Titivillus Editing for the Health Sciences: Glossary

Titivillus Editing for the Health Sciences

Preparing Ideas and Research Results for Publication

Timothy DeVinney, Author's Editor and Copy Editor

Titivillus Editorial Services

Terms

AMA style. The styling specified by the American Medical Association Manual of Style.

APA style. The styling specified by the Publication Manual of the American Psychological Association.

AP style. The styling specified by the Associated Press Stylebook and Libel Manual.

author's editor. Someone who helps authors prepare material before they submit it to a publisher or journal, either to help them improve their chances of acceptance or because the publisher no longer provides adequate editorial assistance. This role is more specific than that of a copy editor, in that copy editors often work for publishers and journals to prepare accepted materials in accordance with their needs and requirements.

Chicago style. The styling specified by the Chicago Manual of Style.

copy editor. Someone who helps prepare material for publication—for authors and for publishers and journals. Copy editors find and correct mistakes in grammar, spelling, and usage (asking, eg, is this the right word to use for what you are trying to say here?).
They also try to ensure consistency (if the table gives a cohort size of 123, the text should refer to the same number of participants) and completeness (are the questions raised in the "Introduction" ever addressed?).
And, finally, copy editors help style the work so that it conveys the message intended by the author(s) and is consistent with the style stipulated or expected by a journal or publisher and other readers in the field.

Harvard style. A general term for the many varieties of approach to author-date citation specified by APA style and by the styles of publishers such as Springer-Verlag.

headline-style capitalization. Varies by style guide, but for AMA style (p 239), capitalize the first letter of the first and last words on each line of the heading or subheading (if there is more than one line), of all adjectives, adverbs, nouns, and verbs, but lowercase articles, prepositions, and coordinating conjunctions with 3 letters or fewer, and the to of the infinitive.

MLA style. The styling specified by the MLA Style Manual and Guide to Scholarly Publishing.

MS. See Abbreviations: MS.

sentence-style capitalization. Capitalize the first letter of the first word in the sentence, the first word after a colon, and all proper nouns and adjectives.

style guide. An authoritative source (see sources) for points of styling and formatting to be applied to a work intended for a particular publication or readership.

style sheet. A style sheet is a list of styling points that is kept for reference during a copyedit, so that once a decision is made about formatting or spelling (generally, regarding some point that is not covered in the style guide being used), it is applied consistently throughout the rest of the work.

styling. In editing, styling means deciding how to punctuate sentences, render words including technical terms (hyphenated or open, lowercase or capitalized, in italics or roman type), and format units of measurement, so that your expression extends beyond basic syntax and the dictionary meaning of words.
If you go against current usage as it has developed in your field, you show either that you don't know what's what, that you are part of a group that does things differently, or that you want to make a point regarding how you see something.
A good copy editor will help you recognize the signals you send by following such conventions or violating them. More often, the copy editor will simply help prepare the MS so it is in line with what the editors at a particular journal or publisher are used to seeing (thus making them more likely to accept your work for publication).

Uniform Requirements. See Vancouver style.

Vancouver style. The numbered reference citation style specified by the International Committee of Medical Journal Editors in their publication "Uniform Requirements for Manuscripts Submitted to Biomedical Journals," which can be found at http://www.nlm.nih.gov/
bsd/uniform_requirements.html. Accessed April 24, 2006.

Abbreviations

CE: copy editor. (See definition of copy editor.)

CMS15: The Chicago Manual of Style. 15th ed. (See sources, below.)

ETS: Electronic typescript: the version of an article that is kept on the computer ready for editing, transmission, and eventual publication; in contrast to a printout.

IMRAD: acronym for the Introduction, Methods, Results, and Discussion format for presenting original research results.

ME: managing editor. This is often the title of the person at a publisher who oversees the editing and preparation of a journal article or book (but not always; sometimes editing is handled by the production department. See also PE).

MS: the manuscript; ie, the work in its prepublication state. Strictly speaking, this should be ETS (electronic typescript), but MS remains a commonly used abbreviation. (See the AMA style manual, p 246.)

MW11 (also referred to as Web11): Merriam-Webster's Collegiate Dictionary. 11th ed. (See sources, below.)

PE: production editor. This is sometimes the title of the person at a publisher who oversees editing as well as the production of journal articles or books (but not always; sometimes editing is handled by the editorial department. See also ME).

STM: scientific, technical, and medical. This is used to designate a field in publishing.

Web11 (also MW11): Merriam-Webster's Collegiate Dictionary. 11th ed. (See sources, below.)

WIT: Words into Type. 3rd ed. (See sources, below.)

Sources

American Medical Association Manual of Style. 9th ed. Philadelphia, Pa: Lippincott Williams & Wilkins; 1998.

American Psychological Association. Publication Manual of the American Psychological Association. 5th ed. Washington DC: American Psychological Association; 2001. (Note: there is a Web site with FAQs and updates to APA style. Available at: http://www.apastyle.org/faqs.html. Accessed April 24, 2006.)

The Associated Press Stylebook and Libel Manual. Reading, Mass: Perseus; 1998.

Council of Biology Editors Style Manual Committee. Scientific Style and Format: CBE Manual for Authors, Editors, and Publishers. 6th ed. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press; 1994.

The Chicago Manual of Style. 15th ed. Chicago, Ill: University of Chicago Press; 2003.

Gibaldi, Joseph, ed. MLA Style Manual and Guide to Scholarly Publishing. 2nd ed. New York, NY: Modern Language Association; 1998.

Merriam-Webster's Collegiate Dictionary. 11th ed. Springfield, Mass: Merriam-Webster Inc; 2003.

The Oxford English Dictionary [book on CD-ROM, Version 3.0]. 2nd ed. Oxford: Oxford University Press; 2002.

Skillin, Marjorie, and Robert Gay. Words into Type. 3rd ed. Englewood Cliffs, NJ: Prentice-Hall; 1974.

URL for this page: http://www.HeathSciEdit.com/tes-gloss.htm
© 2003–2009 Timothy DeVinney. Page last updated April 24, 2006.