Scope | Editorial Policy | ORCID | Manuscript Preparation | Formatting | Required Sections | Supplementary Material | Reviews | Proofs | Publication Charges | Access Options | Author Publishing Agreement | Author Language Services | Artificial Intelligence Policy

Scope

Twin Research and Human Genetics is the official journal of the International Society for Twin Studies. Twin Research and Human Genetics communicates the results of original research in human genetics with a special emphasis on multiple birth research. It also provides timely state-of-the-art reviews on all aspects of human genetics and twin studies. Topics covered include: genetic epidemiology, behavioral genetics, complex diseases, endocrinology, fetal pathology, medical genetics, obstetrics, pediatrics, psychiatric genetics and other areas of human genetics, with an emphasis on twin studies.

Editorial Policy

All inquiries regarding submissions and general correspondence regarding editorial matters should be addressed to the Editor and sent to the Editorial Office: ISTS@qimrberghofer.edu.au.

Manuscripts submitted to the journal must represent reports of original research. Manuscripts will be sent for anonymous review either by members of the editorial board, or by individuals of similar standing in the field. Authors are requested to submit up to three suggested reviewers for the manuscript. Authors will be notified of acceptance, rejection or the need for revision within 6 weeks. When a manuscript is returned to the corresponding author for revision, it should be returned to the Editors within 2 months, otherwise it may be considered withdrawn. Accepted manuscripts will appear in the journal within 3 months, whenever possible.

ORCID IDs

Twin Research & Human Genetics now requires that all corresponding authors identify themselves using ORCID when submitting a manuscript to the journal. Joining ORCID is fast, free and you do not need to have a current affiliation. ORCID provides a unique identifier for researchers and, through integration in key research workflows such as publication and grant applications, provides the following benefits:

• Discoverability: ORCID increases the discoverability of your publications, by enabling smarter publisher systems and by helping readers to reliably find work that you’ve authored.
• Convenience: As more organisations use ORCID, providing your ID or using it to register for services will automatically link activities to your ORCID profile, and will save you re-keying information multiple times.
• Keeping track: Your ORCID profile is a neat place to record and display (if you choose) validated information about your research activities.

If you don’t already have an ID, you’ll need to create one if you decide to submit a manuscript to Twin Research & Human Genetics. You can register for one directly from your user account on ScholarOne or Editorial Manager or via https://orcid.org/register. If you already have an ID, please use this when submitting by linking it to your ScholarOne user account. Simply log in to your account using your normal username and password. Edit your account by clicking on your name at the top right of the screen and from the dropdown menu, select 'E-Mail / Name'. Follow the instructions at the top of the screen to update your account.

For more information on ORCID please visit: https://www.cambridge.org/using-ORCID

Preparation of the Manuscripts

All manuscripts should be in English presented electronically in Microsoft Word. All sections of the manuscript should be double-spaced with one inch margins on all four sides. Please subdivide manuscripts into the following sequence of sections: Title page, Abstract, Introduction, Materials and methods, Results, Discussion, Acknowledgement, References, Tables, Figure legends. Number each page (title page is 1). Please indicate the position of each figure and table in the text using the words "Figure X about here".

Manuscript Formatting Requirements

In general, the formatting requirements are those recommended by the American Psychological Association (APA), especially for references:

American Psychological Association (2010). Publication manual of the American Psychological Association (6th ed.). Washington, DC: American Psychological Association.

Title Page/keywords

The title should be as brief as possible with no abbreviations. Include each author’s initials and surname and complete addresses in English, including department, institution, city with postal code and country (indicating clearly which author is at which address). A corresponding author should be indicated with telephone, fax numbers and e-mail address provided. Please also provide a running title of not more than 50 characters.

Abstract

The second page of the manuscript should contain only an abstract in a single paragraph of not more than 200–250 words. Abbreviations and reference citations should be avoided.

Introduction

The introduction should assume that the reader is knowledgeable in the field and should therefore be a brief as possible and should not exceed 1500 words. Do not use the heading "Introduction".

References

References should follow the general format advocated by the Publication Manual of the American Psychological Association (6th ed.). However, in the text, "et al." should be used for references with three or more authors, as follows:

• One author: (Jones, 1981)
• Two authors: (Jones & Smith, 1981)
• Three or more authors: (Jones et al., 1981).

At the end of the manuscript references should be listed (double-spaced) in alphabetical order. If an article has more than seven authors, list the names of the first six authors followed by ... and then the last author’s name in the reference entry. Full periodical titles should be used and first and last page numbers for each reference should be provided. Abstracts and letters must be identified as such.

Abbreviations

These should be defined in parentheses after their first mention in the text, except for the use of accepted abbreviations, such as SI Symbols, which need not be defined. Use generic names when referring to drugs; trade names may be given in parentheses at first mention.

Tables

These should be typed on separate sheets and numbered consecutively with Arabic numerals. Tables should be self-explanatory and include a brief descriptive title. Footnotes to tables indicated by lower case letters are acceptable, but they should not include extensive experimental detail. Please indicate in the manuscript the most appropriate position for each table using the words "Table X about here".

Illustrations, figures, photographs and mathematics

Electronic submission of artwork

To ensure optimum quality, please follow these guidelines when submitting artwork via e-mail or disk. Photographs, graphs and figures should be prepared to the correct size (max. width 80mm single column or up to 160mm double column). Please follow their instructions in order to avoid any delay in the publication of your article.

1. Each photograph, graph or figure should be:

• supplied as an individual file, separate to the manuscript Word file with placement instructions included in the Word document, such as [insert Fig 1 here]

OR

• if created in Microsoft Word, Excel or Powerpoint, embedded in the Word file at the end of the document and supplied ALSO as a PDF

Figures created in a drawing program such as Adobe Illustrator, CorelDRAW, Freehand, Microsoft Publisher or similar should be saved as an EPS (encapsulated postscript) files or a PDF. Figures created in Photoshop or with other photographic software should be saved with a minimum resolution of 600 dpi and in TIF format. Minimum resolution for scanned graphics is 300 dpi for halftone work (e.g., photographs) and 600 dpi for line art, and these should also be in TIF format.

2. Manuscripts which contain equations created with LaTeX or similar specialist software need to be supplied as a PDF file as well as a Microsoft Word document.

3. Prior to sending artwork, the separate files of figures, graphs, illustrations, and so on, should be checked online by the author to test that the fonts have been embedded correctly and there is no distortion in the artwork (e.g., lines and fonts reproduce cleanly with no jagged lines or fuzzy edges), as any such faults cannot be corrected by the publisher.

4. Preferred method of submission: email as attachments to ISTS@qimr.edu.au.

Required Sections

Acknowledgements

You may acknowledge individuals or organisations that provided advice, support (non-financial). Formal financial support and funding should be listed in the following sections:

Financial support

Please provide details of the sources of financial support for all authors, including grant numbers. For example, "This work was supported by the Medical research Council (grant number XXXXXX)". Multiple grant numbers should be separated by a comma and space, and where research was funded by more than one agency the different agencies should be separated by a semi- colon, with "and" before the final funder. Grants held by different authors should be identified as belonging to individual authors by the authors’ initials. For example, "This work was supported by the Wellcome Trust (A.B., grant numbers XXXX, YYYY), (C.D., grant number ZZZZ); the Natural Environment Research Council (E.F., grant number FFFF); and the National Institutes of Health (A.B., grant number GGGG), (E.F., grant number HHHH)". Where no specific funding has been provided for research, please provide the following statement: "This research received no specific grant from any funding agency, commercial or not-for-profit sectors."

Conflict of interest

Please provide details of all known financial, professional and personal relationships with the potential to bias the work. Where no known conflicts of interest exist, please include the following statement: "None."

Ethical standards

Where research involves human and/or animal experimentation, the following statements should be included (as applicable): "The authors assert that all procedures contributing to this work comply with the ethical standards of the relevant national and institutional committees on human experimentation and with the Helsinki Declaration of 1975, as revised in 2008." and "The authors assert that all procedures contributing to this work comply with the ethical standards of the relevant national and institutional guides on the care and use of laboratory animals."

Publication Ethics

Please visit here for information on our ethical guidelines.

Supplementary Material

The online platform gives authors the opportunity to include material that it would be impossible or impractical to include in the printed version, for example, extensive datasets, complex mathematical calculations, 3D structures/images or video files. You must submit Supplementary Material at the same time that you submit your manuscript, and you must give details in your cover letter of all supplementary files uploaded. If accepted, this material will be placed in the Cambridge University Press Supplementary Material data archive, and it will be accessible online. Authors should ensure that they mention within their article that Supplementary Material is available on the Cambridge Core website.

At the head of the first page of your Supplementary Material file, type ‘Twin Research and Human Genetics’, the article title, the names of the authors, and then the relevant inclusions. Please note that captions or legends should be included for all figures and tables in Supplementary Material. You should number figures or tables with the prefix ‘S’,

e.g. Supplementary Figure S1, Supplementary Table S1.

Although Supplementary Material is peer reviewed, it is not copyedited or typeset and it is loaded onto the journal’s website exactly as supplied. You should check your Supplementary Material carefully to ensure that it adheres to journal styles. Corrections cannot be made to the Supplementary Material after acceptance of the manuscript. Please bear this in mind when deciding what content to include as Supplementary Material.

Reviews

Scholarly reviews of topics within the scope of Twin Research and Human Genetics will be considered for publication after paper review. Please send a one page letter of inquiry to the Editor before preparing your manuscript, to make sure that a similar review is not in press.

Proofs

Manuscripts will be scheduled for publication upon receipt of proofs. Extensive changes to the proofs will result in publication delay. Important new information that has become available between acceptance of the manuscript and receipt of the proofs may be inserted as an Addendum in proof with the permission of an Editor. Proofs must be checked immediately for typographical errors and returned to the publisher along with the copyright assignment form. Authors will receive a PDF offprint of their article.

Publication charges

Effective from October 2006, please note that manuscripts will be charged publication charges of:

• ISTS MEMBERS (first or last author) - AUD100.00 per page 
• NON-ISTS MEMBERS (first/last author) – AUD150.00 per page

You will receive an invoice from the society regarding this. Please do reach out to them directly with any questions.

Free access

Included in the above publication cost is free online access to the paper for non-subscribers as well as subscribers from one year after publication.

Open Access

Green Open Access Option:

Authors are also allowed to post their accepted paper (i.e., not the final pdf /version of record) on their departmental or non-commercial subject repositories after 6 months of publication. This is called ‘Green Open Access’ and more detail regarding Cambridge’s Green Open Access policies can be found here.

OR

Gold Open Access Option: 

Authors may make their paper Gold Open Access from the time of online publication on payment of an additional fee of AUD665 for ISTS MEMBERS (first or last author) or AUD790 for NON-ISTS MEMBERS (first/last author). The Gold Open Access option satisfies funder requirements as authors will be able to choose an appropriate CC-BY license under which they will license their work and Cambridge University Press will deposit their manuscript in PubMed Central as part of the additional fee. Please contact the editorial office for more information.

In exceptional circumstances, the Editor may consider reducing or waiving these charges. Please contact Professor Nick Martin directly.

Author Publishing Agreement

The policy of Twin Research & Human Genetics is that authors (or in some cases their employers) retain copyright and grant International Society for Twin Studies a licence to publish their work. In the case of gold open access articles this is a non-exclusive licence. Authors must complete and return an author publishing agreement form as soon as their article has been accepted for publication; the journal is unable to publish the article without this. Please download the appropriate publishing agreement here.

For open access articles, the form also sets out the Creative Commons licence under which the article is made available to end users: a fundamental principle of open access is that content should not simply be accessible but should also be freely re-usable. Articles will be published under a Creative Commons Attribution license (CC-BY) by default. This means that the article is freely available to read, copy and redistribute, and can also be adapted (users can “remix, transform, and build upon” the work) for any commercial or non-commercial purpose, as long as proper attribution is given. Authors can, in the publishing agreement form, choose a different kind of Creative Commons license (including those prohibiting non-commercial and derivative use) if they prefer.

Author Language Services

Cambridge Core recommends that authors have their manuscripts checked by an English language native speaker before submission; this will ensure that submissions are judged at peer review exclusively on academic merit. We list a number of third-party services specialising in language editing and / or translation, and suggest that authors contact as appropriate. Use of any of these services is voluntary, and at the author's own expense.