The Psychology of Music editorial office strongly prefers manuscripts in .doc or .docx. We understand that some authors prefer LaTex document preparation, but please be aware that formatting consistency issues that arise during production require technical assistance. This could delay publication of your article.

Please observe basic manuscript article formatting conventions to ensure that your work is easy to read. E.g., use 1-inch margins, left alignment, double-space throughout the paper, and 0.5-inch indent for the first line of each paragraph. Use a readable font like 11-point Calibri or Arial, or 12-point Times New Roman.

See below for accepted file types and formatting requirements of graphics, figures etc.

Please ensure that your heading levels are clear and the sections clearly defined. It is not adequate simply to change the text appearance to bold or italic, etc. You must apply header styles as per your document preparation system to organise the structure of your manuscript.

Manuscript structure and reporting standards

We welcome original research that addresses the social impact of music, and acknowledge the diverse reporting practices inherent in critical, applied, and qualitative psychological research. Our journal's editorial policy prioritizes methodological integrity over standardized reporting.

The American Psychological Association (APA) Style, 7th edition, outlines clear guidelines for manuscript structure and reporting to promote clarity, consistency, and readability. Referencing, statistical reporting, and the presentation of tables must adhere to our guidelines (see below), which follow APA conventions. We recommend adopting APA Style broadly throughout written work.

Additionally, the APA offer guidelines including various journal article reporting standards (JARS) resources. Authors of original empirical investigations may choose to follow APA guidelines for reporting quantitative, qualitative and mixed methods studies.

Authors of theoretical critical papers should use an effective and transparent reporting structure appropriate to their work.

If how you wish to report your research does not align with other aspects of submission guidelines (e.g., manuscript format, word count, or data availability), we encourage authors and reviewers to consult with the Editors.

Title

Your manuscript’s title should be concise, descriptive, unambiguous, accurate, and reflect the precise contents of the manuscript. A descriptive title that includes the topic of the manuscript makes an article more findable in the major indexing services.

Abstract

Prepare an unstructured abstract of 150-200 words that concisely states the purpose of the research, its major findings, and conclusions. If your research includes clinical trials, the trial registry name, URL, and registration number must be included at the end of the abstract. At the point of submission, the web form includes a separate text box for your abstract. After acceptance, the abstract should be placed between the title and main body of your manuscript when preparing your final, de-anonymised version.

Keywords

Please prepare a minimum of 5 keywords. Keywords should be as specific as possible to the research topic. As per the Abstract, these are entered separately on submission; after acceptance, the final version should list keywords in one line after the abstract.

Artwork, figures, and other graphics

Figure resolution is 300dpi. For guidance on the preparation of illustrations, pictures, and graphs in electronic format, it is essential that authors read Sage’s artwork guidelines. 

Figures supplied in colour will appear in colour online regardless of whether or not these illustrations are reproduced in colour in the printed version. If you have requested colour reproduction in the print version, we will advise you of the costs on receipt of your accepted article.

Ensure that you have obtained any necessary permission from copyright holders for reproducing any illustrations, tables, figures, or lengthy quotations previously published elsewhere. For further information including guidance on fair dealing for criticism and review, please see the Frequently Asked Questions page on the Sage Journal Author Gateway.

Reference style and citation

Psychology of Music follows APA reference style.

Every in-text citation must have a corresponding citation in the reference list and vice versa. Corresponding citations must have identical spelling and year.

Authors should update any references to preprints when a peer-reviewed version is made available, to cite the published research. Citations to preprints are otherwise discouraged.

Statistical reporting

Use tables or figures to present large amounts of statistical information clearly. Ensure clarity by labelling every statistic and providing descriptions as necessary.

• With the exception of Greek letters, use italics for statistical symbols (M, SD, N, t, p, etc.).
• Round to two decimal places unless more precision is necessary.
• Provide exact p-values (e.g., p = .034) unless p < .001.

For descriptive statistics, report mean and standard deviation as M = xx.xx, SD = xx.xx. Use N for total sample size and n for subgroup sizes

For inferential statistics, present as follows:

• t-test: t(df) = xx.xx, p = .xxx.
• ANOVA: F(df1, df2) = xx.xx, p = .xxx, η² = .xx.
• Chi-Square: χ²(df, N = xx) = xx.xx, p = .xxx.
• Correlations: r(df) = .xx, p = .xxx.

Always report effect sizes to provide context for statistical significance. Common measures include:

• Cohen’s d for t-tests (e.g., d = .xx).
• η² or partial η² for ANOVA (e.g., η² = .xx).
• R² for regression analyses (e.g., R² = .xx).

Report 95% confidence intervals (CI) for effect sizes and parameter estimates. E.g., M = xx.xx, 95% CI [xx.xx, xx.xx].

For regression analyses, report coefficients (e.g., B = xx.xx), standard errors, t-values, and p-values. Include R² and adjusted R² to indicate the proportion of variance explained.

Table

Use a consistent format for all tables in your manuscript, numbering tables sequentially as they appear in the text (Table 1, Table 2, etc.). Do not try to present too much data in a single table. It is better to simplify complex data into easily digestible sections.

Mention each table in the text in the order they appear. For example, "As shown in Table 1..." Tables should appear near to their first citation.

Table components

• Clearly label all columns and rows. Use concise headings, and capitalize only the first word and proper nouns.
• Present data clearly in rows and columns. Align numbers by decimal points for clarity.
• Include notes below the table to explain, clarify, or provide additional information. Indicate whether these are general, specific, or probability notes.

Formatting details

• Use minimal horizontal lines for clarity. Avoid vertical lines and shading.
• Use the same font as the rest of your document, typically 12-point Times New Roman.
• Tables can be single or double-spaced depending on the table’s complexity and the manuscript requirements.

Title page

Psychology of Music’s review process involves double-blind peer review. To ensure fair and anonymous peer review, your manuscript must be fully anonymized. Please ensure any identifying information is removed from the main manuscript document and included on the Title Page instead. Do not include any author names in the manuscript file name and remove names from headers and footers.

This version of the manuscript is sent to the peer reviewers. The Title Page will not be sent to peer reviewers.

See the Sage Journal Author Gateway for detailed guidance on making an anonymous submission.

The Title Page must include:

a. Article title
b. The full list of authors including names and affiliations of each

• The listed affiliation should be the institution where the research was conducted. If an author has moved to a new institution since completing the research, the new affiliation can be included in a note at the end of the manuscript – please indicate this on the title page.
• All persons eligible for authorship must be included at the time of submission (please see the authorship section for more information).

c. Contact information for the corresponding author: name, institutional address, phone, email
d. Acknowledgments section
e. Statements and declarations

• Ethical approval and informed consent statements,/li>
• Declaration of conflicting interest
• Funding statement
• Data availability statement

f. Any other identifying information related to the authors and/or their institutions, funders, approval committees, etc, that might compromise anonymity.

Acknowledgments

Any acknowledgements section will be published at the end of your article. The Acknowledgments section should include all contributors who do not meet the criteria for authorship. Per ICMJE recommendations, it is best practice to obtain consent from non-author contributors who you are acknowledging in your manuscript.

If you have received any writing or editing assistance from a third-party – for example, a specialist communications company, or the use of generative AI for this purpose – this must be clearly stated in the Acknowledgements section and in the covering letter. Please see the Sage Author Gateway for what information to include in your Acknowledgements section. If your submission is being made on your behalf by someone who is not listed as an author, for example the third-party who provided writing/editing assistance, you must state this in the Acknowledgements and also in your covering letter. Please note that the journal editor reserves the right to not consider submissions made by a third party rather than by the author/s themselves.

Statements and declarations

To ensure proper anonymization, please include a section with the heading ‘Statements and Declarations’ on your Title page, after the Acknowledgements section (and Author Contributions section if applicable) including each of the sub-headings listed below. If a declaration is not applicable to your submission, you must still include the heading and state ‘Not applicable’ underneath. Please note that you may be asked to justify why a declaration was not applicable to your submission by the Editorial Office. This information will be added to the end of your published paper.

Ethical considerations

Psychology of Music requires authors to demonstrate their compliance with ethical research practices.

All papers reporting studies involving human participants, human data or human tissue must state that the relevant Ethics Committee or Institutional Review Board approved the study, or waived the requirement for approval, providing the full name and institution of the review committee in addition to the approval number. If applicable, please also include this information in the Methods section of your manuscript.

You can find information on what to say in your ethical statements as well as example statements on Sage’s Publication ethics and research integrity policies page.

Consent to participate

Please include any participant consent information under this heading and state whether informed consent to participate was written or verbal. If the requirement for informed consent to participate has been waived by the relevant Ethics Committee or Institutional Review Board (i.e. where it has been deemed that consent would be impossible or impracticable to obtain), please state this. If this is not applicable to your manuscript, please state ‘Not applicable’ in this section. More information and example statements can be found on our Publication ethics and research integrity policies page.

Consent for publication

Submissions containing any data from an individual person (including individual details, images or videos) must include a statement confirming that informed consent for publication was provided by the participant(s) or a legally authorized representative. Non-essential identifying details should be omitted. Please do not submit the participant’s actual written informed consent with your article, as this in itself breaches the participant’s confidentiality. The Journal requests that you confirm to us, in writing, that you have obtained written informed consent to publish but the written consent itself should be held by the authors/investigators themselves, for example in a patient’s hospital record. The confirmatory letter may be uploaded with your submission as a separate file in addition to the statement confirming that consent to publish was obtained within the manuscript text. If this is not applicable to your manuscript, please state ‘Not applicable’ in this section.

Declaration of conflicting interest

The journal requires a declaration of conflicting interests from all authors so that a statement can be included in your article. For guidance on conflict of interest statements, see our policy on conflicting interest declarations.

If no conflict exists, your statement should read: ‘The author(s) declared no potential conflicts of interest with respect to the research, authorship, and/or publication of this article’.

Funding statement

All articles need to include a funding statement, under a separate heading, even if you did not receive funding. You’ll find guidance and examples on our Funding page.

Supplemental material

Psychology of Music can host additional materials online (e.g. datasets, podcasts, videos, images, etc.) alongside the full text of the article. Your supplemental material must be one of our accepted file types. For that list and more information please refer to our guidelines on submitting supplemental files.

English language editing services

Authors seeking assistance with English language editing, translation, or figure and manuscript formatting to fit the journal’s specifications should consider using Sage Author Services. Visit Sage Author Services for further information.

The journal will consider submissions of manuscripts that have been posted on preprint servers.

Please enter the preprint DOI in the designated field when submitting your manuscript. We advise that you inform the Journal Editorial office about your posted preprint at submission.

Note that you should not post an updated version of your manuscript on a preprint server while it is being peer reviewed.

Learn more about our preprint policy.

• ORCID ID of the submitting author.
  • It is strongly encouraged that all co-authors ensure their ORCID IDs are linked to their accounts in the submission system prior to article acceptance, as this is the only way to have their ORCID ID present on the published article. ORCID IDs cannot be added to manuscripts after acceptance/publication. Please note that each co-author must log in to the submission system to add their own ORCID ID to their account. To add an ORCID ID, edit your account, click the link when prompted, and sign into your ORCID account to validate your ID. You will then be redirected back to the submission system and your ORCID ID will become part of your accepted publication’s metadata.
  • Please create an ORCID ID if you do not already have one or visit our ORCID homepage to learn more.