofs: We will send the corresponding author instructions for reviewing and correcting article proofs. Please review the proofs and return any corrections as soon as possible, or by the deadline requested, so as not to delay the publication process. The corresponding author is responsible for sending the production team one set of proof corrections. When the corresponding author sends in their corrections, we will assume this is the definitive version and that if any of the co-authors needed to see the first proof, that the corresponding author would have arranged this and obtained their edits.
• Sage Production: At Sage we place an extremely strong emphasis on the highest possible production standards. We attach a great deal of importance to our quality service levels in production and publication. We also seek to uphold excellent author relations throughout the publication process. We value your feedback to ensure we continue to improve our author service levels. On publication all corresponding authors will receive a brief survey on your experience of publishing with Sage.  Do take the time to complete this as we are responsive to your comments, and they are valued highly by our journal editors.
• Open access continuous publication: Many open access journals operate on a continuous publication model where articles are posted online as soon as they have completed the production process in a fully citable form. At this time articles are free to view and download for all. As there are no issues to fill and no page count constraints, the time to publication is often quick. Check the 'Latest Articles' tab on the journal website for the latest published content. Articles are batched periodically (every month, quarter, or year, according to the journal), and are then available on the 'Archive' tab on the journal website.
• OnlineFirst publication: Many Sage journals benefit from OnlineFirst, a feature offered through the Sage Journals platform. It allows final revision articles (completed articles in queue for assignment to an upcoming issue) to be published online prior to their inclusion in a final print and online journal issue. This significantly reduces the lead time between submission and publication. For more information, please see our OnlineFirst Fact Sheet.

For general author queries, please visit the Journals Solutions portal which contains answers to common questions.

Access to your published article 
We provide you with online access to your published article. The online access link is provided to the corresponding author for sharing with their co-authors.  

Promoting your article 
Publication is not the end of the process! Between us, we can ensure that your article is found, read, downloaded and cited as widely as possible. Many of the most effective tactics are those you can do quickly and easily to your network of contacts and peers. For numerous resources to help you promote your work, see Promoting your article & building your network.   

Sage supports a range of author benefit policies, which vary by journal. The most common policy among Sage journals is to provide authors with a complimentary digital copy of their final article, called an e-print. E-prints are sent automatically to the corresponding authors following the article's initial publication and issue publication (if applicable), and include a link for downloading the final article PDF. The corresponding author can share the link and/or PDF with co-authors, and can also share the PDF in certain other uses as explained in Sage’s author archiving and re-use guidelines. If a journal's policy is an exception to the standard policy, the specific terms for that journal will be supplied in the author's Contributor license.

If an author would like to purchase a print copy of the issue in which their article appears, they will receive a 30% discount off the standard single-issue price. Single issue prices are listed in the "Subscribe" tab of each journal's website.

• To order a copy for US journals, please contact journals@sagepub.com or 1-800-818-7243.
• To order a copy for UK journals, please contact subscriptions@sagepub.co.uk or +44 (0)20 7324 8701.

Please specify the journal name and volume/issue number in your request.

• Sage Production: At Sage we place an extremely strong emphasis on the highest possible production standards. We attach a great deal of importance to our quality service levels in production and publication. We also seek to uphold excellent author relations throughout the publication process. We value your feedback to ensure we continue to improve our author service levels. On publication all corresponding authors will receive a brief survey on your experience of publishing with Sage.  Do take the time to complete this as we are responsive to your comments, and they are valued highly by our journal editors.
• Open access continuous publication: Many open access journals operate on a continuous publication model where articles are posted online as soon as they have completed the production process in a fully citable form. At this time articles are free to view and download for all. As there are no issues to fill and no page count constraints, the time to publication is often quick. Check the 'Latest Articles' tab on the journal website for the latest published content. Articles are batched periodically (every month, quarter, or year, according to the journal), and are then available on the 'Archive' tab on the journal website.
• OnlineFirst publication: Many Sage journals benefit from OnlineFirst, a feature offered through the Sage Journals platform. It allows final revision articles (completed articles in queue for assignment to an upcoming issue) to be published online prior to their inclusion in a final print and online journal issue. This significantly reduces the lead time between submission and publication. For more information, please see our OnlineFirst Fact Sheet.