Regular Articles Research Articles

REGULAR ARTICLES / ARTICLES RÉGULIERSSize-related predation reduces intramorph competition in paedomorphic Alpine newts

Evolutionary theory assumes that facultative paedomorphosis in newts and salamanders is adaptive in allowing either a younger age at maturity or resource partitioning between the heterochronic morphs. In newt populations that only take the metamorphic ontogenetic pathway, juveniles are terrestrial and avoid food competition with larvae and breeding adults. In contrast, in populations where paedomorphosis occurs, branchiate newts of all sizes coexist in the aquatic habitats, posing the question of whether intramorph competition exists and its relationship with the evolution of paedomorphosis. We studied size-related predation in such a size-structured community of branchiate Alpine newts (Triturus alpestris) inhabiting a deep alpine lake. Although gape limitation may explain such size-related predation, individuals also exhibited selectivity according to prey size. Amongst small prey that were within the capture range of all newt size classes, smaller newts preyed on smaller items than did larger ones. We assume that such decisions favour the coexistence of different-sized individuals. It is suspected that such size-selective predation on items which are avoided by water-living metamorphs allows the maintenance of facultative paedomorphosis, in favouring resource partitioning between morphs.

Special issue on Polyelectrolytes

At the launch of the Soft Matter part of the European Physical Journal EPJ E, we insisted on two points: the journal should be interdisciplinary and accessible to the various communities working on Soft Condensed Matter, primarily physicists, physico-chemists and chemists but also biophysicists; it should also become a forum where important and controversial issues are debated. Two proposals have emerged to push these ideas forward, the publication of perspectives or commentaries on articles that raise important issues and of special issues on topics of broad interest for the whole community. The first of our special issues is on ``Polyelectrolytes''. This is a subject of active research in particular because of the numerous applications of polyelectrolytes as water-soluble polymers and as biomaterials and it should be of interest for a large part of the community targetted by EPJ E. For this issue, we have invited a few articles and added several regular articles that fitted well into the subject. In order to avoid too long publication delays, some of the manuscript that we intended to include have already been published as regular articles and some late manuscripts will be published in forthcoming issues of the journal. Nevertheless, we feel that we have here a representative collection of manuscripts spanning various aspects of research on polyelectrolytes. A large proportion of the papers in this issue deals with the interfacial behavior of polyelectrolytes. This is certainly indicative of the very large effort currently made in this area. The main aspects are: fundamental studies of polyelectrolyte adsorption, polyelectrolyte brushes, polyelectrolytes trapped in soap films, polyelectrolyte multilayers and a theoretical description of polyampholyte adsorption. The other papers deal with the synthesis of copolymers with ampholyte blocks and various aspects of polyelectrolyte solutions (associating polyelectrolytes and complexation by multivalent ions). We hope that this issue will be useful in stimulating debate on some of the ideas raised and that it will help to strengthen the links between the various communities.

Review Articles in the PASP

For a number of years the policy regarding review articles in the Publications of the Astronomical Society of the Pacific (PASP) has been that they were submitted by invitation of the Editors. We have decided to broaden the way review articles are solicited and handled. Now review articles may also be submitted by authors without a specific invitation from the Editors. We invite authors who would like to write a review article to send an outline and a date by which they plan to submit their article. We hope this process will prevent an author from spending a lot of time preparing a review, only to hear that a very similar one is already in press. All submitted review articles will be sent to referees in the same way that regular research articles are handled. Page charges for review articles will be the same as those for regular papers. We hope that the rapid publication time for which the PASP is known will also apply to all review articles. Some general guidelines for authors of review articles are as follows:

REGULAR ARTICLES / ARTICLES RÉGULIERS Whether to reproduce or not: immune suppression and costs of parasites during reproduction in the Arctic charr

Secondary sexual characters are assumed to be costly to develop, and the costs of parasite infections and immune suppression are currently an active area of research within sexual selection. We investigated differences in parasitic infections and immunological activity between reproductively active and inactive Arctic charr (Salvelinus alpinus). Spawning fish were found to have higher intensities of macroparasite infections than nonspawning or resting fish. The difference in intensity between spawning and resting fish was only observed in males, and can be explained by differences in exposure or susceptibility to parasites. However, there is indirect evidence that the difference in parasite intensities does not stem from varying exposure originating from group differences in consumption of carotenoid-containing intermediate hosts. We show, rather, that spawning males may be more susceptible, since they have a smaller spleen, which is an important lymphocyte-producing organ, than resting males. As these costs of spawning are found predominantly among males, they are unlikely to be the result of energetic investment in gamete production, as gamete production in general is thought to be more energetically demanding in females than in males. Rather, we suggest that the observed costs of reproduction result from immune suppression related to ornamental development and spermatogenesis.

<b>REGULAR ARTICLES / ARTICLES RÉGULIERS</b><p> Whether to reproduce or not: immune suppression and costs of parasites during reproduction in the Arctic charr

<b>REGULAR ARTICLES / ARTICLES RÉGULIERS</b><p> Whether to reproduce or not: immune suppression and costs of parasites during reproduction in the Arctic charr

Establishing a twin register in Sri Lanka.

Nearly all twin registers are based in developed countries and there is no twin register in the developing world. Our objectives were to initiate the process of establishing a nationwide twin register in Sri Lanka by starting a volunteer register first and working towards a population-based register. Regular newspaper advertisements, feature articles, radio talks, and television programmes were used to publicise a competition for twins, their parents/relatives and friends requesting them to participate by sending in details of twins. The competition ran from 28 March 1997 for a period of 3 months. It offered prizes for three winners selected by drawing lots. Advertisements highlighted the objective of the competition as establishing a twin register for future research and emphasised that informed consent would be obtained for individual research projects. Those who registered comprise 4602 twin pairs (same sex: male--1564, female--1885; different sex--1153), 80 sets of triplets (same sex: male--17, female--31; different sex--42) and two sets of quadruplets (different sex). The oldest twins, triplets, quadruplets are 85, 46, and 5 years old, respectively; 88.0% of twins are less than 30 years old. Although others have previously used media publicity to enrol twins in twin registers, we believe this to be the first time that twins have been enrolled through competition. We have more young twins, and our gender and zygosity proportions after applying Weinburg's rule do not match the proportions expected from a volunteer twin sample. Establishing a twin register for research purposes has proved possible in a developing country.

The invited review ? or, my field, from my standpoint, written by me using only my data and my ideas, and citing only my publications.

The invited review ? or, my field, from my standpoint, written by me using only my data and my ideas, and citing only my publications.

Establishing a twin register in Sri Lanka

Nearly all twin registers are based in developed countries and there is no twin register in the developing world. Our objectives were to initiate the process of establishing a nationwide twin register in Sri Lanka by starting a volunteer register first and working towards a population-based register. Regular newspaper advertisements, feature articles, radio talks, and television programmes were used to publicise a competition for twins, their parents/relatives and friends requesting them to participate by sending in details of twins. The competition ran from 28 March 1997 for a period of 3 months. It offered prizes for three winners selected by drawing lots. Advertisements highlighted the objective of the competition as establishing a twin register for future research and emphasised that informed consent would be obtained for individual research projects. Those who registered comprise 4602 twin pairs (same sex: male – 1564, female – 1885; different sex – 1153), 80 sets of triplets (same sex: male – 17, female – 31; different sex – 42) and two sets of quadruplets (different sex). The oldest twins, triplets, quadruplets are 85, 46, and 5 years old, respectively; 88.0% of twins are less than 30 years old. Although others have previously used media publicity to enrol twins in twin registers, we believe this to be the first time that twins have been enrolled through competition. We have more young twins, and our gender and zygosity proportions after applying Weinburg's rule do not match the proportions expected from a volunteer twin sample. Establishing a twin register for research purposes has proved possible in a developing country. Twin Research (2000) 3, 202–204.

An Analysis of Finance Journal Impact Factors

This paper provides an analysis of the citation counts of articles published in the leading finance journals. It identifies the determinants of the most prevalent measure of influence for finance journals, the Social Sciences Citation Index impact factors. It finds that impact factors are affected by citations outside the finance field, are not affected by the distribution of published articles across subfields, and are good predictors of the long‐term citation counts of articles. The citation impact factors are reduced for both the Journal of Financial Economics and The Journal of Finance by their publication of other than regular articles.

Quality assessment of reports on clinical trials in the Journal of Hepatology

Background/Aims: Electronic searches on databases for randomised clinical trials and controlled clinical trials do not identify as many trials as handsearches, and trial reporting may be flawed. The aims were to identify all fully reported randomised clinical trials in the Journal of Hepatology and to make a qualitative assessment of the reporting. Methods: The publications were identified by systematically handsearching the full text of the journal and searching MEDLINE. Central dimensions of trial quality were used to assess the reporting quality of the trials. Results: Randomised clinical trials represented 8.4% of the original articles ( 171 2028 ). Ten original articles (0.5%) could not be classified. A search on MEDLINE identified 81.3% of the randomised clinical trials, i.e., 139 out of the 171 identified by the handsearch. A total of 166 randomised clinical trials could be quality assessed. Forty-seven (28.3%) of them reported adequate generation of allocation sequence; 22 (13.3%) adequate allocation concealment; 95 (57.2%) allowed intention-to-treat analysis with only a fewlosses to follow-up; 50 (30.1%) were double-blind; 33 (19.9%) reported sample-size calculations; 13 trials (7.8%) employed the crossover design; and the median number of subjects per intervention arm in parallel group trials was 19 subjects (interquartile range: 11–31; range: 5–519). The quality of reporting was significantly better in regular issue articles than in supplement articles. Conclusions: Many important randomised clinical trials are published in the Journal of Hepatology, but there seems to be ample room for improvement of quality of reporting.

Energy translation operator

Brief Reports are accounts of completed research which do not warrant regular articles or the priority handling given to Rapid Communications; however, the same standards of scientific quality apply. (Addenda are included in Brief Reports.) A Brief Report may be no longer than four printed pages and must be accompanied by an abstract. The same publication schedule as for regular articles is followed, and page proofs are sent to authors.

Regular Articles

Regular Articles

Problems with drugs in Croatia.

Croatia has 4.8 million inhabitants, 11,800 physicians, 2000 pharmacists, two now shareholding, pharmaceutical companies (about 6500 employees, total sales of about 350 million US dollars). There are a number of problems due to the war (GNP fell from 3800 to about 1500 US dollars), occupation of 25% of its territory, 0.5 million refugees and lack of resources (139 US dollars/capita for health, about 40 US dollars i.e. 30%!! for drugs)--about three times less than before the aggression. The drug situation is controlled with the help of: (1) donations (approximate value of 600 million US dollars since 1991 from Europe and US), (2) (essential) drug formularies--250 for outpatients, and 580 generic names for various levels of hospital use, (3) special efforts to purchase drugs of good quality at a reasonable price (a kind of tender), (4) control of prescribing (prescriptions, specialists referral) especially by GPs. A new Medicines Act is in preparation and about 1000 generic names are on the market. DRUG EDUCATION: Pharmaca: the Croatian journal of pharmacotherapy has been published since 1962, there are several Drug bulletins (one published since 1975); special chapters on clinical pharmacology in textbooks, translation of three editions of Laurence's textbook with special commentary and adaptation to local needs; ADR spontaneous and intensive monitoring (WHO programme) with a personal feedback to the reporters and regular articles on drug use in a number of periodicals. Data on drug consumption indicates that there is room for improvement of prescribing. There is an enthusiasm for 'vasoactive drugs'--after dipirydamole came oxpentifylline and antimicrobials are always overprescribed. All these problems will hopefully decrease when the war finally stops and when industry (especially tourism) starts being fruitful again. In any case the importance of teaching of pharmacotherapy at the under- and postgraduate level should be recognized.

Problems with Drugs in Croatia

Croatia has 4.8 million inhabitants, 11,800 physicians, 2000 pharmacists, two now shareholding, pharmaceutical companies (about 6500 employees, total sales of about $350 million). There are a number of problems due to the war (GNP fell from $3800 to about $1500), occupation of 25% of its territory, 0.5 million refugees and lack of resources (US$139/capita for health, about $40 i.e. 30%!! for drugs)—about three times less than before the aggression. The drug situation is controlled with the help of: (1) donations (approximate value of $600 million since 1991 from Europe and US), (2) (essential) drug formularies—250 for outpatients, and 580 generic names for various levels of hospital use, (3) special efforts to purchase drugs of good quality at a reasonable price (a kind of tender), (4) control of prescribing (prescriptions, specialists referral) especially by GPs. A new Medicines Act is in preparation and about 1000 generic names are on the market. Drug education—Pharmaca: the Croatian journal of pharmacotherapy has been published since 1962, there are several Drug bulletins (one published since 1975); special chapters on clinical pharmacology in textbooks, translation of three editions of Laurence's textbook with special commentary and adaptation to local needs; ADR spontaneous and intensive monitoring (WHO programme) with a personal feedback to the reporters and regular articles on drug use in a number of periodicals. Data on drug consumption indicates that there is room for improvement of prescribing. There is an enthusiasm for ‘vasoactive drugs’—after dipirydamole came oxpentifylline and antimicrobials are always overprescribed. All these problems will hopefully decrease when the war finally stops and when industry (especially tourism) starts being fruitful again. In any case the importance of teaching of pharmacotherapy at the under- and postgraduate level should be recognized. © 1997 by John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.

Introduction to the featured section: Psychological and behavioral studies in cancer prevention and control.

Cancer is a major health problem for Americans. There has been a steady rise in the cancer mortality rate in the United States in the last half-century. For example, whereas the cancer death rate was 157 per 100,000 population in 1950, it was 174 per 100,000 population in 1990 (American Cancer Society, 1996). The major cause of this increase has been lung cancer: A 452% increase in the lung cancer death rate for women and a 104% increase in the lung cancer death rate for men have occurred in the last 30 years. Death rates for other major cancers have leveled off (e.g., cancers of the colon, ovary, and pancreas) or declined (e.g., cancers of the rectum and cervix). Notable exceptions are the common breast and prostate cancers, the death rates for which have increased 7% and 24%, respectively, in the last 30 years. Cancer is the number one killer of women as young as 35, and this circumstance extends to those in their mid-70s. During these same prime ages, cancer is the number two killer of men. Thus, the following four articles examine the psychological and behavioral aspects of cancer both as a risk and as a reality. Editor's Note. During the past 2 years, Health Psychology has occasionally published Special Sections on timely topics in the field. Articles for these Special Sections are obtained either from an open announcement and solicitation of submissions in a given area or, on rare occasion, from invited articles. In both cases, these solicitations are followed by rigorous peer review of the articles. However, with this issue, we introduce a Featured Section consisting of four articles (two regular articles and two brief reports) on behavioral issues in cancer prevention and control that were spontaneously submitted to the journal by each group of authors and that made their way through the usual Health Psychology review process, sheperded by one or more of our associate editors. After these articles were accepted and placed in the publication queue, they presented a unique opportunity for creating a coherent collection (Featured Section) of articles in this increasingly popular and timely area. In addition, Barbara Andersen agreed to provide an overview. In the future, when a critical mass of articles on a related and timely topic are accepted by the journal, the editors of Health Psychology will take the opportunity to solicit an introduction and to group them together as a Featured Section.--DSK.

Introduction to the featured section: psychological and behavioral studies in cancer prevention and control.

Cancer is a major health problem for Americans. There has been a steady rise in the cancer mortality rate in the United States in the last half-century. For example, whereas the cancer death rate was 157 per 100,000 population in 1950, it was 174 per 100,000 population in 1990 (American Cancer Society, 1996). The major cause of this increase has been lung cancer: A 452% increase in the lung cancer death rate for women and a 104% increase in the lung cancer death rate for men have occurred in the last 30 years. Death rates for other major cancers have leveled off (e.g., cancers of the colon, ovary, and pancreas) or declined (e.g., cancers of the rectum and cervix). Notable exceptions are the common breast and prostate cancers, the death rates for which have increased 7% and 24%, respectively, in the last 30 years. Cancer is the number one killer of women as young as 35, and this circumstance extends to those in their mid-70s. During these same prime ages, cancer is the number two killer of men. Thus, the following four articles examine the psychological and behavioral aspects of cancer both as a risk and as a reality. Editor's Note. During the past 2 years, Health Psychology has occasionally published Special Sections on timely topics in the field. Articles for these Special Sections are obtained either from an open announcement and solicitation of submissions in a given area or, on rare occasion, from invited articles. In both cases, these solicitations are followed by rigorous peer review of the articles. However, with this issue, we introduce a Featured Section consisting of four articles (two regular articles and two brief reports) on behavioral issues in cancer prevention and control that were spontaneously submitted to the journal by each group of authors and that made their way through the usual Health Psychology review process, sheperded by one or more of our associate editors. After these articles were accepted and placed in the publication queue, they presented a unique opportunity for creating a coherent collection (Featured Section) of articles in this increasingly popular and timely area. In addition, Barbara Andersen agreed to provide an overview. In the future, when a critical mass of articles on a related and timely topic are accepted by the journal, the editors of Health Psychology will take the opportunity to solicit an introduction and to group them together as a Featured Section.--DSK.

American Journal of Geriatric Psychiatry

The<i>American Journal of Geriatric Psychiatry</i>serves as the official journal of the American Association for Geriatric Psychiatry, an organization with approximately 1500 members. In the inaugural issue, the editor describes plans to make available the latest scientific and clinical developments relating to aging and mental health by publishing original research results, scholarly review articles, and clinical reports. This journal contains a diverse selection of special articles, regular articles, clinical and research reports, editorial commentaries, and book reviews. A sampling of topics with a clinical focus includes geriatric depression, somatization disorder, geriatric psychopharmacology, and consultation in nursing homes. Other areas addressed are ethical and legal concerns, public policy, and academic interests. The "Special Articles" section provides a comprehensive review of the literature in clinically pertinent subject areas. It gives special emphasis to theory, conceptual understanding, data, and recent research findings. In the first issue the flow of this information is

Education of an Editor

HomeCirculationVol. 91, No. 1Education of an Editor Free AccessResearch ArticleDownload EPUBAboutView EPUBSections ToolsAdd to favoritesDownload citationsTrack citationsPermissions ShareShare onFacebookTwitterLinked InMendeleyReddit Jump toFree AccessResearch ArticleDownload EPUBEducation of an Editor Fulfillment of Promises James T. Willerson James T. WillersonJames T. Willerson Search for more papers by this author Originally published1 Jan 1995https://doi.org/10.1161/01.CIR.91.1.244Circulation. 1995;91:244The biggest problem of making internal maps of reality is not that we have to start from scratch, but that if our maps are to be accurate, we have to continually revise them. M. Scott Peck, MD, 1993 In July 1993, we promised that Circulation would be increasingly interactive with its readership through a balanced selection of manuscripts reflecting the best of the clinical and basic research work that is submitted. We stated that we wished to publish Circulation twice a month in the near future; to review brief communications and regular manuscripts and communicate our decisions to authors within 2 and 4 weeks, respectively; and to provide a Cardiovascular News section, a monthly Clinicopathological Conference, a Cardiovascular Images section, and one to three editorials focusing on specific contributions in each issue. We committed ourselves to more timely publication of the brief communications and regular articles. We are pleased to introduce twice-monthly publication of Circulation starting with this month, January 1995. Some question the value of such an effort, but we expect to be able to publish excellent manuscripts more rapidly in a slimmed-down version of Circulation and to compete even more effectively for the best clinical and basic research work as it applies to human disease, including the major clinical trials. Ultimately, I hope for even more frequent publication of Circulation as I believe that worldwide cardiovascular medicine deserves a weekly publication, and publishing the journal every 2 weeks is a step in that direction. We have not yet kept some of the other commitments made in an editorial in July 1993 (Willerson JT. Circulation: in the next 5 years. Circulation. 1993;888:1-3). After 1 year of publishing Circulation from the Texas Medical Center in Houston, we have been communicating decisions for brief communications within 2.5 weeks and for all manuscripts within 5.7 weeks. It still requires a longer period than is desirable to publish manuscripts in Circulation. We hope to do better, but we need the readership’s support. There are inevitable delays in review times if reviewers refuse to review a manuscript or if they do not return manuscripts to our office within the 2 to 3 weeks allotted for the review. There are also unavoidable delays if the review returned is not a useful one. On occasion, a reviewer has never returned a manuscript. Available reviewers committed to providing useful and timely reviews are an essential part of any journal’s ability to respond well and promptly to its potential authors and to making a first-class journal available to its readership every 2 weeks. The Cardiovascular News section, Cardiovascular Images, Clinicopathological Conferences, and our commitment to publish the best clinical work and basic science research related to human disease that is submitted to us provide a balance of material and, we hope, something for everyone interested in cardiovascular medicine. We are very grateful for the fine efforts of many reviewers who have made the publication of excellent cardiovascular work a pleasure. We appreciate the opportunity to serve as stewards for Circulation and to share a commitment to help make it the journal of cardiovascular medicine that its readership deserves. Please join us in celebrating the opportunity to publish interesting cardiovascular medicine more frequently, more rapidly, and in a format that is easy to read and use and in extending to the American Heart Association our most sincere gratitude. When the opportunity arises to serve Circulation as a reviewer, please accept it and provide a timely and useful review. With our readership’s help, we shall continue to devote ourselves to making Circulation the best of its kind. Previous Back to top Next FiguresReferencesRelatedDetails January 1, 1995Vol 91, Issue 1 Advertisement Article InformationMetrics Copyright © 1995 by American Heart Associationhttps://doi.org/10.1161/01.CIR.91.1.244 Originally publishedJanuary 1, 1995 Advertisement

Academic Affiliations of Social Work Journal Article Authors

The academic affiliations of the authors of all regular journal articles published in the Journal of Social Service Research, Social Work, Social Service Review, Journal of Social Work Education, Social Casework, and Child Welfare between 1984-1988 were reviewed and tabulated, producing a ranking of the colleges and universities whose faculty are making the most substantive contributions to the social work literature. The resulls are compared with the findings of a similar, previously published, study covering the years 1979-1983, allowing an assessment of any changes in the relative rankings of these academic institutions.

Journal of Psychotherapy Practice and Research

The<i>Journal of Psychotherapy Practice and Research</i>, now in its second year of publication, states as its aim "to address the professional understanding of human behavior and to enhance the psychotherapeutic treatment of mental disorders." In the inaugural issue, the editors further define the journal's goals: to "enhance our appreciation of the conduct of psychotherapy by addressing clinical concerns reflected by single case or small sample reports, as well as by publishing important research initiatives that attempt to deepen our understanding of how different psychotherapies work, and for whom, by studying larger groups of patients." As well as regular articles, the journal has published special articles, clinical and research reports, grand rounds case presentations, reprints of classic articles, editorial commentaries, and book reviews. Fairly diverse topics are covered, including clinical applications of theoretically derived hypotheses, studies of technical interventions, psychotherapeutic approaches to treatment of specific disorders, and others. A few