The ''Journal of Abnormal Psychology'' (formerly ''Journal of Abnormal Psychology and Social Psychology'' and ''Journal of Abnormal and Social Psychology'') is a

peer-reviewed Peer review is the evaluation of work by one or more people with similar competencies as the producers of the work ( peers). It functions as a form of self-regulation by qualified members of a profession within the relevant field. Peer revie ...

academic journal An academic journal or scholarly journal is a periodical publication in which scholarship relating to a particular academic discipline is published. Academic journals serve as permanent and transparent forums for the presentation, scrutiny, and ...

published by the

American Psychological Association The American Psychological Association (APA) is the largest scientific and professional organization of psychologists in the United States, with over 133,000 members, including scientists, educators, clinicians, consultants, and students. It ha ...

(APA). The journal has been in publication for over 110 years, and it is considered to be a "preeminent outlet for research in

psychopathology Psychopathology is the study of abnormal cognition, behaviour, and experiences which differs according to social norms and rests upon a number of constructs that are deemed to be the social norm at any particular era. Biological psychopathol ...

". Beginning in 2022, the journal will be known as the ''Journal of Psychopathology and Clinical Science''. The ''Journal of Abnormal Psychology'' addresses the following major areas of focus: # psychopathology (

etiology Etiology (pronounced ; alternatively: aetiology or ætiology) is the study of causation or origination. The word is derived from the Greek (''aitiología'') "giving a reason for" (, ''aitía'', "cause"); and ('' -logía''). More completely, ...

, development, symptomatology, and the course) # normal processes in abnormal disorders # pathological or atypical features of behavior of normal individuals # experimental studies (with human or animal subjects) relating to the abnormal emotional behavior or pathology # sociocultural effects on pathological processes (gender, ethnicity) # tests of hypotheses from psychological theories that relate to

abnormal behavior Abnormality (or dysfunctional behavior) is a behavioral characteristic assigned to those with conditions that are regarded as rare or dysfunctional. Behavior is considered to be abnormal when it is atypical or out of the ordinary, consists of un ...

History

''Journal of Abnormal Psychology'' began publication in April 1906 under the ownership of Richard G. Badger of Boston and the editorship of

Morton Prince Morton Henry Prince (December 22, 1854 – August 31, 1929) was an American physician who specialized in neurology and abnormal psychology, and was a leading force in establishing psychology as a clinical and academic discipline. He was part o ...

. In 1921, the name was changed to the ''Journal of Abnormal Psychology and Social Psychology'' under the guiding assumption of the era that states of mind can only be judged to be "normal" or not against a background of the prevailing social norms of the particular time and place. In 1925, this was simplified to ''Journal of Abnormal and Social Psychology'', the title it would go by for the next 40 years. Upon Prince's death in 1929, the journal was purchased by the

and the editorship fell to Henry T. Moore, the president of

Skidmore College Skidmore College is a private liberal arts college in Saratoga Springs, New York. Approximately 2,650 students are enrolled at Skidmore pursuing a Bachelor of Arts or Bachelor of Science degree in one of more than 60 areas of study. Histo ...

. In 1938, the prominent personality theorist

Gordon W. Allport Gordon Willard Allport (November 11, 1897 – October 9, 1967) was an American psychologist. Allport was one of the first psychologists to focus on the study of the personality, and is often referred to as one of the founding figures of person ...

became the journal's editor. In 1965, the name reverted to simply the ''Journal of Abnormal Psychology,'' the same year that the ''

Journal of Personality and Social Psychology The ''Journal of Personality and Social Psychology'' is a monthly peer-reviewed scientific journal published by the American Psychological Association that was established in 1965. It covers the fields of social and personality psychology. The ed ...

'' began publication.

Editors

The editor of the ''Journal of Abnormal Psychology'' is Angus MacDonald of

University of Minnesota The University of Minnesota, formally the University of Minnesota, Twin Cities, (UMN Twin Cities, the U of M, or Minnesota) is a public land-grant research university in the Twin Cities of Minneapolis and Saint Paul, Minnesota, United States. ...

. With the resources of the APA's new "online first" publication, full text manuscripts appear online as soon as the editors have completed the work. Authors must consult the APA's "Instruction for All Authors" for information regarding manuscript preparation, publication policies, permission, and figures.

Calls for papers

The APA website states:

Theoretical papers of scholarly substance on abnormality may be appropriate if they advance understanding of a specific issue directly relevant to abnormal psychology and fall within the length restrictions of a regular (not extended) article. The priority is empirical papers. ... Therefore, a study that focuses primarily on treatment efficacy should be submitted to the ''
Journal of Consulting and Clinical Psychology The ''Journal of Consulting and Clinical Psychology'' is a monthly academic journal published by the American Psychological Association. Its focus is on treatment and prevention in all areas of clinical and clinical-health psychology and especiall ...
''. However, a
longitudinal study A longitudinal study (or longitudinal survey, or panel study) is a research design that involves repeated observations of the same variables (e.g., people) over short or long periods of time (i.e., uses longitudinal data). It is often a type of ob ...
focusing on developmental influences or origins of abnormal behavior should be submitted to the ''Journal of Abnormal Psychology''.

Abstracting and indexing

The journal is abstracted and indexed by

MEDLINE MEDLINE (Medical Literature Analysis and Retrieval System Online, or MEDLARS Online) is a bibliographic database of life sciences and biomedical information. It includes bibliographic information for articles from academic journals covering med ...

PubMed PubMed is a free search engine accessing primarily the MEDLINE database of references and abstracts on life sciences and biomedical topics. The United States National Library of Medicine (NLM) at the National Institutes of Health maintai ...

and the

Social Sciences Citation Index The Social Sciences Citation Index (SSCI) is a commercial citation index product of Clarivate Analytics. It was originally developed by the Institute for Scientific Information from the Science Citation Index. The Social Sciences Citation Index ...

. According to the ''

Journal Citation Reports ''Journal Citation Reports'' (''JCR'') is an annual publicationby Clarivate Analytics (previously the intellectual property of Thomson Reuters). It has been integrated with the Web of Science and is accessed from the Web of Science-Core Colle ...

'', the journal has a 2020

impact factor The impact factor (IF) or journal impact factor (JIF) of an academic journal is a scientometric index calculated by Clarivate that reflects the yearly mean number of citations of articles published in the last two years in a given journal, as ...

of 6.673.

References

{{Psychology Abnormal psychology journals Personality journals American Psychological Association academic journals English-language journals 8 times per year journals

History

Editors

Calls for papers

Abstracting and indexing

See also

References