Journal of Language and Social Psychology
Interpersonal Communication | Language and communication | Social Psychology (General)
The JLSP publishes theory driven research that thoroughly explicates the psychological mechanisms explaining how language functions in social interaction. The JLSP values well-articulated work that thoroughly deduces hypotheses and/or poses meaningful research questions. The JLSP aims to publish work with precisely detailed narratives that explain why causal connections exist among constructs. The JLSP publishes exploratory, descriptive, and pure replication work, primarily as Short Research Reports; at the same time, the Journal prioritizes full-length research reports that advance theory using sophisticated methods appropriate for the (causal, correlation, behavioral, cognitive, etc.) claims being tested.
Notwithstanding its history of publishing quantitative experimental social science, the JLSP accepts submissions employing any method or epistemology, as well as articles with pure theoretical agendas and no data. The JLSP values stimulus generalizability (especially for papers reporting a single study), as well as multi-study conceptual replications that operationally diversify efforts across studies within a single article. Multi-study articles may employ the same tool, such as a 3-experiment paper, or they can use diverse methods, such as a computational language model reported alongside a survey. Articles with methodological triangulation via diverse and/or mixed methods are effective means of theoretical advancement, particularly when authors directly discuss (in)consistencies and theoretical and operational implications across studies; and the JLSP aims to publish such efforts.
The JLSP aims to publish research on the social psychology of language use with social justice implications and practical utility whenever possible. The JLSP prioritizes work on the social psychological mechanisms of linguistically leveraged oppression, discrimination, and related processes. Publishing contextually consequential work with far reaching benefits for humanity and social change is an aim of the JLSP. Example contexts with strong social justice implications for language and social psychology and attendant fields include, but are not limited to: intimate partner abuse and violence, cyberbullying and mental health, hate graffiti, social media misinformation, elder abuse, political advertisements and polarization, charitable contributions, online dating and loneliness, sexual consent, collective action and organizing, environmental campaigns and preservation efforts, policy/law implementation, neo-pronouns, revisionist history, reproductive rights, health disclaimers and medical adherence, social and emotional support, music lyrics and well-being, and police brutality.
Regardless of the topic, the JLSP aims to publish articles that advance theory employing rigorous methods on fundamental processes of language and social psychology, such as communication, social cognition, message production and processing, power dynamics, intergroup vitality, ageing, ethnicity, bilingualism, discourse and conversation, person perception and message attitudes, digitally mediated social interaction, human-computer interaction, emotion and physiology, and gender and sexual identities.
For more on aims and scope, consult Palomares (2024), A vision for the continued success of the JLSP, Vol. 43(1), p 9-13 (https://doi.org/10.1177/0261927X231206337).
| Nicholas A. Palomares | University of Texas at Austin, USA |
| Howard Giles | University of California, Santa Barbara, USA; The University of Queensland, Brisbane, Australia |
| John A. Banas | University of Oklahoma, USA |
| Ali H. Al-Hoorie | Royal Commission for Jubail and Yanbu, Saudi Arabia |
| Martha Augoustinos | University of Adelaide, Australia |
| Natalie N. Bazarova | Cornell University, USA |
| Quinten S. Bernhold | University of Tennessee, Knoxville, USA |
| Megan E. Birney | Staffordshire University, UK |
| Kate G. Blackburn | University of Texas, Austin, USA |
| David E. Clementson | University of Georgia, USA |
| Brandon Van Der Heide | Michigan State University, USA |
| William A. Donohue | Michigan State University, USA |
| Marko Dragojevic | University of Kentucky, USA |
| Norah E. Dunbar | University of California, Santa Barbara, USA |
| John R.. Edwards | St Francis Xavier University and Dalhousie University, Canada |
| Susan R. Fussell | Cornell University, USA |
| Jessica Gasiorek | University of Hawaii, Manoa, USA |
| Cynthia Gordon | Georgetown University, USA |
| Pascal Gygax | University of Fribourg, Switzerland |
| Jeffrey A. Hall | University of Kansas, USA |
| Mark Hamilton | University of Connecticut, USA |
| Karolina Hansen | University of Warsaw, Poland |
| Jake Harwood | University of Arizona, USA |
| Andrew C. High | Pennsylvania State University, USA |
| Tom Holtgraves | Ball State University, USA |
| Nicholas S. Holtzman | Southeastern Louisiana University, USA |
| Kokil Jaidka | National Singapore University, Singapore |
| Janice L. Krieger | University of Florida, USA |
| Hans J. Ladegaard | The Hong Kong Polytechnic University, Hong Kong, China |
| Timothy R. Levine | University of Alabama at Birmingham, USA |
| Wang Liao | University of Washington, USA |
| David M. Markowitz | Michigan State University, USA |
| Matthew S. McGlone | University of Texas-Austin, USA |
| Joann M. Montepare | Lasell College, USA |
| Silvia Moscatelli | University of Bologna, Italy |
| Margaret J. Pitts | University of Arizona, USA |
| Scott A. Reid | University of California, Santa Barbara, USA |
| Kim Serota | Oakland University, USA |
| Lijiang Shen | Pennsylvania State University, USA |
| Natasha Shrikant | University of Colorado, Boulder, USA |
| Hillary C. Shulman | Ohio State University, USA |
| Anna Stefaniak | St. Andrews University, UK |
| Robbie M. Sutton | University of Kent, UK |
| Karen Tracy | University of Colorado, Boulder, USA |
| Joseph B. Walther | University of California, Santa Barbara, USA |
| Kevin A. Whitehead | University of California, Santa Barbara, USA |
| Sally Wiggins | Linköping University, Sweden |
| Steven R. Wilson | University of South Florida, USA |
Full paper manuscripts should not exceed 11,000 words (including abstract [no more than 150 words], keywords, title, text, references [with DOIs], endnotes, tables, figures, and appendices) on double-spaced pages using 12-point font. For Short Research Reports, manuscripts should not exceed 4,000 words (including everything). Online only supplementary material do not count toward word limits. Authors should double-check text-to-references for accuracy and presence. Manuscripts should be anonymized in document attributes and in text for double-blind peer review. Manuscripts should be prepared in accordance with the American Psychological Association (APA) current edition guidelines (https://apastyle.apa.org/). Authors may consult the sample articles below as an example for guidance on formatting headings, subheadings, tables, figures, and acknowledgments.
JLSP FORMATTING EXAMPLES:
- Generative AI Are More Truth-Biased Than Humans: A Replication and Extension of Core Truth-Default Theory Principles: https://doi.org/10.1177/0261927X231220404
- Depression and Reciprocal Language Style Matching in Text Messages: https://doi.org/10.1177/0261927X231163305
Successful submissions to the JLSP will a) test and advance theory focused on the social psychology of language use, b) employ rigorous and appropriate methods, c) be well-written and concisely articulated, and d) demonstrate theoretical and practical implications to language and social psychology and related fields. Short Research Reports should focus more on b) method, c) clear writing, and d) implications and less on a) theory advancement, given the word limit. Short Research Reports can pursue pure replication agendas (with no or minimal extensions) as well. Submissions with pure theoretical and non-empirical pursuits are also welcome, though their novelty and utility must be thoroughly justified; likewise, articles with methodological goals are encouraged with proper justification. Quantitative research should be clear and thorough about reliability and validity of measures and manipulations; report effect sizes, central tendency, and variability, a priori power estimates for sample sizes; be cognizant of generalizability limits; and attend to effect sizes as well as statistical significance when discussing conclusions and implications of results. Computational research should be clear in the source of data, as well as how various filtering and algorithmic decision were made computationally and how those computational choices align with conceptual ones. Meta-analyses should be clear regarding how the study advances theory, which articles in their references were employed for tests, and how inclusion decisions were made. Qualitative work should be clear about the procedures used to check the validity of conclusions, such as negative case analysis or member-checking, and explicitly articulate how empirical observations led to conclusions.
Authors must maintain publication ethics. Data fabrication/falsification, multiple publication of uncited author work, plagiarism, and other unethical conduct will not be tolerated and will be handled according to current practices (see:https://publicationethics.org/).
Writing should be clear and concise, avoiding redundancies when possible. For instance, multiple experiment submissions should be super-efficient when methods are identical or very similar to streamline methods and results for experiments. Likewise, descriptive and inferential statistics reported in tables should not also be reported in the text. Authors should aim for cogent arguments that explicate processes and mechanisms germane to the social psychology of language use. When discussing conclusions, claims should align with tests of hypotheses and answers to research questions.
Authors are encouraged to use Open Science Framework (https://osf.io/) or other pre-registration and open science platforms when possible for submissions in the design and reporting stages of research. Materials and data should be made available when ethically possible. As part of our commitment to ensuring an ethical, transparent, and fair peer review process, Sage is a supporting member of ORCID, the Open Researcher and Contributor ID. ORCID provides a unique and persistent digital identifier that distinguishes researchers from every other researcher, even those who share the same name, and, through integration in key research workflows such as manuscript and grant submission, supports automated linkages between researchers and their professional activities, ensuring that their work is recognized.