» INSTRUCTIONS FOR AUTHORS

INSTRUCTIONS FOR AUTHORS

Authors are advised to strictly follow the Instructions for Authors when preparing their manuscripts to ensure a smooth submission process.

1. MANUSCRIPT PREPARATION

Research papers and review papers are accepted on the understanding that they have not been and will not be published elsewhere without the Editor-in-Chief’s permission. Papers accepted become the copyright of the Universiti Putra Malaysia Press.

Research paper is a full-length original empirical research paper that has not been published previously and should not exceed 7,500 words from introduction to conclusion (not including references) (including no more than five tables and figures combined). A research paper should not contain more than 40 references.

Review paper is a critical evaluation of materials about current research that has already been published by organizing, integrating, and evaluating previously published materials. It synthesizes the status of knowledge and proposes future research directions within the journal’s scope. It should not exceed 10,000 words from introduction to conclusion (not including references) (including allowance for no more than five tables and figures combined). A review paper should not contain more than 120 references.

Language

Manuscripts to be submitted should be written in clear and comprehensible English. Authors whose native language is not English are strongly advised to have their manuscripts checked by an English-speaking colleague before submission. It is the author’s responsibility to pay attention to grammar and spelling.

Originality

The author must ensure that when a manuscript is submitted to the International Food Insights Journal (IFIJ), the manuscript must be an original work. The author should check the manuscript for any possible plagiarism using any program, such as Turnitin or any other software, before submitting the manuscript to IFIJ.

All submitted manuscripts must be in the journal’s acceptable similarity index range:

≤ 18% - PASS

> 18% - REJECT

Generative AI technologies may only be used to improve the readability and language of the manuscript. They should not be used to generate content during the manuscript writing process. Authors must declare the use of generative AI in writing by adding a statement at the end of the manuscript upon submission. The declaration statement should be placed in a new section before the list of references. An example:

Title of section: Declaration of the Use of Generative AI

Declaration statement: The author(s) used [name of AI tool] for [purpose] during the preparation of this manuscript.

Author(s) with nothing to declare may write as follows:

Declaration statement: The author(s) declare that no generative AI was used in the preparation, writing, or editing of this manuscript.

Authorship

All persons designated as authors should qualify for authorship. Each author should have participated sufficiently in the work to take public responsibility for the content. Authorship credit should be based only on substantial contributions to (1) conception and design, or analysis and interpretation of data; to (2) drafting the article or revising it critically for important intellectual content; and on (3) final approval of the version to be published. Conditions 1, 2, and 3 must all be met. Participation solely in the acquisition of funding or the collection of data does not justify authorship. General supervision of the research group is not sufficient for authorship. Any part of an article critical to its main conclusions must be the responsibility of at least one author. Editors may ask authors to describe what each contributed; this information may be published. Increasingly, multicenter trials are attributed to a corporate author. All members of the group, who are named as authors, either in the authorship position below the title or in a footnote, should fully meet the above criteria

When submitting a manuscript to IFIJ, the corresponding author has the opportunity to recommend up to four potential reviewers for the manuscript. The suggested reviewers must not be the co-authors listed in this manuscript and must not have seen the manuscript before. It is advised to suggest reviewers from other institutions. The editors are not, however, bound by these suggestions.

Copyright

Copyright violation is an important, and possibly related, ethical issue. Authors are obliged to ensure that their manuscripts comply with copyright regulations, including obtaining formal permission for the reproduction of quotations, figures, tables, or other materials derived from previously published works or online sources. Such permissions must be secured before submission to the lFIJ.

Ethical Considerations

Studies involving animal or human subjects must obtain ethics clearance from the relevant body. Authors should specify the approving committee and include a statement confirming that informed consent was obtained from all participants.

2. MANUSCRIPT FORMAT

Microsoft Word files containing title page information, anonymized manuscript, figure(s) and/or table(s), and cover letter should be uploaded in ScholarOne Manuscripts.

Title Page

The title page should consist of the following information:

Title: Should be written in the form of lower-case with capitalization of the first word.
Author names and affiliations: Please ensure that all authors’ full names are correctly spelled. Present the authors’ affiliation addresses below their names. Indicate all affiliations with number superscripts, before the author’s names and in front of the appropriate address. Please provide the full postal address of each affiliation.
Corresponding author: Clearly indicate who with (*) in front of the author’s name, and only the e-mail address of the corresponding author is allowed.
Acknowledgement: Should be kept to the absolute minimum.

Manuscript

Manuscripts should be double-spaced, typed using 11-point Arial typeface with a margin of 1 inch on all four sides.

IFIJ follows a double anonymized review process, which means author identities are concealed from reviewers and vice versa. Author identifying information should not appear anywhere in the main manuscript document to preserve anonymity during the review process. Please do not include any acknowledgments or disclose any funding information in the manuscript intended for peer review.

The anonymized manuscript should be divided into the following sections:

Title: The manuscript title should be concise, descriptive, unambiguous, accurate, and reflect the precise contents of the manuscript
Abstract: Provides essential information in no more than 150 words, which includes stating the purpose of the research, methods, key findings, and conclusions. It should be intelligible without reference to the paper itself. Non-standard or uncommon abbreviations should be avoided, but if essential, they must be defined at their first mention in the abstract itself.
Keywords: A minimum of 3 keywords and a maximum of 6 keywords are allowed to indicate the essentials of the research work. Separate the keywords with commas.
Introduction: Provides the context, problem statement, and purpose of the study.
Literature Review: Discussion of related theories, models, and previous studies.
Methods: Research design should be presented systematically. For experimental or science-based studies, only new methods need to be described in detail for reproducibility. Established or published methods must have adequate reference. Relevant modifications should be described.
Results: Report clearly and concisely. Presentation of results with tables and figures may improve its clarity.
Implications: Explains the theoretical and practical implications of the results.
Limitations and Directions for Future Research: Acknowledge the limitations of the study and provide recommendations for future research.
Conclusion: Summary of results interpretation with suggested recommendations. Highlight the novel contributions. The conclusion should not merely repeat points made in the preceding sections.
Ethical Statement: Studies involving animal or human subjects must obtain ethics clearance from the relevant body. Authors should specify the approving committee and include a statement confirming that informed consent was obtained.
Declaration of the Use of AI: Authors must declare whether generative AI was used in the preparation of the manuscript.
References: Authors should follow the American Psychological Association (APA) (7th ed.) reference style and citations.

Headings of the sections are to be bold and not underlined. They should appear clearly on their own. Any subsections should be given a brief heading, italicized, and they should also appear clearly on their own separate line. Authors are advised to minimize subsections.

Tables, Figures, and Photographs

Tables, figures, and photographs should be embedded within the main document and located near the sections of text to which they refer. Tables, figures, and photographs should be numbered consecutively in accordance with their appearance in the text. Tables are captioned on top of the table body and place any table notes below the table body with proper indications to the contents in the table body (if needed). Figures are captioned at the bottom of the figures. Tables and figures should be placed as editable text and not as images. Scanned or digital photographs should be in high resolution, minimum 300 dpi in the PC format. A maximum of five tables, figures, and photographs combined only allowed; hence, be sparing.

Footnotes

Footnotes should be kept to a minimum; in most cases, it will be possible to incorporate the information in the text. If footnotes are used, they should be numbered in the text, indicated by superscript numbers, and kept as brief as possible.

References

Reference style

IFIJ follows the APA (7th ed.) reference style and citations. It is the authors’ responsibility to provide accurate details of the bibliographic citations. Please ensure that all references cited within the text must also be present in the reference list and vice versa.

Citation in text

In APA, in-text citations are inserted in the text of manuscripts to briefly document the source of the information. Please follow the author-date method of in-text citation. In the author-date method, the author and date are included within the body of the paper and include a corresponding reference in the Reference list.

In-text citations may be parenthetical or narrative.

In parenthetical citations, use an ampersand (&) between names for a work with two authors or before the last author when all names must be included to avoid ambiguity.
In narrative citations, always spell out the word “and.”

The format of the author element of the in-text citation changes depending on the number of authors and is abbreviated in some cases.

For a work with one or two authors, include the author name(s) in every citation.
For a work with three or more authors, include the name of only the first author plus “et al.” in every citation (even the first citation).

When citing multiple works parenthetically, place the citations in alphabetical order, separating them with semicolons.

Reference list

All references should be arranged alphabetically by authors’ name, listing all authors, the full title of articles and journals, the publisher, and the year. Please note that journal names are not to be abbreviated. The references in text and in the list of the manuscript should be cross-checked to ensure similarity.

Examples:

Journal

Author, A. A., Author, B. B., & Author, C. C. (year). Article title. Journal Name, vol. no.(issue no.), page range. DOI or URL

Book

Author, A. A., Author, B. B., & Author, C. C. (year). Book title. Publisher.

Chapter in Book

Author, A. A., Author, B. B., & Author, C. C. (year). Chapter title. In A. Editor, B. Editor, & C. Editor (Eds.), Book title (pp. xxx–xxx). Publisher.

Website

Author, A. A., Author, B. B., & Author, C. C. (date). Title of work. Site Name. URL

Conference Proceedings

Contributor, A. A., Contributor, B. B., & Contributor, C. C. (date). Title of contribution [Type of contribution]. Conference name, location. DOI or URL

Please refer to the Publication Manual of the American Psychological Association (7th ed.) for further details: https://apastyle.apa.org/

Page Numbering

Every page of the manuscript should be numbered.

English Spelling

Authors should follow American English spelling.

Miscellaneous

IFIJ does not include any appendices, abbreviations, or supplementary materials in the publication. Hence, authors are advised to include them in the manuscript text if they are necessary. Any abbreviation should be stated in brackets next to the full name at the beginning of the text before proceeding to use the abbreviation. Chemical compounds should be stated with their full name first, and the chemical formulae in brackets.

Standard units – Please follow these examples: 5 g, 1 h, 30 s, 5 min, 10%, 37°C, 2 mL, 2 mg/mL (not 2 mg mL-1)

3. MANUSCRIPT SUBMISSION

All submissions must be made electronically via the ScholarOne Manuscripts link on the Manuscript Submission page.

Submission Checklist

Please use the following list to perform the last checking of the manuscript prior to submitting it to IFIJ for review.

Ensure that the following items are checked and present:

E-mail address of corresponding author only
Full names and affiliation addresses of all authors
Anonymized manuscript compiled in a single Microsoft Word file
Manuscript has been spell-checked and grammar-checked
All figure captions
All tables (including title, description, footnotes)
References are in the correct format
Do not exceed the word limit
Declaration Form

Declaration Form

Authors have to sign a declaration form. In signing the form, authors declare that the work submitted for publication is original, previously unpublished, and not under consideration for any publication elsewhere. The Declaration Form can be submitted through the ScholarOne Manuscripts system.

4. PUBLICATION CHARGE

There are no fees payable to submit or publish in IFIJ.

5. AFTER ACCEPTANCE

Copyright Form

Authors will be asked to sign a copyright form when the paper is accepted. In signing the form, it is assumed that authors have obtained permission to use any copyrighted or previously published material. All authors must read and agree to the conditions outlined in the form and must sign the form or agree that the corresponding author can sign on their behalf. Papers cannot be published until a signed form has been received.

Production

IFIJ will keep authors informed of their paper’s progress throughout the production process. Proofs will be sent by email to the corresponding author and should be returned promptly to avoid delaying publication. Authors are reminded to check their proofs carefully to confirm that all author information, including names, affiliations, sequence, and contact details are correct, and that Funding and Conflict of Interest statements, if any, are accurate. This is the final opportunity to make changes to the manuscript. Further corrections will not be possible after publication. Changes to the author list are not permitted at this stage.

Publication

Authors will be provided with online access to their published articles. The corresponding author will receive the access link, which can be shared with co-authors, contacts, and peers.

Publication Frequency

IFIJ is published twice a year in June and December. Papers are released online, and accepted papers are scheduled for publication in the next available issue after the editorial and production process is completed.

6. AUTHOR INQUIRIES

Please send any inquiries to ifij@upm.edu.my

Authors are encouraged to refer to the IFIJ website for the latest updates: ifij.upm.edu.my

EDITOR-IN-CHIEF

Faculty of Food Science and Technology

Universiti Putra Malaysia

43400 UPM Serdang, Selangor

Malaysia

Phone: +(6)03-9769 5100

Email: ifij@upm.edu.my

Website: food.upm.edu.my

PUBLISHER