Author Guidelines

Notes for Authors

  • Only registered users can submit manuscripts to Al-Hayat. A user has to be registered as an Author in order to submit a manuscript
  • To submit a paper, follow the "New Submission" link in your user profile, next to "Author"
  • The article's length ranges from 10 to 16 pages, including references. 5500 of 8000 words
  • The manuscript should be written in English and papers generally consist of a title (text size of 14), author affiliation, abstract, keywords, introduction, body, conclusions and references (text size of 12), table or diagram (text size of 11). A paper may also include appendices and an acknowledgement. The abstract is written concisely and factually, includes the purpose of research, the method of research, the result and conclusion of the research and should concisely state the content of the paper. The abstract is written in English and Indonesian language, in account between 150 - 250 words in one paragraph (see the template for details)

  • Arabic romanization should be written: â, b, t, th, j, ḥ, kh, d, dh, r, z, s, sh, á¹£, á, á¹­, ẓ, â, gh, f, q, l, m, n, h, w, y. Short vowels: a, i, u. long vowels: ā, Ä«, Å«. Diphthongs: aw, ay. TÄ marbūṭā: t. Article: al-. For detailed information on Arabic Romanization, please refer to the transliteration system of the Library of Congress (LC) Guidelines click here
  • Authors must use SI (for Système International) units and internationally recognised terminology and symbols
  • All graphics and figures in good quality should be attached directly to the body of the paper. Large figures can span both columns. Colour figures and pictures are accepted, provided that they are of good quality
  • References are cited in the text using reference managers Mendeley, Zotero, Endnote, etc with style APA. They are listed under the "References" section
  • The maximum number of authors for each manuscript is five (5)
  • Paper size A4, margins Top, Left: 3 cm and Bottom, Right 2,5 cm. Please download and follow our live template to format your manuscript
  • All instructions and styles are included in the template in order to help authors achieve fast and easy formating

  • You must have an ORCID; fill it in the column when submitting

  • If you experience any problems during the submission through our page (e.g. upload time-out in case of large files), please contact the editor here

  • Make sure you have read Author Fees and Withdrawal of Manuscript

  • Fill out the ethical clearance and upload it to the supplementary file or email that is in the AJIE contact: alhayatjournal@gmail.com

 

General standards

Language Editing
AJIE requires manuscripts submitted to meet international standards for the English language to be considered for publication. Articles are normally published only in English with a minimum grammar score of 98. 
For authors who would like their manuscript to receive language editing or proofreading to improve the clarity of the manuscript and help highlight their research, AJIE recommends the language-editing services provided by the internal or external partners (contact Principal of the AJIE for further information).
Note that sending your manuscript for language editing does not imply or guarantee that it will be accepted for publication by the AJIE. Editorial decisions on the scientific content of a manuscript are independent of whether it has received language editing or proofing by the partner services or other services.
 
Language Style
The default language style at AJIE is British English. If you prefer your article to be formatted in American English, please specify this on the first page of your manuscript.  To understand British and American English please read here.
 
Format
The article file must be written in Microsoft Word format. We do not accept other formats, such as LaTex files or PDFs.

Article Organisation
The body of the article should be set (at least) using an IMRaD structure like the following:

  • » Abstract and Keywords
  • » Introduction
  • » Method
  • » Result and Discussion
  • » Conclusion
  • » Acknowledgement* [*optional]
  • » References 
Search Engine Optimisation (SEO)
There are a few simple ways to maximise your article's discoverability. Follow the steps below to improve the search results of your article:
  • Include a few of your article's keywords in the title of the article;
  • Do not use long article titles;
  • Pick 3 to 5 keywords using a mix of generic and more specific terms on the article subject(s);
  • Use the maximum amount of keywords in the first 2 sentences of the abstract;
  • Use some of the keywords in level 1 headings.
Title
The title is written in title case, aligned to the left, and in Times New Roman font at the top of the page.
The title should be concise, omitting terms that are implicit and, where possible, be a statement of the main result or conclusion presented in the manuscript. Abbreviations should be avoided within the title.
Witty or creative titles are welcome, but only if relevant and within the measure. Consider if a title meant to be thought-provoking might be misinterpreted as offensive or alarming. In extreme cases, the editorial office may veto a title and propose an alternative.
Authors should try to avoid, if possible:
  • Titles that are mere questions without giving the answer.
  • Unambitious titles, for example, starting with "Towards", "A description of", "A characterization of", "Preliminary study on".
  • Vague titles, for example, starting with "Role of...", "Link between...", "Effect of..." do not specify the role, link, or effect.
  • Include terms that are out of place, for example, the taxonomic affiliation apart from the species name.
Authors and Affiliations
There is a comma-separated list of all the names. Provide exact and correct author names, as these will be indexed in the official archives. Affiliations should be keyed to the author's name with superscript numbers and listed as follows: Institut/University/Organisation, Country (without detailed address information such as city zip codes or street names).
Example: Universitas Muhammadiyah Ponorogo, East Java, Indonesia.
The Corresponding Author(s) should be marked with a superscript. Provide the exact contact email address of the corresponding author(s) in a separate section below the affiliation.
 
Headings and Sub-Headings
Capitalize on headings and capitalize each word of sub-headings. Headings and subheadings need to be defined in Arial, 12, bold.
 
Abstract
As a primary goal, the abstract should render the general significance and conceptual advance of the work clearly accessible to a broad readership. In the abstract, minimise the use of abbreviations and do not cite references. The word length is not more than 150-250 words, written in English and Indonesian.
Tips:
  • Background of study
  • Aims and scope of the paper
  • Methods
  • Summary of result or findings
  • Conclusions/ Originality
Keywords
All article types: you may provide up to 5 keywords; at least 3 are mandatory.
 
Text
The body text is in 12 points of normal Times New Roman. New paragraphs will be separated with a single empty line. The entire document should be single-spaced and contain page and line numbers in order to facilitate the review process. The AJIE-recommended manuscript was written using MS Word 97-2003.
 
Nomenclature
The use of abbreviations should be kept to a minimum. Non-standard abbreviations should be avoided unless they appear at least four times and are defined upon first use in the main text. Consider also giving a list of non-standard abbreviations at the end, immediately before the acknowledgements.
 
Sections
Headings and subheadings serve to organise your manuscript.
For Original Research Articles, it is recommended to organise your manuscript in the following sections:
 
Introduction
The introduction is a little different from the short and concise abstract. The reader needs to know the background to your research and, most importantly, why your research is important in this context. What critical question does your research address? Why should the reader be interested?
The purpose of the introduction is to stimulate the reader's interest and provide pertinent background information necessary to understand the rest of the paper. You must summarise the problem to be addressed, give background on the subject, discuss previous research on the topic, and explain exactly what the paper will address, why, and how. A good thing to avoid is making your introduction into a mini-review. There is a huge amount of literature out there, but as a scientist, you should be able to pick out the things that are most relevant to your work and explain why. This shows an editor, reviewer, or reader that you really understand your area of research and that you can get straight to the most important issues.
Keep your introduction very concise, well structured, and inclusive of all the information needed to follow the development of your findings. Do not overburden the reader by making the introduction too long. Get to the key parts of the other paper sooner rather than later.
Tips:
  1. Begin the introduction by providing a concise background account of the problem studied.
  2. State the objective of the investigation. Your research objective is the most important part of the introduction.
  3. Establish the significance of your work: Why was there a need to conduct the study?
  4. Introduce the reader to the pertinent literature. Do not give a full history of the topic. Only quote previous work having a direct bearing on the present problem. (State of the art, relevant research to justify the novelty of the manuscript.)
  5. State the gap analysis or novelty statement.
  6. Clearly state your hypothesis, the variables investigated, and concisely summarise the methods used.
  7. Define any abbreviations or specialised or regional terms.
An example of a novelty statement or a gap analysis statement at the end of the introduction section (after the state of the art of the previous research survey): "........ (short summary of background)....... A few researchers focused on ....... There have been limited studies concerned on ........ Therefore, this research intends to ................. The objectives of this research are .........".
Be concise and aware of who will be reading your manuscript and make sure the introduction is directed at that audience. Move from general to specific, from the problem in the real world to the literature to your research. Lastly, please avoid making a subsection in the introduction.
 
Method
In the Method section, you explain clearly how you conducted your research in order to: (1) enable readers to evaluate the work performed and (2) permit others to replicate your research. You must describe exactly what you did: what and how experiments were run, what, how much, how often, where, when, and why equipment and materials were used. The main consideration is to ensure that enough detail is provided to verify your findings and enable the replication of the research. You should maintain a balance between brevity (you cannot describe every technical issue) and completeness (you need to give adequate detail so that readers know what happened).
Tips:
  1. Define the population and the methods of sampling;
  2. Describe the instrumentation;
  3. Describe the procedures and if relevant, the time frame;
  4. Describe the analysis plan;
  5. Describe any approaches to ensure validity and reliability;
  6. Describe statistical tests and the comparisons made; ordinary statistical methods should be used without comment; advanced or unusual methods may require a literature citation, and;
  7. Describe the scope and/or limitations of the methodology you used.
In the social and behavioural sciences, it is important to always provide sufficient information to allow other researchers to adopt or replicate your methodology. This information is particularly important when a new method has been developed or an innovative use of an existing method is utilised. Last, please avoid making a subsection in Method.
 
Result and Discussion
The purpose of the Results and Discussion is to state your findings, make interpretations and/or opinions, explain the implications of your findings, and make suggestions for future research. Its main function is to answer the questions posed in the introduction, explain how the results support the answers and, how the answers fit in with existing knowledge on the topic. The Discussion is considered the heart of the paper and usually requires several writing attempts.
The discussion will always connect to the introduction by way of the research questions or hypotheses you posed and the literature you reviewed, but it does not simply repeat or rearrange the introduction; the discussion should always explain how your study has moved the reader's understanding of the research problem forward from where you left them at the end of the introduction.
To make your message clear, the discussion should be kept as short as possible while clearly and fully stating, supporting, explaining, and defending your answers and discussing other important and directly relevant issues. Care must be taken to provide commentary and not a reiteration of the results. Side issues should not be included, as these tend to obscure the message.
Tips:
  1. State the Major Findings of the Study;
  2. Explain the Meaning of the Findings and Why the Findings Are Important;
  3. Support the answers with the results. Explain how your results relate to expectations and to the literature, clearly stating why they are acceptable and how they are consistent or fit in with previously published knowledge on the topic;
  4. Relate the Findings to Those of Similar Studies;
  5. Consider Alternative Explanations of the Findings;
  6. Implications of the study;
  7. Acknowledge the Study's Limitations, and;
  8. Make Suggestions for Further Research.
It is easy to inflate the interpretation of the results. Be careful that your interpretation of the results does not go beyond what is supported by the data. The data are the data: nothing more, nothing less.  Please avoid an makeover interpretation of the results, unwarranted speculation, inflating the importance of the findings, tangential issues or over-emphasize the impact of your research.
 
Work with Graphic:
Figures and tables are the most effective way to present results. Captions should be able to stand alone, such that the figures and tables are understandable without the need to read the entire manuscript. Besides that, the data represented should be easy to interpret.
Tips:
  1. The graphic should be simple, but informative;
  2. The use of colour is encouraged;
  3. The graphic should uphold the standards of a scholarly, professional publication;
  4. The graphic must be entirely original, unpublished artwork created by one of the co-authors;
  5. The graphic should not include a photograph, drawing, or caricature of any person, living or deceased;
  6. Do not include postage stamps or currency from any country, or trademarked items (company logos, images, and products), and;
  7. Avoid choosing a graphic that already appears within the text of the manuscript.
To see the samples of the table and figure, please download the template of the AJIE.
Last, please avoid making a subsection in Results and Discussion.
 
Conclusion
The conclusion is intended to help the reader understand why your research should matter to them after they have finished reading the paper. A conclusion is not merely a summary of the main topics covered or a re-statement of your research problem, but a synthesis of key points. It is important that the conclusion does not leave the questions unanswered. 

Tips:

  1. State your conclusions clearly and concisely. Be brief and stick to the point;
  2. Explain why your study is important to the reader. You should instil in the reader a sense of relevance;
  3. Prove to the reader, and the scientific community, that your findings are worthy of note. This means setting your paper in the context of previous work. The implications of your findings should be discussed within a realistic framework, and;
For most essays, one well-developed paragraph is sufficient for a conclusion, although in some cases, a two or three paragraph conclusion may be required. Another important thing about this section is (1) do not rewrite the abstract; (2) statements with "investigated" or "studied" are not conclusions; (3) do not introduce new arguments, evidence, new ideas, or information unrelated to the topic; (4) do not include evidence (quotations, statistics, etc.) that should be in the body of the paper.
 
Acknowledgements & Author Contributions Statement (Applied since 2020/Vol 1 Issue 1)
This is a short text to acknowledge the contributions of specific colleagues, institutions, or agencies that aided the efforts of the authors, optional (if needed)

The Author Contributions Statement can be up to several sentences long and should briefly describe the tasks of individual authors. Please list only two initials for each author, without full stops, but separated by commas (e.g. JC, JS). In the case of two authors with the same initials, please use their middle initial to differentiate between them (e.g. REW, RSW). The Author Contributions Statement should be included at the end of the manuscript before the References.
 
References
All citations in the text must be in the reference list and vice versa. The references should only include articles that are published or accepted. Datasets that have been deposited in an online repository should be included in the reference list, including the version and unique identifier when available. For accepted but unpublished works use "in press" instead of page numbers. Unpublished data, submitted manuscripts, or personal communications should be cited within the text only, for the article types that allow such inclusions. Personal communications should be documented with a letter of permission.
In-text citations should be called according to the surname of the first author, followed by the year. For works by two authors, include both surnames, followed by the year. For works by more than two authors, include only the surname of the first author, followed by et al., followed by the year. For assistance please use management references (Mendeley, Zotero, Endnote, etc) and utilise the format of the American Psychological Association 7th Edition. If possible, please provide the retrieved link for each reference.
 
Article in a print journal:
Siddiq, U. (2017). Hubungan Masyarakat dan Sekolah dalam Perspektif Islam. Al-Hayat: Journal of Islamic Education, 4(2), 99-109.
 
Article in an online journal:
Siddiq, U. (2017). Hubungan Masyarakat dan Sekolah dalam Perspektif Islam. Al-Hayat: Journal of Islamic Education, 4(2), 99-109. https://doi.org/10.25273/ajie.v7i2.1852
 
Article or chapter in a book:
Hambleton, R. K. (2005). Issues, designs, and technical guidelines for adapting tests into multiple languages and cultures. In Adapting educational and psychological tests for cross-cultural assessment (pp. 3-38). Mahwah, NJ, US: Erlbaum.
 
Book:
Baron, R. A. (2013). Human Aggression. Boston, MA: Springer US.
 
Theses and Dissertations:
Ikhwan, A. (2017). Peran Organisasi Islam Muhammadiyah Terhadap Pembentukan Karakter Siswa (Dissertation). Universitas Muhammadiyah Ponorogo, Ponorogo.
 
*Minimum references to publications in the last five (5) years; 80% of references must be from scientific journals with details of publications in Sinta-2 journals and reputable international scientific journals with a DOI (Digital Object Identifier).

Supplementary Material
AJIE does not support pushing important results and information into supplementary sections. However, data that is not of primary importance to the text, or which cannot be included in the article because it is too large or the current format does not permit it (such as movies, raw data traces, PowerPoint presentations, etc.) can be uploaded during the submission procedure and will be displayed along with the published article. Supplementary material can be uploaded as Data Sheet (word, excel, csv, cdx, fasta, pdf or zip files), Presentation (PowerPoint, pdf or zip files), Supplementary Image (cdx, eps, jpeg, pdf, png or tif), Supplementary Table (word, excel, csv or pdf), Audio (mp3, wav or wma) or Video (avi, divx, flv, mov, mp4, mpeg, mpg or wmv).
Supplementary material is not typeset so please ensure that all information is clearly presented, the appropriate caption is included in the file and not in the manuscript, and that the style conforms to the rest of the article.
 

Figures and Table Guidelines

General Style Guidelines for Figures
Figures help readers visualise the information you are trying to convey. Often, it is difficult to be sufficiently descriptive using words. Images can help achieve the accuracy needed for a scientific manuscript. For example, it may not be enough to say, "The surface had nanometer-scale features." In this case, it would be ideal to provide a microscope image.
For images, be sure to:
  • Include scale bars
  • Consider labelling important items
  • Indicate the meaning of different colours and symbols used
General Style Guidelines for Tables
Tables are a concise and effective way to present large amounts of data. You should design them carefully so that you clearly communicate your results to busy researchers.
The following is an example of a well-designed table:
  • Clear and concise legend or caption
  • Data divided into categories for clarity
  • Sufficient spacing between columns and rows
  • Units are provided in a font type and size that are legible
Figure and Table Requirements
Legends
Figure and table legends are required to have the same font as the main text (11 points normal Times New Roman, single-spaced). Legends should be preceded by the appropriate label, for example, "Figure 1" or "Table 4". Figure legends should be placed at the end of the manuscript (for supplementary images you must include the caption with the figure, uploaded as a separate file). Table legends must be placed immediately before the table. Please use only a single paragraph for the legend. Figure panels are referred to by bold capital letters in brackets: (A), (B), (C), (D), etc.
 
Image Size
Figure images should be prepared with the PDF layout in mind; individual figures should not be longer than one page and have a width that corresponds to 1 column or 2 columns.
 
Format
The following formats are accepted:
TIFF (.tif) TIFF files should be saved using LZW compression or any other non-lossy compression method. JPEG (.jpg)
EPS (.eps) EPS files can be uploaded upon acceptance
 
Colour Image Mode
Images must be submitted in the colour mode RGB.
 
Resolution Requirements
All images must be uploaded separately in the submission procedure and have a resolution of 300 dpi at the final size. Check the resolution of your figure by enlarging it to 150%. If the resolution is too low, the image will appear blurry, jagged or have a stair-stepped effect.
Please note that saving a figure directly as an image file (JPEG or TIF) can greatly affect the resolution of your image. To avoid this, one option is to export the file as PDF, then convert it into TIFF or EPS using graphics software. EPS files can be uploaded upon acceptance.
Details of all funding sources must be provided in the funding section of the manuscript, including grant numbers, if applicable.