The vast majority of academic paper abstracts in social science journals are atrocious -- and you can quote me on that. To me, this also applies to those journals that have divided their abstracts into sections, such as the research problem, the methodology and the findings, as well as those that list paper "highlights". I personally find these as superficial and unengaging as most of 150 word abstracts that were put together as afterthoughts by the authors. Not that the abstracts in Tourism Geographies are perfect, especially going back in time, but I have been trying to make them more robust in recent year.

I think it is safe to say that the goal of both authors and journal editors is to publish papers that our peers will read and cite in their work. I believe that the abstract is the second most important part of the paper in achieving that, with the title being the most important (see my Tips on Titling Your Paper).

So here are my guidelines on how to write an acceptable abstract for Tourism Geographies, much of which I think would apply to any academic paper that you write that requires an abstract.

1. The abstract as a mini-version of the entire paper. Tourism Geographies gives you 300 words to do this (twice what many journals allow). Use those words to clearly cover:
- the objectives or purpose of the research;
- the theoretical context that the research is set within;
- the methodology (I consider this the least important part of the abstract -- people can read this in the paper); and
- the findings and global significance (these are the most important part of the abstract!).

You need to provide sufficient information in the abstract so that people who read it can determine whether if your paper warrants being fully read and cite it as a reference. Even if they do not read the entire paper, perhaps due to download issues, they can still cite it if the abstract is complete enough. This is your goal.

2. Again the abstract is a mini-version of the paper, it is not a description of the paper (which is the approach that many people use). Therefore, use declarative (not descriptive) sentences. Avoid using the words: "This paper..." or "The paper...". 

3. The abstract should be written in present tense, not future tense -- so do not say "We will..." or "The policy implications will be discussed...".  You need to say what you did and what the results were, not what you will do in the paper. (In other words, avoid using the world "will" in your paper.)

4. Limit the use of first person ("I" and "We") in your abstract. You can use it once (or twice?) in an abstract if it makes a lot of sense to do so. You should not be focusing on yourself, but rather on the research. This is true for scholarly papers in general. In Tourism Geographies, we allow first person usage to a degree in qualitative papers. However, it can be overdone, which can make the author(s) sound either egotistical or amateurish (IMO).

5. The abstract should be able to stand alone, separate from the full paper. As such, do not cite references in the abstract and do not use acronyms or other abbreviations without fully defining them. 

6. For place-based articles, the places referred to in the article should be mentioned in the abstract (some people do not do this).  They should also be listed among the keywords to make your paper more visible in online search results.

7. For Tourism Geographies, the abstract should be the same format (font type and size, line spacing and indentations) as the rest of the paper, and it should be in the form of a single paragraph.

Here are some examples of abstracts that follow the guidelines above:
- http://www.tandfonline.com/doi/abs/10.1080/14616688.2015.1053971
- http://www.tandfonline.com/doi/full/10.1080/14616688.2016.1144642
- http://www.tandfonline.com/doi/abs/10.1080/14616688.2015.1053971

If you have any questions about this, just let me know as I am happy to help any author who submits their paper to Tourism Geographies to improve their title, abstract and keywords.

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Optional: You might also want to see my blog on "How to Title Your Journal Article".

UPDATE: 4 September 2019 - Related information on Abstracts is provided in the Taylor & Francis Author Guide to Discoverability. (Please note that the abstract word limit in this document is less than what is allowed for Tourism Geographies).
​

Previously, I wrote about the difference between case study papers and theory-based papers and how that influences your title. This blog entry is a more comprehensive complication of tips for you to follow when coming up with a title for an article.

The goal of the title is to capture the interests of potential readers so they will then read your abstract, and then read and cite your paper. As such, the title is possibly the most crucial part of your paper from a “visibility” and “citation” perspective. You really should choose your title with care.

Here are some tips based on what I have learned from various sources on this topic over my years as the TG journal editor-in-chief.

Creating Curiosity

You want to create a Curiosity Gap. This is done through a careful balance of having too much information and too little in the title. If your title is too informative, then more people are likely to decide that they do not need to read it for their purposes. If you title is too vague, however, then potential readers are more likely to decide that it is not worth reading.

There are two types of curiosity that you can try to generate: (a) novelty or newness; and (b) epistemic knowledge building. While somewhat overlapping, we can think of novelty as tapping into the human curiosity to explore unknown places, ideas and concepts. It proposes new ways of seeing or uncovers hidden realities. Epistemic curiosity taps into human interest in how our known thoughts and concepts might evolve with new knowledge. It builds and connects concepts that we are already familiar with.  

Being Clear

You know your research inside and out. However, most of the rest of the world has no clue as to what you are doing. A clear title is essential to capture the widest possible relevant audience for your paper. Here are some rules:

1. USE COMMON WORDS – the more uncommon words that are in a titles, the less the paper is downloaded
   
   
2. USE SHORT TITLES – it is generally believed that you should have no more than 12 words in your title (including the subtitle) because long titles are difficult to remember and downloaded less are less likely to be downloaded (see the Curiosity Gap comment above). Also, if you have a subtitle keep it short. Tourism Geographies does not allow more than 12 words in a title.
   
   
3. AVOID WORDS WITH LITTLE OR NO MEANING – these make title unnecessarily long (again see the Curiosity Gap comment above).
   
   In particular, do not use the words “A Study of…” or “Exploring…”  or “Understanding…” or anything like that. All journals articles are a study of something, or are exploring something. You do not need to tell your reader that you are doing that.
   
   
4. DO NOT USE ACRONYMS OR ABBREVIATIONS in your title without spelling them out. While you and your friends may understand the acronym, many potential readers will not.
   
   
5. DO NOT USE THE WORD “CASE” in your title because case study papers are downloaded and cited much less than other papers. (See: Please Avoid Using Case Study in Your Paper Title)
   
   
6. AVOID HUMOR – humor, puns and innuendos are often are culturally specific and not understood by other cultures. In addition, papers with such titles may not show up as often in search results.
   
   
7. USE DECLARATIVE TITLES – because these types of titles were found to be downloaded somewhat more than other types, which increases their alt-metric scores. However, I have not heard that they are cited more than other types. Here are the three most common types of titles:
   
   
   • Descriptive (most common) – describes the subject of the article but does not reveal the main conclusions. Example: 'Internet Mediated Representations of Ecotourism'
     
     
   • Declarative – states the main findings or conclusions in the title. Example: 'Internet Representations of Ecotourism Fail to Effectively Integrate Tourism and Ecology’
     
     
   • Interrogative – introduce the subject in the form of a question. Example: 'How Does the Internet Mediate Representations of Ecotourism?'
     
     

Who would have thought that the Title to a paper would be so important and so complicated?

That is what I have so far. I will add to this blog as I come across additional ideas.

UPDATE: 4 September 2019 - Related information on Book Titles is provided in the Taylor & Francis Author Guide to Discoverability.

As you may have noticed that Tourism Geographies these days has become mostly, but not entirely, driven by Special Issues. Some of these, like the annual Tourism Places Special Issue, are created by me from papers submitted to the journal. I have been doing this since the first issue came out in 1999.

Many others, especially in recent years, have been proposed and created by Guest Editors.

The way I run special issues with guest editors is different from what I have heard other journals do because I maintain control over the review and decision process. I have heard that at least some other journals turn that role completely over to the guest editor(s). 

What I have the guest editors do is (1) to review papers before they are submitted to filter out those that will clearly not survive the review process or are for other reasons not suited to the special issue, and (2) to recommend potential reviewers to me. 

Eventually, each paper will have one reviewer who is a guest editor, plus to other reviewers. All three of these are anonymous to the paper authors. I pay a lot of attention to the reviews of the guest editor. If the guest editor recommends rejection, and the other reviewers are largely in agreement ("rejection" or "major revisions"), then I will reject the paper.

If, however, the other reviewers recommend rejection, but the guest editor does not, then I will carefully conciser the guest editor's comments and I might contact the guest editor and discuss the issue, if that seems appropriate, before I make the final decision. On the other hand, if the other reviewers have convincing arguments, then I will reject the paper without contacting the guest editor beforehand.

Full acceptance of a paper requires acceptance by all three of the reviewers. This is the same as the process for all papers submitted to TG. (Sometimes one reviewer will recommend rejection after the first round of reviews and decline to review additional revisions. If the other two reviewers favor revisions, then I will return the paper to the author(s) to revise it, but seek an new third reviewer on the next round of anonymous reviews.)

In sum, special issue papers are somewhat less likely to be rejected than non-special issue papers submitted to TG, but must still meet the same requirements to be accepted as other papers do. Also, reviewers tend to be somewhat more lenient toward special issue papers (though not always), which can gives those papers some advantage. And finally, even though guest editors are not in full control of accepting or rejecting a paper, they have a lot of influence.

(See also a more recent blog post: How to Title Your Article: Rules and Tips)

In there early days of Tourism Geographies (which was first published in 1999), there were basically no restrictions on how authors titled their papers. Some of them approached the method that is common for some thesis and dissertations of including ​every possible keyword in the title, with the apparent belief that this would be (1) the most accurate approach, and (2) attract the most (or maybe the best?) readers. After TG became accepted in the Social Science Citation Index (SSCI, in 2008), however, I learned that there are some general guidelines on how to title a paper to attract the largest audience. 

I was told by my publisher that, in general, papers that review the research literature on a certain topic attract the largest audiences. Thus, Progress in Human Geography, which mostly publishes review-type articles, has the highest SSCI rating of all geography journals. On the other hand, papers with the words "case study" in their title generally have the smallest readership because only people who have a specific interest in that case study location are likely to read the paper.

Based on this knowledge, I initially implemented a policy of limiting titles for Tourism Geographies to 10 words. (I had heard of other journals that have an 8 word limit!) The goal was to make every paper sound like a literature review paper to maximize their potential for citation. After a couple of years of complaints, I changed the word limit to 12 words, which people seem to be OK with. I will also suggest alternate titles that I think will work better for people who have a hard time with the 12 word limit. 

In addition, I mostly ban the words "case study" from titles -- although occasionally they slip through because I am not always so vigilant. If there is a case study involved, it should be mentioned in the abstract and the place should be listed in the keywords (I have been even more lax on enforcing this). However, the place does not need to be in the title. (Occasionally, an author has a case study that is not mentioned it in the title, abstract or keywords, which I also think is a mistake-- although in the opposite direction.)

Most of the papers that are published in a journal like Tourism Geographies are in between the two extremes of pure literature review and pure case study. They are driven by theory, and therefore contain a well conceptualized literature review, and they are empirically based on case study field work that is trying to resolve a theoretical question. For those papers, the theoretical question is what should drive the title. The empirical place (usually) does not need to be in the title, but should be mentioned in the abstract and keywords.

On the other hand, if the paper is mostly a case study, in which theory is secondary or only used to support a critical analysis of the case, then the case study place should be in the title, along with the basic goals of the argument that is being made. This is especially true of 'Tourism Places' articles, which are a special type of article published in Tourism Geographies. These articles usually have a particular theoretical perspective or lens that is used to expand out understanding of the tourism experience, though they are usually not trying to necessarily develop new theoretical understandings.

Of course nothing is sacrosanct, and it is very possible for a case study to be very popular, and for a literature review paper to fall flat. In the end, the quality of the research and writing are more important that the title. But I think knowing these general rules can help place a paper in a proper perspective to build its readership.

I am sure that authors feel really bad when they submit an article to Tourism Geographies (or any journal) and it gets a desk rejection -- i.e., an editor decides not to send a paper out for anonymous review. There are several reasons for doing a desk rejection, including a poorly written paper with many grammar and other problems. But the most common reason that I encounter is that the paper is primarily a case study that does not address a theoretical or conceptually debated social science issue. For that type of paper, here is a typical paragraph that I might send to explain my decision:

Tourism Geographies is a social science journal and we primarily publishing papers that address theoretical issues grounded in the social sciences. Your paper lacks a significant theoretical research question (or at least it was not clearly defined) and is mostly dealing with issues related to a specific, though very detailed, case study. Your conclusions, for example, only address the case study and do not offer findings that inform a debated conceptual problem that would be of interest to a global audience. Because of this issue, I will not be sending it out for review.

When I tell people this in writing workshops that I sometimes conduct, someone often asks if that means I would never accept a case study. The answer, of course, is no. Case studies are important. But they are not the most important part of a good paper.  Here is some advice that I once received about doing research, and which I try to instill in people (students and colleagues) who I advise.

• "When you think about your research, the primary research problem should be entirely unrelated to any one specific case study. You should temporarily forget the case study and just focus on defining your conceptual problem, making sure it is well grounded in theory. You should be able to ignore your case study completely, and still clearly see what the theoretical research problem is. That problem should be one that can be answered by different case studies, not just the one that you happen to be in a position to pursue at this time."
  
  "Once you have defined the research problem in this way, then you can turn to the case study. The main question about the case study then becomes, why is this case study especially suited to answering or addressing the theoretical research problem that you have defined."

This is what I am looking for when authors submit a paper to Tourism Geographies. I have no problem that there is a case study, but most importantly I want to know what the conceptual problem is that the case study is helping to resolve. Secondarily would be the question of why this case study is especially good in addressing the conceptual problem.

This approach has helped me enormously in my own conceptualization of research projects and papers. Hopefully this tip will help others, as well. 
​
Alan A. Lew
Editor-in-Chief
Tourism Geographies

Update 24 May 2016 - METHODOLOGY & OTHER ISSUES: Following the guideline above will not, of course, guarantee that you will avoid a desk rejection from a Tourism Geographies editor.  Some of the other issues that our group looks for include:

• methodological rigor,
• originality and significance of the topic (including potential reader interest), and
• overall depth of thought and expository style.

In addition, each of the editors of Tourism Geographies will consider these aspects in different ways based on their knowledge of your topic. We do our best to be objective and consistent, but we are all human and inconsistencies can sometimes arise. 

Update 24 May 2016 - LACK OF OTHER RESEARCH: One indication that a paper is a case study that does not contribute to theory is when authors state that their research is significant because very few others have looked at their topic. This is made worse when the lack of other research is the one and only reason that the research paper is considered a significant contribution to the literature. Lack of research on a topic does not equal significance -- it could mean that others found the topic too insignificant to pursue. It also does not demonstrate a contribution to theory. In my experience, the use of this justification usually points to a mostly descriptive case study.

Update 8 October 2016 - "TOURISM PLACES" SPECIAL EDITION: Starting in 2017, Tourism Geographies will publish a special edition titled Tourism Places: Critical Perspectives on Tourism Development and Experiences. This special edition will feature well crafted case studies that give insight into tourism in a place, with less concern for the development of social science theory. One special edition is planned for 2017, but two or more editions may come out in future years based on demand. Additional information on the Special Edition of the journal can be found on the Author Notes page of this website.