Author guidelines

Scope

Annals of Work Exposures and Health is an official publication of the British Occupational Hygiene Society. To publish the Journal, the British Occupational Hygiene Society partners with Oxford University Press (OUP), a not-for-profit publisher and a department of the University of Oxford. Learn more about how publishing with OUP reinvests in the scholarly community on the OUP For Authors page.

Annals of Work Exposures and Health publishes original research that helps reduce risk of ill-health resulting from work. Successful submissions have a strong focus on the assessment or control of exposures, or the associations between specific work exposures and health. For more details, including some categories which we do not normally consider, see our About page.

Please note that Annals complies with the major funding body requirements for open access publication (e.g. the RCUK, Wellcome Trust and the NIH). Further details on this can be found here.

We ask you to read the instructions below carefully and follow them closely. The editors may return manuscripts that do not follow these instructions.

How we publish

Annals of Work Exposures and Health is a peer reviewed journal publishing 9 issues per year online, plus occasional supplements.

Upon acceptance, the editorial office reviews the submitted files for completeness, and may request additional information from authors. For example, authors may be asked to provide higher resolution figures. The submitted files are typeset into Annals templates. Corresponding authors will access PDF proofs via e-mail, on which only minor alterations may be made.

After the proof corrections have been received from the authors and implemented, the article will be published on the Advance articles page of the Journal website. At publication, the corresponding author of a published paper will receive a URL for free access to the online article. The Journal uses the digital object identifier (DOI) system, which enables the paper to be indexed and cited at this stage in a way which remains valid after transfer to an issue. The paper will be transferred later to an issue of the Journal.

Submitting

After preparing your manuscript according to the guidance in the Preparing your manuscript section, you can submit your work through the Journal’s online submission site. If you have not used our submission site before, you will need to create an account. Additional help and instructions are available on the submission site as you go through the process. Please contact us with any questions about submitting your manuscript

Speed

The editors’ target is to send a decision to the author within two months of receiving a paper. In practice the median time achieved is about seven weeks.

Expedited review offered to graduate students

In recognition of the time pressures some students will experience as they near program completion, Annals of Work Exposures and Health offers students expedited review of papers that are submitted to the Journal. The editors will make every attempt to return a first decision with review comments within four weeks of submission. If you qualify, please identify your student status in the submitted cover letter and request expedited review of your manuscript.

Articles from a thesis or dissertation may be submitted, consistent with the rights statements in the Author Self-archiving and Public Access section, but authors may wish to embargo their thesis or dissertation so that the work appears first in Annals.

Peer review process

The Journal operates single-anonymized peer review, meaning that the identity of the authors is known to the editors and to the reviewers, but that the reviewers’ identities are known only to the editors and are hidden from the authors.

During peer review, reviewers communicate directly with the editors but not the authors or other reviewers.

All submitted papers are screened by the Chief Editor for quality and alignment with Annals scope. Papers may be rejected after this screening. Once a submitted manuscript passes initial assessment, it will then be passed to a handling editor, who will oversee peer review and recommend a final decision. The Chief Editor makes the final decision on the submitted manuscript. The Chief Editor will inform the author of the outcome of the review, and what modifications, if any, are necessary to be further considered for acceptance. Reviewers’ anonymised comments will be transmitted to the author with the Editor’s decision. The decision will reflect not only technical considerations, but the priority of the material for the occupational hygiene community, and Annals scope. The Editor may make minor editorial changes to accepted material.

Editors and reviewers must not handle manuscripts if they have a conflict of interest with an author or the content. Editors make every effort to avoid potential conflicts of interest in the assignment of other editors and peer reviewers. For more information, please see the section on Disclosure of potential conflicts of interest. During the peer review phase, all papers which contain scientific data or opinions are typically reviewed by at least 2 people.

You must suggest at least 2 potential reviewers at submission. However, there is no guarantee the suggested reviewers will be selected by the Journal. Recommended reviewers should be experts in their field and able to provide an objective assessment of your manuscript without financial or interpersonal conflicts of interest with any authors. We encourage you to consider reviewers from a diverse range of backgrounds, including those from under-represented communities. 

At the time of submission, you may request that specific individuals not be used as reviewers of your manuscript. However, there is no guarantee these individuals will be excluded by the Journal. 

If your manuscript is accepted for publication, no information about the review process or editorial decision process is published, unless one of the authors has a role on the Journal. See the Disclosure of potential conflicts of interest section for more information in that case.

For full details about the peer review process, see Fair editing and peer review. 

Screening for misconduct

Manuscripts may be screened using iThenticate to help detect publication misconduct including plagiarism and redundant publication.

Appeals and complaints

As we receive many more papers than we have room for, the editors have to make a judgment on the importance of a paper. The decision of the Chief Editor is normally final, but an author may appeal if:

• the procedures spelt out here or published by COPE (see Publication Ethics section, Submission Ethics) have not been properly followed;
• the author can show that the objections by the editor and reviewers to the paper are based on major misunderstandings;
• the author can suggest ways of overcoming the major criticisms of the paper.

To make an appeal, please contact the editorial office at [email protected], providing as much specific detail as possible about why the original decision should be reconsidered. Every appeal will receive a response within a reasonable timeframe. Please do not resubmit your manuscript in the interim.

To register a complaint regarding non-editorial decisions, the Journal’s policies and procedures, editors, or staff, please contact [email protected]. Complaints will be taken seriously and will be carried forward following COPE guidelines and processes.

Publication and research ethics

Authorship

Authorship is limited to those who have made a significant contribution to the design and execution of the work described. Any contributors whose participation does not meet the criteria for authorship should be acknowledged but not listed as an author. The Journal will contact all listed authors at the point of submission to confirm their role. For a detailed definition of authorship, please see the International Committee of Medical Journal Editors (ICMJE) definitions of authors and contributors.

The Journal does not allow ghost authorship, where an unnamed author prepares the article with no credit, or guest/gift authorship, where an author who made little or no contribution is listed as an author. The Journal follows Committee on Publication Ethics (COPE) guidance on ghost, guest, or gift authorship. For more information, please see the OUP Publication Ethics page.

Natural language processing tools driven by artificial intelligence (AI) do not qualify as authors, and the Journal will screen for them in author lists. The use of AI (for example, to help generate content or images, write code, process data, or for translation) should be disclosed both in cover letters to editors and in the Methods or Acknowledgements section of manuscripts. Please see the COPE position statement on Authorship and AI for more details.

After manuscript submission, no authorship changes (including the authorship list, author order, and who is designated as the corresponding author) should be made unless there is a substantive reason to do so. The editor and all co-authors must agree on the change(s), and neither the Journal nor the publisher mediates authorship disputes. If individuals cannot agree on the authorship of a submitted manuscript, contact the editorial office at [email protected]. The dispute must be resolved among the individuals and their institution(s) before the manuscript can be accepted for publication. If an authorship dispute or change arises after a paper is accepted, contact OUP’s Author Support team. COPE provides guidance for authors on resolving authorship disputes.

After submission, changing who is designated as the corresponding author will be permitted only where there is a substantive reason to do so. For the avoidance of doubt, changing the corresponding author in order to access Read and Publish funding is not permissible. For more information on Read and Publish funding, see the Open access charges section.

ORCiD

Authors are encouraged to provide their ORCID iDs (Open Researcher and Contributor IDs) at submission and take advantage of the benefits of participating in ORCID. If you do not already have an ORCID iD, you can register for free via the ORCID website. 

As ORCID identifiers are collected, they are included in papers and displayed online, both in the HTML and PDF versions of the publication, in compliance with recommended practice issued by ORCID.

ORCID functionality online allows users to link to the ORCID website to view an author’s profile and list of publications. ORCID iDs are displayed on web pages and are sent downstream to third parties in data feeds, where supported.

If you have registered with ORCID, you can associate your ORCID iD with your submission system account by going to your account details, entering your ORCID iD, and validating your details. Learn more about ORCID and how to link it to your account.

Disclosure of potential conflicts of interest

Authors

The Journal follows the COPE guidance for any undisclosed conflict of interest that emerges during peer review, production, or after publication.

The corresponding author must complete a form concerning authorship and potential conflict of interest on behalf of all co-authors.. The form must be submitted even if there are no conflicts of interest to disclose, in which case the Conflict of Interest form and manuscript should state “none declared.”

The following must be declared on the form: contributions made by each author; contributors (if any) who are not identified as authors and their role; the role (if any) of the study sponsor, or other interested bodies, in preparing the research material, writing, reviewing or approving the submitted manuscript; the source of direct financial support for the work; any indirect sources of support including involvement of the authors in legal testimony or consultancy related to the material in the paper; any financial or other relationships with a body that could appear to influence what is in the paper, whether or not the content of the paper was discussed with that body, including any financial interest in products or companies producing products discussed in the paper. If in doubt, it is better to disclose any possible conflict of interest. The presence of a conflict will not disqualify the manuscript.

Reviewers

This journal is a member of the Committee on Publication Ethics (COPE), so reviewers may want to read their guidelines for reviewers, which address important considerations.

Reviewers are expected to identify and communicate to the Editor potential conflicts of interest or competing interests with manuscripts either due to relationships with the authors or scientific conflicts that may impair their ability to provide independent review of the quality of the work. Some examples of interests that should lead reviewers (and Editors) to recuse themselves include, but are not limited to: role as an expert or consultant in litigation, philosophical or conceptual disagreement that may bias review, employment by a company that makes a product or provides a service that competes with the subject of the research. Reviewers may recuse themselves by declining the invitation to review, with or without comments. Reviewers who identify any ethical concerns related to an article should communicate this to the Editor or Chief Editor in writing. Authors may identify reviewers with whom they perceive a conflict of interest at the time of submission. If during peer review an editor, reviewer, or author becomes aware of a conflict of interest that was not previously known or disclosed they must inform the Chief Editor immediately.

Annals relies on reviewers for conducting reviews in accordance with, and in order to uphold, the standards of the Journal. While there are potential opportunities arising from generative AI, reviewers must ensure these types of tools and resources are not used as a substitute for their expert opinion and do not supersede their own judgment.

Maintaining confidentiality both throughout and following the review process is important, so reviewers must not share information about this manuscript, its content, or their review with any person or entity, including Large Language Models (LLMs) and AI tools.

Editors and editorial board

Annals aims to conform with the Core Practices and the Guidelines of the Committee on Publication Ethics (COPE) in editorial operations. Annals is the journal of the British Occupational Hygiene Society but maintains editorial independence from the Society. The Editorial Board members are identified on the Annals website. Editorial Board members are selected because of their technical expertise in the range of topical areas published by Annals.

At initial submission, the corresponding author must declare if the Chief Editor or an Editorial Board Member of the Journal is an author of or contributor to the manuscript. Editorial Board members are expected to identify and communicate to the Chief Editor potential conflicts of interest or competing interests with manuscripts either due to relationships with the authors or scientific conflicts that may impair their ability to provide independent review of the quality of the work and suitability for Annals.

Manuscripts with which the Chief Editor has a conflict of interest will be assigned another Editor to serve in the Chief Editor role, and the manuscript is blinded to the Chief Editor in ScholarOne. If accepted, a statement will be published in the paper describing how the manuscript was handled. The statement will read “[Author name] holds the position of [role] for Annals of Work Exposures and Health and has not peer reviewed or made any editorial decisions for this paper."

Funding and conflict of interest statements

In addition to completing the form, the authors must include a Funding Statement and a Conflict of Interest Statement in their article. These statements should be placed at the end of the paper, before the references, under the headings ‘Funding’ and ‘Conflict of Interest’.

Annals and Oxford Journals are committed to sustainable Open Access publishing, and support efforts from research sponsors to promote or require public access to research findings. This includes the CHORUS initiative, the Crossref Open Funding Data Registry, and government sponsors, among others. Any specific declarations required by the funding source (e.g., name of funding source, or statement that there is no funding source) must be included in the Funding Statement. For example, for work resulting from a grant from the US National Institutes of Health grant, the statement may read: ‘This work was supported by the National Institutes of Health GRANT # to PI Name.’ Oxford Journals will deposit all NIH-funded articles in PubMed Central. See Author Resources for details. Authors must ensure that manuscripts are clearly indicated as NIH-funded.

Previously published material

You should only submit your manuscript(s) to the Journal if:

• It is original work by you and your co-author(s).
• It is not under consideration, in peer review, or accepted for publication in any other publication.
• It has not been published in any other publication.
• It contains nothing abusive, defamatory, derogatory, obscene, fraudulent, or illegal.

The submitting author must disclose in their cover letter and provide copies of all related or similar preprints, dissertations, manuscripts, published papers, and reports by the same authors (i.e., those containing substantially similar content or using the same, similar, or a subset of data) that have been previously published or posted electronically or are under consideration elsewhere at the time of manuscript submission. You must also provide a concise explanation of how the submitted manuscript differs from these related manuscripts and papers. All related previously published papers should be cited as references and described in the submitted manuscript.

The Journal does not discourage you from presenting your findings at conferences or scientific meetings but recommends that you refrain from distributing complete copies of your manuscripts, which might later be published elsewhere without your knowledge.

For previously published materials including tables and figures, please see the Reusing copyrighted materials section.

Preprints

As an author, you retain the right to make an Author’s Original Version (preprint) available through various channels and this does not prevent submission to the Journal. If accepted, you are required to update the status of any preprint, including adding your published paper’s DOI. For full details on allowed channels and updating your preprint, please see our Author self-archiving policy.

Reusing copyrighted material

As an author, you must obtain permission for any material used within your manuscript for which you are not the rightsholder, including quotations, tables, figures, images, data, or software. In seeking permissions for published materials, first contact the publisher rather than the author. For unpublished materials, start by contacting the creator. Copies of each grant of permission should be provided to the editorial office of the Journal. The permissions agreement must include the following:

• Nonexclusive rights to reproduce the material in your paper in Annals of Work Exposures and Health
• Rights for use in print and electronic format at a minimum, and preferably for use in any form or medium
• Lifetime rights to use the material
• Worldwide English-language rights

If you have chosen to publish under an open access licence but have not obtained open access re-use permissions for third-party material contained within the manuscript, this must be stated clearly by supplying a credit line alongside the material with the following information:

• Title of content
• Author, Original publication, year of original publication, by permission of [rightsholder]
• This image/content is not covered by the terms of the Creative Commons licence of this publication. For permission to reuse, please contact the rights holder.

Our publisher, Oxford University Press, provides detailed Copyright and Permissions Guidelines, and a summary of the fundamental information.

Other types of reuse

After publication, authors may reuse portions of their content in only the following ways without obtaining formal permission:

• a maximum of one chapter/article from your contribution to an edited volume or collection (e.g., Oxford Handbooks)
• a maximum of one chapter/article of your contribution to an online-only or digital-original publication

Additionally, OUP is pleased to grant permission for the following uses [subject to necessary RightsLink applications]:

• posting on your personal website or in an institutional or subject-based repository after a 12-month period for Science and Medical titles
• inclusion in scholarly, not-for-profit derivative reuses (e.g., the extension of your contribution to a book-length work, or inclusion in an edited collection of your own work, or any work of which you are an author or editor)
• reproduction within course-packs or e-course-packs for your own teaching purposes, but only if the cost to students does not exceed the cost of reproduction
• inclusion within your thesis or dissertation

Permission for these reuses is granted on the following conditions:

• the material you wish to reuse is your own work and has already been published by OUP
• the intended reuse is for scholarly (non-commercial) purposes, for publication by a not-for-profit publisher
• full acknowledgement is made of the original publication stating the specific material reused [pages, figure numbers, etc]. To request permission, visit the relevant journal and locate your desired content. Click on ‘Order Permissions’ within the table of contents and/or at the bottom article’s abstract to open the Rightslink page. On the Rightslink page, select the way you would like to reuse the content. You will then need to create an account or login to your existing account. Finally, you will need to accept the terms and conditions and permission will be granted. You might be asked to pay a fee for this. For more details on how to use the Rightslink system, visit our Rightslink page. Let your OUP editor know if you plan to use a portion of your OUP publication in your thesis or dissertation
• you have obtained permission from your co-authors for reuse/republication of your joint-authored work
• any reuse on personal websites and institutional or subject based repositories includes a link to the published work online (e.g. on Oxford Academic) and/or to the OUP online catalogue entry
• the material is not distributed under any kind of open access license (e.g., Creative Commons) that would counter the terms of your license with OUP

Misconduct

Authors should observe high standards with respect to research integrity and publication ethics as set out by the Committee on Publication Ethics (COPE). Falsification or fabrication of data including inappropriate image manipulation, plagiarism, including duplicate publication of the author's own work without proper citation, and misappropriation of work are all unacceptable practices. Allegations of ethical misconduct, both directly and through social media, are treated seriously and will be investigated in accordance with the relevant COPE guidance.

If misconduct has been established beyond reasonable doubt, this may result in one or more of the following outcomes, among others:

• If a submitted manuscript is still under consideration, it may be rejected and returned to the author.
• If a paper has already been published online, depending on the nature and severity of the infraction, either a correction notice will be published and linked to the paper, or retraction of the paper will occur, following the COPE Retraction Guidelines.
• The relevant party’s institution(s) and/or other journals may be informed.

Manuscripts submitted to the Journal may be screened with plagiarism-detection software. Any manuscript may be screened, especially if there is reason to suppose that part or all the of the manuscript has been previously published.

COPE defines plagiarism as:

“when somebody presents the work of others (data, words or theories) as if they were their own and without proper acknowledgment.”

COPE defines redundant/overlapping publication as: 

“when a published work (or substantial sections from a published work) is/are published more than once (in the same or another language) without adequate acknowledgment of the source/cross-referencing/justification,
or
when the same (or substantially overlapping) data is presented in more than one publication without adequate cross-referencing/justification, particularly when this is done in such a way that reviewers/readers are unlikely to realise that most or all the findings have been published before.”

COPE defines citation manipulation as: 

“behaviours intended to inflate citation counts for personal gain, such as: excessive self-citation of an authors’ own work, excessive citation to the journal publishing the citing article, and excessive citation between journals in a coordinated manner.”

Data fabrication is defined as intentionally creating fake data or misrepresenting research results. An example includes making up data sets.

Data falsification is defined as manipulating research data with the purpose of intentionally giving a false representation. This can apply to images, research materials, equipment, or processes. Examples include cropping of gels/images to change context and omission of selected data.

If notified of a potential breach of research misconduct or publication ethics, the Journal editor and editorial office staff may inform OUP and/or the author’s institutional affiliation(s).

Reporting and assessing ethical issues

Allegations of misconduct, conflicts of interest, competing interests or any other ethical concerns should be brought to the attention of the Chief Editor in writing, or to another member of the Editorial Board if the concern involves the Chief Editor. The Chief Editor (or other Editorial Board member) will review the allegations to determine if they are specific and detailed, contain evidence to support the claim, and appear to have merit. If these criteria are not met, the Chief Editor will ask for more detail, and if claims remain vague the Chief Editor may elect to not pursue the claimant further and will communicate that to the person who made the allegations. If these criteria are met, the Chief Editor will communicate to the person who raised the concern that they will investigate, let them know the outcome, and may or may not be in contact regularly until then. The Chief Editor will then transmit the allegations to the authors and ask them to provide a written response. The Chief Editor and a member of the Editorial Board will independently review the allegations and response and will discuss how to proceed. If the issue(s) appear to be the result of misunderstanding or honest mistake, the Chief Editor will seek to facilitate dialogue between the parties to attempt to resolve the allegations, perhaps leading to published exchange of letters or a correction. Otherwise, the Chief Editor will facilitate a dialogue between the parties to gather additional information to determine the nature of and evidence of misconduct. This may include review of data, verification of statistical analyses, ethics approvals or other items. Possible outcomes may be correction, retraction, exchange of letters or report of misconduct to the research sponsor and / or authors’ institutions.

Ethical research

The Journal follows Committee on Publication Ethics (COPE) guidelines on ethical oversight. We take research integrity seriously, and all research published in the Journal must have been conducted in a fair and ethical manner. Wherever appropriate, the Journal requires that all research be done according to international and local guidelines.

In occupational hygiene practice, exposure measurements and related data may be collected through normal operations in a workplace, without the original intent for use in research. As a result, such data were likely collected without review by an ethics committee. Such data, however, may have value for the occupational hygiene community. For papers utilizing such data, a statement as to the purpose for the collection of these data should be included in the Methods Section so-as-to explain why an ethics committee review was not performed. In only very rare circumstances would the lack of ethics committee review be expected to apply to articles that utilize health-related data.

If requested, authors must produce original data (deidentified) for inspection by the Chief Editor and / or specific members of the Editorial Board.

Human participants

When reporting on human participants, you should indicate whether the procedures followed were in accordance with the ethical standards of the Helsinki Declaration, which were developed by the World Medical Association. For non-interventional studies, where ethical approval is not required or where a study has been granted an exemption by an ethics committee, this should be stated within the manuscript with a full explanation. Otherwise, manuscripts must include a statement in the Methods section that the research was performed after approval by a local ethics committee, institutional review board and/or local licensing committee, or that such approval was not required. The name of the authorizing body and any reference/permit numbers (where available) should also be stated there. Please be prepared to provide further information to the editorial office upon request.

Human participants must give written informed consent, or if they are minors or incapacitated, such consent must be obtained from their parents or guardians. Consent forms should cover not only study participation but also the publication of the data collected and deposition in databases and/or biobanks. Also, any patient or provider information should be anonymized to the extent possible; names and ID numbers should not be used in the text and must be removed from any images (X-rays, photographs, etc.). Please note blanking out an individual’s eyes in a photograph is not an effective way to conceal their identity. In studies where verbal, rather than written, informed consent was obtained, this must be explained and stated within the manuscript. If informed consent is not required or where a study has been granted an exemption, this must be included in the Methods section along with the name of the authorizing body. The Journal does not routinely collect consent forms, but authors should be prepared to provide written consent forms signed by the participants or other appropriate documentation to the editorial office upon request. For further guidance and examples, please refer to COPE’s guidance on consent.

Animals

Studies involving animals require approval from the relevant institutional ethics committee or institutional animal use and care committee, and the research must be conducted in accordance with applicable national and international guidelines. All such manuscripts must include a statement in the Methods section providing details of the name of the committee(s) that approved the study, as well as the permit or animal license numbers where available. Where a study has been granted an exemption, this must be stated in the Methods section along with the name of the authorizing body. Please be prepared to provide further information to the editorial office upon request.

Inclusive language and images

As defined by the Linguistic Society of America: 

“Inclusive language acknowledges diversity, conveys respect to all people, is sensitive to differences, and promotes equal opportunities”

We encourage you to consider using inclusive language and images when preparing your manuscript. For guidelines, please see the Joint Statement of Principles of C4DISC.
 

Accessibility

Written, visual, and audio content in your submission should be accessible to all. Please see the C4DISC guidelines for making text, images, charts, tables, and audio and video accessible.

For more information about Figure accessibility at alt text, see the below “Figures” section.

Availability of data and materials

Where ethically feasible, the Journal strongly encourages authors to make all data and software code on which the conclusions of the paper rely available to readers. Authors are required to include a data availability statement in their paper. When data and software underlying the research article are available in an online source, authors should include a full citation in their reference list. For details of the minimum information to be included in data and software citations see the OUP guidance on citing research data and software.

Whenever possible, data should be presented in the main manuscript or additional supporting files or deposited in a public repository. Visit OUP’s Research data page for information on general repositories for all data types, and resources for selecting repositories by subject area.

Data availability statement

The inclusion of a data availability statement is a requirement for papers published in the Journal. Data availability statements provide a standardized format for readers to understand the availability of original and third-party data underlying the research results described in the paper. The statement should describe and provide means of access, where possible, by linking to the data or providing the required unique identifier.

More information and example data availability statements.

Data citation

Annals supports the Force 11 Data Citation Principles and requires that all publicly available datasets be fully referenced in the reference list with an accession number or unique identifier such as a digital object identifier (DOI). Data citations should include the minimum information recommended by DataCite:

• [dataset]* Authors, Year, Title, Publisher (repository or archive name), Identifier

*The inclusion of the [dataset] tag at the beginning of the citation helps us to correctly identify and tag the citation. This tag will be removed from the citation published in the reference list.  

Digital preservation

Content published in the Journal will automatically be deposited into digital preservation services, including CLOCKSS, the Global LOCKSS Network, and Portico. This ensures the long-term preservation of your work. Through LOCKSS, participating institutions can sustain access to content if the Journal were to otherwise be unavailable, even for a short period of time. Should the Journal ever cease to publish, or content would otherwise become permanently unavailable, long-term access to the archives of CLOCKSS and Portico would be triggered. Until such a trigger event were to occur, this content is not available to the public through CLOCKSS and Portico.

Self-archiving

Self-archiving refers to posting a copy of your work on a publicly accessible website or repository. Under certain circumstances, you may self-archive versions of your work on your own webpages, on institutional webpages, and in other repositories. For information about the Journal's policy, and to learn which version(s) of your paper are acceptable for self-archiving, please see our Author self-archiving policy.

Archiving

All files submitted to ScholarOne are maintained for one year in ScholarOne from date of decision, and the ScholarOne-compiled PDF of the article is maintained in ScholarOne indefinitely. After one year, files are archived in ScholarOne for two years and by OUP for five years.

Publishing agreement and charges

Authors, please read each section on the publishing agreement and charges carefully.

If you have any questions relating to your publishing agreement or charges please contact OUP Support.

Publishing agreement

After your manuscript is accepted, you will be asked to sign a licence to publish through our licencing and payment portal, SciPris. The Journal offers the option of publishing under either a non-open access (standard) licence or an open access (Creative Commons) licence. There is a charge to publish under an open access licence, which allows your paper to be freely accessible to all readers immediately upon online publication. Editorial decisions occur prior to this step and are not influenced by payment or ability to pay. The standard licence makes your paper available only to Journal subscribers and there is no licence charge. This licence grants OUP an exclusive licence to publish and distribute the content. There is no transfer of ownership of the copyright. You, the author, retain copyright for the content.

Papers can be published under the following:

• Creative Commons Attribution license (CC BY)
• Creative Commons Attribution Non-Commercial license (CC BY-NC)
• Creative Commons Attribution Non-Commercial No Derivatives license (CC BY-NC-ND)

Please see the OUP guidance on Licences, copyright, and re-use rights for more information regarding these publishing agreement options.

Complying with funder mandates

Please note that some funders require open access publication as a condition of funding. If you are unsure whether you are required to publish open access, please do clarify any such requirements with your funder or institution before selecting your licence.

Further information on funder mandates and direct links to a range of funder policies.

Charges

Open access charges

Please see the details of open access licences and charges. If you select an open access licence, you must pay the open access charge or request to use an institutional agreement to pay the open access charge through our licencing and payment portal, SciPris.

OUP has a growing number of open access agreements with institutions and consortia, which provide funding for open access publishing (also known as Read and Publish agreements). This means corresponding authors from participating institutions can publish open access, and the institution may pay the charge. Find out if your institution has an open access agreement.

To be eligible for one of OUP’s Read and Publish agreements, the corresponding author must provide their qualifying institution as their primary affiliation when they submit their manuscript. After submission, changing the corresponding author in order to access Read and Publish funding is not permissible.

Colour charges

The Journal does not charge for colour.

Page charges

The Journal does not have page charges.

Changes to published papers

The Journal will only make changes to published papers if the publication record is seriously affected by the academic accuracy of the published information. Changes to a published paper will be accompanied by a formal correction notice linking to and from the original paper.

As needed, we follow the COPE guidelines on retractions.

For more information and details of how to request changes, including for authors who wish to update their name and/or pronouns, please see OUP’s policy on changes to published papers.

Promoting your work

As the author, you are the best advocate for your work, and we encourage you to be involved in promoting your publication. Sharing your ideas and news about your publication with your colleagues and friends could take as little as 15 minutes and will make a real difference in raising the profile of your research.

You can promote your work by:

• Sharing your paper with colleagues and friends. If your paper is published open access, it will always be freely available to all readers, and you can share it without any limitations. Otherwise, use the toll-free link that is emailed to you after publication. It provides permanent, free access to your paper, even if your paper is updated.
• Signing up for an ORCID iD author identifier to distinguish yourself from any other researchers with the same name, create an online profile showcasing all your publications, and increase the visibility of your work.
• Using social media to promote your work. To learn more about self-promotion on social media, see our social media guide for authors.

Find out how Oxford University Press promotes your content. 

Preparing and submitting your manuscript

General guidelines on preparing your manuscript for publication can be found on OUP’s Preparing and submitting your manuscript page and the online submission instructions web page. Specific instructions for Annals of Work Exposures and Health can be found below.

Please note: manuscripts should only be submitted by the corresponding author, and cannot be submitted by someone who is not an author of the manuscript.

Language

Manuscripts must be in English and authors should try to write in a way which is simple and clear. British or American styles and spelling may be used, but should be used consistently, and words or phrases which might be unclear in other parts of the world should be avoided or clearly explained. It is the authors’ responsibility to provide a text in good English, and this should be done before first submission to ensure a thorough peer review. Major problems with English language or construction may lead to rejection. If English is not your first language, you may wish to have your manuscript edited by a native English speaker or professional editor for language before submission. See section on “Pre-submission language editing” for more information.

Pre-submission language editing

You may wish to use a language-editing service before submitting to ensure that editors and reviewers understand your manuscript. Our publisher, Oxford University Press, partners with Enago, a leading provider of author services. Through the OUP-Enago partner page, prospective authors are entitled to a discount for language editing, abstract and layperson summary writing, rejected manuscript editing, and creation of graphical abstracts, illustrations, and videos.

Enago is an independent service provider, which will handle all aspects of this service, including payment. As an author you are under no obligation to take up this offer. Language editing and other services from Enago are optional and do not guarantee that your manuscript will be accepted. Edited manuscripts will undergo the regular review process of the Journal. For more details and a list of additional resources, please see OUP’s page on language services.

Language editing does not guarantee that your manuscript will be accepted for publication. Authors are responsible for all costs associated with such services.

Brevity

The necessary length of a paper depends on the subject, but any submission must be as brief as possible consistent with clarity. The number of words, excluding the abstract, references, tables and figures, must be stated at the time of submission. The Submission categories section details the word count for each category. If the length of the submission exceeds the guidelines, a statement must be included in the cover letter justifying the extra length. Suitable extra material can be included as supplementary material (see Supplementary material below). 

Title, abstract and keywords

Titles should be constructed to succinctly describe the major issue or question examined by the paper and should not assert the research findings as a truth. Words and phrases in the title are used to index the article in databases, so keywords should not duplicate words in the title. Ensure that the abstract contains the most important terms for aid in indexing and searching. Common synonyms are indexed in databases like Web of Science, but not necessarily on internet search engines, so consider including a common synonym in the key words, if appropriate. Annals does not require a structured abstract, but it can be structured using the paper headings (e.g., Introduction, Methods, Results, Discussion and Conclusions).

Text abstracts

Text abstracts must be written in English.

Authors

All names and affiliations of authors should be clearly stated at the beginning of the paper. For full details see Publication Ethics section (Authorship).

What's important about this paper 

For Original research papers, Review articles and Short communications only: We ask you to state, in 3-5 sentences, why the article you are submitting is important. This is an opportunity for you to demonstrate the potential impact of your paper, and it may also assist in subsequent promotion of the work. You will be asked to submit the statement at Step 6 of the online submission process. The statement, or an edited version of it, will be published with the paper in the Journal if the article is accepted for publication. The statement will appear after the abstract and keywords, and before the introduction. Authors of accepted papers are requested to approve any changes to the statement at the proof stage.

Structure of paper

Papers should generally conform to the pattern: Introduction, Methods, Results, Discussion, and Conclusions, unless these are clearly inappropriate. A paper must be prefaced by an abstract of the argument and findings. As with many other journals, we are unable to publish footnotes to the text. Please therefore incorporate this sort of material into the body of the paper, in brackets if appropriate.

Design and analysis

The quality of the data and analysis must always be good enough to justify the inferences and conclusions drawn. Particular attention should be given to design of sampling surveys, which should be planned using modern statistical principles, and to the treatment of results below the limit of detection (see this page). Caution is advised with respect to the presentation and analysis of real-time data, as these time series data are not statistically independent.

Units and symbols

SI units must be used, though their equivalent in other systems may be given as well.

Acknowledgments

Authors may include an Acknowledgements Statement in their article under the heading ‘Acknowledgements’ that identifies any individuals or organizations that contributed to the work but do not meet the criteria for authorship. Those acknowledged should provide written approval before being listed in the Acknowledgements.

Study funding

You must fully declare all funding information relevant to the study, including specific grant numbers, under a separate subheading following the acknowledgements.

References

The accuracy of references is the responsibility of the author. This journal follows CSE Scientific Style and Format 8th edition with name-year references:
https://www.scientificstyleandformat.org/Home.html.  All references should be listed in alphabetical order and all author names listed unless there are more than ten authors.

Examples:
Journal Article: Smart N, Fang ZY, Marwick TH. A practical guide to exercise training for heart failure patients. J Card Fail. 2003:9(1):49–52.

Book: Schott, Priest J. 2002. Leading antenatal classes: a practical guide. 2nd ed. Boston (MA): Books for Midwives; 2002.

Book Chapter: Anderson RJ, Schrier RW. Acute renal failure. In: Braunwald E, Isselbacher KJ, Petersdorf RG, editors. Harrison’s principles of internal medicine. 15th ed. New York (NY): McGraw-Hill; 2001. P. 1149–1155.

Websites: APSnet: plant pathology. St Paul (MN): American Phytopathological Association; 1994-2005 [accessed 2005 Jun 20]. http://www.apsnet.org/.

Supplementary material

Supporting material that is not essential for the argument of the paper, but would nevertheless benefit the reader, can be submitted to accompany the main paper on the Journal website. Examples are more detailed descriptions of methods, extended data sets/data analysis, or additional figures (including colour), or audio or video files. Ensure that the supplementary material is referred to in the main text where necessary, for example as '(see supplementary material)' or '(see Figure S1)'. Figures and tables in the main paper and supplementary material should be numbered in different sequential series, using, for example, Figure S1, S2, etc. for figures in the supplementary material. Supplementary materials containing text, tables and figures should be assembled into a single document that includes the article title, authors and author affiliation, and submitted with the revision as a PDF. Datasets or spreadsheets must be made available in an accessible format (comma separated variable format is preferred, but Microsoft Excel® may be acceptable).

Tables 

Tables should be numbered consecutively and given a suitable, informative caption. In the first submission, tables can be incorporated into the text or at the end of the manuscript, but in the revised version each table should be presented on a separate page. Footnotes to tables should be provided below the table and should be referred to by superscript lowercase letters.

Figures

Figures include photographs, diagrams and charts and may be shown in full colour at no additional cost. Figures should be numbered consecutively and given a suitable, informative caption. Consider accessibility of figures to individuals with visual impairments. For example, select contrasting colours visible to individuals with colour blindness, and use thick lines and large icons visible to individuals with low vision. The first submission may include good quality low resolution copies of figures incorporated into the text or at the end of the manuscript. The revised version of the paper must be accompanied by high resolution electronic copies of the figures in a form and of a quality suitable for reproduction. The figures should be uploaded as separate files about the size they are to be reproduced, with font size at least 6-point. They should have a resolution of 600 dpi for line figures, and 300 dpi for half tones, saved as .tif, .jpg, .gif, .bmp or .eps files (with fonts embedded where appropriate). Clear hatching patterns should be used in preference to solid grey shadings and fine hairlines wherever possible. Graphics intended to be shown in black and white should be produced in greyscale. Colour photographs should be scanned at 300 dpi (600 dpi for colour line/tones) and be in CMYK colour mode.

Figure accessibility and alt text

Incorporating alt text (alternative text) when submitting your paper helps to foster inclusivity and accessibility. Good alt text ensures that individuals with visual impairments or those using screen readers can comprehend the content and context of your figures. The aim of alt text is to provide concise and informative descriptions of your figure so that all readers have access to the same level of information and understanding, and that all can engage with and benefit from the visual elements integral to scholarly content. Including alt text demonstrates a commitment to accessibility and enhances the overall impact and reach of your work.  

Alt text is applicable to all images, figures, illustrations, and photographs. 

Alt text is only accessible via e-reader and so it won’t appear as part of the typeset article. 

Detailed guidance on how to draft and submit alt text. 

Cover photographs 

We are keen to receive interesting and relevant photographs for the cover of Annals of Work Exposures and Health. If you have an image which you wish to submit for consideration, which does not have to be one of the figures in your paper, please email it at any time to [email protected]. Quality is important: on the cover, images will be landscape, and should preferably be at least 2200 x 1800 pixels. If photographs include recognizable individuals or workplaces, documentation is required attesting to permission to disseminate the photo from those individuals or workplaces.

Submitting the revised version

Authors invited to submit a revised version must prepare it as instructed in the letter they will receive. Particular care should be taken to prepare and upload figures and tables, prepare and upload supplementary materials, correctly format references, and include all necessary statements regarding acknowledgements, funding, potential conflicts of interest and data availability. The Journal follows the Council of Science Editors (CSE) style. Please refer to these requirements when preparing your revised manuscript. Revised manuscripts that do not conform to the style and other requirements may be returned to the author.

Submission categories

Annals of Work Exposures and Health has six categories of submissions.

Editorials

Editorials are short communications addressing issues of interest to the readership, especially those regarding issues of publication of Annals. Editorials are generally authored by the Chief Editor or members of the Editorial Board, but may be submitted by a guest editor, or others if invited by the editor to do so. Editorials are generally under 1500 words. Peer review is at the Chief Editor’s discretion, but will normally include at least one review by an editorial board member.

Commentaries

Commentaries are discussions of topics of importance to occupational hygienists, including matters of policy, professional practice, or the science of occupational hygiene and occupational health. Commentaries may provide a perspective on controversial issues, but should be well founded on evidence as cited in the material presented. Commentaries are normally under 2000 words, and are peer reviewed through our normal process.

Letters to the editor

A letter to the editor may be submitted by any reader on any topic of interest to the readership, including comments on papers having appeared previously in Annals. Letters are normally less than 1000 words, and are peer reviewed at the discretion of the Chief Editor, but will normally include at least one review by an editorial board member.

Original research papers

Original research papers are reports of scientific investigations of matters related to occupational hazards, exposures, methods of their assessment, or health risks. Original research reports may be descriptive, observational and/or experimental investigations, and can usually be presented as hypothesis-driven research. Original research reports should be able to clearly state their aim, define the methods with which evidence is gathered and organized, describe the analytic methods used, and present the results of these analyses in a transparent and interpretable format. The conclusions of the paper must be supported by the data and their analysis. Original research papers must be under 5,000 words, and have up to six tables or figures. Original research papers are peer reviewed through our normal process.

Review articles

Review articles review the scientific evidence addressing a topic of interest to occupational hygiene scientists or practitioners. Articles should clearly state the scope of the review, provide a methodology for gathering the evidence reviewed, and summarize the results of that evidence comprehensively. The summary of evidence may be provided through narrative or quantitative analysis, as in a meta-analysis. It is recommended, but not required, that reviews adhere to best practices, such as those specified by the Preferred Reporting Items for Systematic Reviews and Meta-Analyses (PRIMSA). Reviews are normally less than 5000 words and have up to six tables or figures, and are peer reviewed through our normal process.

Short communications

Short communications are descriptive studies, with limited data, that present new information of importance to the readership, but with insufficient data for a full original research report. Examples include: a description of an occupational disease case with a thorough investigation of the exposures likely to have given rise to the disease; a demonstration of a new measurement principle or device with potential for solving an important exposure measurement problem; evidence demonstrating the effectiveness of a novel exposure control strategy; or a study at a single site or involving a small sample. In each case, the data available are insufficient to support a full original research paper or be fully generalizable, but provide potentially important information to occupational hygienists. Short communications will generally be less than 1500 words and have up to two tables or figures. Such reports will be peer reviewed through our normal process.

Contact us

For questions regarding submission and review, including appeals, you can reach the editorial office by email at [email protected].

After your paper has been sent to production, you can contact [email protected] for questions regarding publishing agreements and charges, the production process, or publication. Please see Changes to published papers if you need to request a substantive change to your published paper.

For questions regarding article status, reviewer comments, or whether your article fits within the Journal’s scope, you can contact the Chief Editor, Professor Rachael Jones, at [email protected].