Article types
Formazione & Insegnamento publishes different types of scientific papers (in Italian, English, and Spanish) and acknowledges that scientific output comes in many forms and fashions. In doing so, quality is paramount—both in terms of research process, output and writing. The journal publishes only papers that are original and previously unpublished.
In particular, the journal prioritizes research articles (e.g., with regards to book reviews). Please note that the definition of “research article” varies across different subject fields. For instance, a research article in philosophy of education might not share the same concern for empirical data analysis of an experimental inquiry. For this reason, the journal does not distinguish between articles and essays—quality evaluation is left to reviewers. When words such as “research” and “essays” are used in the journal, they usually refer to different sections, which are usually thematic in nature (e.g., “essays on social work”). The inclusion of a paper in one such sections does not entail an increase or decrease in its qualitative outlook.
As a thumb-rule, we invite prospective Authors to consider whether their manuscript contains either of the following:
- Empirical or data analysis
- Literature reviews
- Methodological works
- Presentation or critique of theories
- Logic models
In strictly editorial terms, the above fall within the "articles" class. Here follows a comprehensive outline of all the types of published contributions (including the aforementioned "articles"):
- Articles (abstract: 150 words; word limit: 3,500–6,000 words excluding abstract, tables, figures, graphs, and references). This category is subject to double-blind peer-review and includes theoretical and empirical research papers.
- Editorials (no abstract; word limit: 800–1,500 words excluding tables, figures, graphs, and references). Writing editorials is usually the responsibility of editors or guest editors.
- Book reviews (no abstract; word limit: 2,000 words excluding tables, figures, graphs, and references; max references: 5). Formazione & insegnamento welcomes authors who would like to review and comment on recently published works of scientific relevance for the field of education (preferably foreign works that have not yet been translated in Italian). Book reviews are not subject to anonymous peer review.
- Corrections (no abstract; word limit varies). These are Errata corrige and are usually titled “Corrigendum: Title of the original article”. Please note that Corrections shall be used for all variations of the content of the article excluding cosmetic changes (e.g., typos, miss-spellings, URL updates, etc.) since the latter are implemented on the original article.
In addition to the above categories, Formazione & insegnamento publishes conference proceedings. The publication process of conference proceedings is in all respects analogous to that of articles, but with the following differences:
- When the conference is promoted with the joint contribution of Formazione & Insegnamento, a thematic call for papers will be issued, which overlaps with the conference call. In this case, the editorial process for the selection of conference participants will correspond to the editorial process of articles.
- When the conference is not directly promoted by Formazione & insegnamento, the conference organizers may reach out to the editorial board in order to secure a publication agreement. If an agreement is found, conference papers shall be submitted to Formazione & insegnamento. However, the journal will carry out its own peer review and editorial process independently from that of the organizers.
In both the above cases, the editorial board decides whether to publish a “special issue” containing only the conference papers that have passed the journal’s peer review or to publish the conference papers that have passed the journal’s peer review in a special section of the regular issue of the journal.
