Hi all,

I don't have access to the following articles and I need them urgently as I am modifying my proposal. Would greatly appreciate it if anyone can gain access to them and PM me please!

Thanks a lot!

1. Drummond, MJN (2002). Men, Body Image, and Eating Disorders. International Journal of Men's Health, Vol, 1(1): 89-103

2. Olivardia, Roberto, Pope Jr., Harrison G., Borowiecki III, John J., Cohane, Geoffrey H(2004). Biceps and Body Image: The Relationship Between Muscularity and Self-Esteem, Depression, and Eating Disorder Symptoms. Psychology of Men and Masculinity, Vol 5(2): 112-120

Thanks everyone for your helpful responses:-)

Hi all,

Just a quick query - can I do some minor revisions (more like rephrasing some sentences so basically the content is not altered only the wording) in the proof forwarded to me by the journal? Exactly what kind of corrections are allowed?

Would appreciate your thoughts/comments/advice on this :-)

Thanks

Thanks Rick, Apple and Parallax for your helpful comments - greatly appreciate your assistance in this matter :-). I think I'll contact the editor and let them know that I've edited the manuscript in terms of rephrasing it and that no new information has been added as Apple and Rick have suggested.

Parallax, good idea regarding the supervisor issue, I'll keep that in mind.

Honestly, your responses have sure made this easier for me to deal with this issue with a clearer perspective 8-)!

Cheers! (up)

Thanks for your response Melsie...

Firstly, I am the primary and corresponding author for this article and the only reason he is on it is because it is the university polity to include supervisors as co-authors when publishing any part of the dissertation. Hence he took the co-authorship as granted and we never had any discussions on that issue.

Secondly, I have already completed my MSc so I am not worried that he's left, only concerned about his current contact details (because this journal wants the contact details of all the co-authors in addition to the corresponding author).

First off a big hug to you Bug! I do feel for you even though I am nowhere near starting a PhD yet, but I sure sympathize with you!

Now you absolutely CANNOT give up writing; you're brilliant at your work and just because someone (albeit your supervisor) criticized your work doesn't mean that it's crap or worthless. After all, she only did it for your good and as constructive criticism! This is coming from someone who is really bad at handling criticism to the extent that I sometimes feel like bursting into tears and yelling my head off and banging stuff etc!

I guess you need to take a short break from this and distract yourself with something else and come back to this after a few days perhaps a week which will hopefully provide you with a fresh perspective and not break your heart as much when going through your supervisor's comments.

Now cheer up ! :-)

======= Date Modified 04 54 2009 20:54:11 =======
Hi,

Ok I know those of you who have been reading my posts in the past may now be pretty tired by my never ending questions regarding publication in journals, but please bear with me as I have absolutely no support from my MSc supervisor :-s and no prior experience in publishing.

I have three main queries:

1. The journal editor had contacted me a month ago after the peer review process was complete and asked me to edit and submit my manuscript as a revision within a few days which I did as the revisions only included correcting some minor typos. I am not sure whether this means that my manuscript has been accepted? Anyway, during this period I began editing my manuscript in terms of modifying the structure of most of the sentences and including another column in a table. Now my question is: should I contact the editor now (though they haven’t gotten back to me since I submitted the revision ) and request them to permit me to submit this edited manuscript or should I wait until they contact me again and if they do accept my article, then submit this modified version as edited off-prints? Is it ok to request the editor to permit me to submit my edited version of the paper before they contact me? Hope I am making sense and not confusing you all :$!


2. My MSc supervisor has either left the university or has been fired, not sure about this. Does that automatically nullify him from claiming co-authorship (as he has provided absolutely no input for my article) or do I still have to retain him? If so, I have no information of his current contact details so what do I do in this case?


3. I provided the journal with his contact details while he was working at the university where I studied, so am I supposed to contact them now and inform them that he is no longer there and hence, no idea what his current contact details are? This may sound pretty naive and silly :$, but I am so concerned about this and I want everything to be in order!


Guess these are the queries for now but I may turn up with more later! Would greatly appreciate your input on these issues :-).

Many thanks!

======= Date Modified 15 05 2009 07:05:55 =======
======= Date Modified 15 39 2009 06:39:58 =======
This might sound like a silly question, but I am really concerned about this issue, so any advice on this would be greatly appreciated!

If I plan on using a quote (of one or two sentences) from a book, do I have to obtain permission from the publishers of the book for this despite citing the original source, page number, etc? Will it constitute plagiarism on my part if I don't seek permission even though I will be providing the entire reference (plus explicitly stating that this is a quote)?

Would greatly appreciate quick responses on this (if possible)!

Cheers! :-)

Just thank and acknowledge all those who helped you during this process by naming them one by one - example: ''I am very grateful/I would like to thank/I would like to extend my gratitude or appreciation to X for guiding and supporting me/stood by me when I felt like this was the last straw or felt like giving up(!) (ok, that's probably not a good idea although it may reflect your true emotions ;-) or it could actually sound humorous...) throughout this challenging endeavor" or something like that. Then mention something similar about Y and then Z and conclude by asserting that you couldn't have possibly completed this without their guidance and support (if you want).

I don't know how original this may sound to you but I hope it helps somewhat! Good luck and let us know how it goes.(up)

Ouch, my sympathies are with you. It's probably a good idea to email all your documents, etc to your email account regularly. Can be a bit tedious and time consuming, but at least this way, you have less chances of losing your data and all your hard work!

======= Date Modified 03 Sep 2009 14:15:39 =======
Sneaks - thanks for your advice; you're right, I really shouldn't have asked more than one person to go through my paper and I won't in the future, now that I have learned the hard way....by experience! I guess I was pretty naive but then I had no idea who to turn to as my supervisor wasn't being helpful but in the future (like in PhD), if anything like this ever happens (which I hope it won't!), I'll do the best I can on my own (which is exactly what I am doing now anyway)! Good idea about inserting 'primary author' in various places ;-)! I guess that's obvious though, because it is explicitly stated that this was part of an MSc dissertation.



Zelda - it's interesting that the journal I recently submitted to wrote back inquiring why the student who did the thesis isn't the sole author and why there are co-authors included as well! I was sorely tempted to forward that email to my co-authors but decided it was best not to! I doubt whether it will be ok to publish as sole author a few months down the line though - if any of the staff stumble across the paper (if it is accepted, that is!), there could be some major issues especially with regard to obtaining references etc, as Sylvester pointed out.



Appreciate all of your responses and it sure made me feel a lot better to vent my frustration out!

Hi Sue,

I am afraid they aren't helpful at all and although they were initially very enthusiastic about my thesis and were actually the ones encouraging and pushing me to get parts of it published (I achieved a distinction in it - by the way, this is a Master's and not a PhD), they lost interest after a while and started criticizing my work! I found it very strange that they should be quite happy about it in the first place and then suddenly change their minds. I find it even more strange that despite criticizing my work, they still want to be included as co-authors! I wouldn't have minded including them if they would have contributed actively or at least had been helpful and supportive but what's biting me is that after being so harsh and critical (not constructive criticism rather negative comments), they still expect me to include them  :-s

I understand that it is in my best interest not to kick up a fuss about this issue and accept is as just another rule of the academic community that we students have to comply with, but it doesn't make it any easier!

I agree you've got a valid point. Appreciate your reasoning and it sure has cooled me down a bit! I am just peeved that they should get credit for something that they don't deserve (I am ok with acknowledging them, but co-authorship is a bit of a sore point for me!) but it's true what you just stated. Cheers!

Thank you for your response, Sylvester. I am aware it could create friction between me and these people if I excluded them from the paper. I am just wondering, though, whether my status would be affected by including them? Meaning, would it look like I haven't done all the work? Or as long as I am first author, it doesn't matter how many co-authors are listed? Apologies for sounding so naive:$.

Hi everyone,

I've got a query regarding the issue of authorship. I am planning on getting some sections of my thesis published and I worked really hard on preparing the article, editing and modifying it etc with little help from my supervisor(s) ('little help' meaning that one only provided feedback while I was doing my thesis and didn't even bother to review the manuscripts prepared for publication while the other just skimmed through a rough draft and edited two lines of the abstract and because of this, demanded to be included as a co-author). In such a case, is it ethical for either of them to demand co-authorship? Does anyone have any idea what's the worst that could happen if they are excluded from co-authorship despite it being the university's policy to include them? (I've already completed my degree). Shouldn't they also contribute to the article if they want their names to be listed as well? Furthermore, what if instead of being encouraging and supportive, they are being extremely unhelpful and discouraging and although criticizing your work without offering any assistance, demand that they be included as co-authors anyway?! I think it's unfair that I do all the work and have to add them as co-authors without any significant contribution on their part. What do the others think? Would greatly appreciate your thoughts and opinions on this issue!