Once I first began my PhD three years in the past, I used to be very new to the world of academia and the method of publishing in journals and conferences. Coming from Pc Engineering, my PhD concerned design analysis, and I felt that the publishing course of for human-computer interplay, design, design engineering, design analysis, and different associated areas was extra ambigious than pc science or different purely STEM topics.
Whereas I didn’t know a lot but, one factor that grew to become immediately clear was that many individuals related publishing with success as a researcher. Publishing appeared vital, even important, not just for the PhD, however for my profession as a tutorial or researcher (even for some locations in business).
Now, three years later and seven first author publications beneath my belt, I’m right here to share every thing I want I knew throughout that first 12 months.
I’m referring to publishing as having a paper accepted at a journal or convention. This sometimes entails a peer-review course of, which implies that two or extra reviewers learn and approve your paper. These reviewers are normally ‘specialists’ on the subject you’ve written the paper on, which may imply they’re teachers, researchers, business specialists, and so forth. This course of is normally blind, which means that your title and establishment are hidden from reviewers to keep away from any biases.
A paper can solely be submitted to one venue at a time and might solely be resubmitted to a second place if rejected or withdrawn from the primary place. Generally a journal paper describing a research could be repurposed as a convention paper, and vice versa. That’s provided that there’s a considerably completely different angle or extension introduced for a similar research/information, however in any other case it’s normally one research = one paper.
Sometimes, within the areas of human-computer interplay and design analysis, papers might be one in every of two sorts:
A Overview Paper: That is normally a scientific literature evaluate the place you’re simply analysing the literature that already exists on a subject. This entails being systematic (i.e., following a recognized course of reminiscent of PRISMA to ensure you’ve collected all of the papers that exist on a subject) and performing some evaluation (i.e., not simply saying ‘these are the papers that exist’, but additionally on the lookout for developments or patterns that may be realized from wanting on the mixture of those papers as an entire).
You’ll be able to see an instance here the place I have a look at all of the papers which have collaboratively designed conversational AI with completely different stakeholders. Not solely do I accumulate and current the papers, however I additionally analyse various factors like which stakeholders have been invovled and which collaborative design actions they used.
Any such paper is normally solely accepted in journals and fewer prone to be accepted at conferences, which are likely to focus extra on the second sort under.
An Empirical Paper: It is a paper the place you’ve executed new analysis and also you’re presenting it. Within the fields I discussed it will usually contain human individuals and embody strategies like surveys, interviews, workshops, ethnography, and so forth. You’ll give the introduction and a brief literature evaluate to provide background and context to your research, then you definately’ll summarise the strategies you used and current your outcomes earlier than discussing them.
An instance of this type of paper is this one. I interview professionals who construct conversational AI to know their experiences and struggles after which summarise and analyse these in relation to related papers which have additionally interviewed different AI professionals. For extra quantitative work, you may take a look at my information for doing statistical analysis on design research.
Any such paper is generally accepted at each conferences and journals.
1. Do the Analysis Research Properly!
Keep in mind that you’re not doing a PhD or doing analysis simply to publish. Your aim is to do good high quality analysis that’s impactful, after which publishing is only a consequence of that and a method of sharing your work with the broader neighborhood. Take the time to determine what you need to analysis and develop an air-tight methodology.
By way of a PhD, I like to recommend breaking it up right into a sequence of research that reply mini-questions, which then work in the direction of your foremost analysis query. In that sense, each research is publish-able as its personal paper (which is what I did). It is usually extremely useful to jot down up the paper for every research as you do it or as quickly as you end it, as a result of then every thing is written up and clear, and it will prevent huge time if you write your thesis on the finish.
One other method of getting publications is collaborating with different researchers on their initiatives and research. This may not get you a first writer publication, the place the primary writer is normally the one who did the vast majority of the work, however it might contribute in the direction of your total publication depend and present that you simply collaborate nicely with others. In my expertise, your first writer publications are essentially the most impactful ones, the place different authors are normally ordered by the dimensions of their contributions after which the final writer(s) are the supervisors of the work or essentially the most senior folks.
2. Establish the Venue
The following step is to select the place you need to publish your work in. I’m going to record some impactful design journals and conferences under, however rule of thumb is to examine the place the papers you’ve got cited in your paper come from. For those who discover you’ve referenced a selected journal or convention many occasions, that’s indicator that your analysis would possibly slot in nicely there. In any other case, it’s vital to examine the impression issue of various venues. This quantity signifies how impactful the papers printed at this venue have been (this can be a mixture of variety of occasions they’re cited and different metrics). Usually, design and human-computer interplay can have decrease impression scores than a subject like medication, the place papers might be far more impactful total. 3 is sort of impression issue for design analysis in my expertise.
On the identical time, in case you’re concentrating on conferences, you need to examine their deadlines. Whereas journals usually settle for papers all 12 months spherical, conferences can have submission deadlines that is perhaps too far-off to your plan.
It is usually value remembering that the higher the impression rating or the extra prestegious a venue is, the extra aggressive it’s going to be to get accepted there!
Good Design/HCI Journals
Design Research, ACM Transactions on Human-Pc Interplay, Co-Design, The Worldwide Journal of Design.
Good Design/HCI Conferences
The ACM CHI Convention on Human Components in Computing Programs (CHI), Designing Interactive Programs (DIS) Convention, Design Analysis Society (DRS) Convention, DESIGN, Worldwide Convention on Human Pc Interplay Concept and Functions (HUCAPP), ACM Convention on Info Know-how for Social Good.
Additionally examine extra domain-specific journals and conferences, relying in your analysis. For instance, AI Ethics and AI & Society are good AI-focused journals, whereas there are different nice journals for medication/medical analysis.
3. Write the Paper
The following step is to jot down the paper itself. Usually, as I discussed earlier, it will embody an introduction, literature evaluate or background part, methodology part, outcomes, dialogue and conclusion. It’s vital to examine papers out of your chosen journal or convention and comply with the format they use as nicely.
Get suggestions from colleagues and supervisors at any time when attainable and don’t be afraid to scratch some components and begin over! It takes time to jot down paper and also you shouldn’t rush the method.
4. Submit and Wait
Comply with the venue’s tips to submit your work and anticipate a choice. Keep in mind that writing a paper and submitting it’s in itself a milestone that you need to have fun! The evaluate course of is lengthy and might take a number of months. It’s vital to maintain that in thoughts if you’re planning publications, particularly if you’d like them printed earlier than ending your PhD. The completely different selections that reviewers may make in your paper will fluctuate from venue to venue, however they often might be:
✅ Settle for — Accepted as is with no additional modifications wanted.
⏳ Settle for with Minor Revisions — Conditional acceptance in case you implement some suggestions reviewers have left you. Often that is minor stuff across the writing itself and also you’ll be given round a month to do them.
⚠️ Settle for with Main Revisions / Revise and Resubmit — This implies the reviewers assume there may be promise and worth in your paper, however there are main modifications that must be made. This would possibly imply having to redo part of the research or accumulate extra information, or it would imply a significant re-write of the paper itself. On common you’ll get round 3 months to do these. In my expertise, this resolution is an effective factor. It means there’s no deadly flaw the place the paper have to be rejected. With some exhausting work and response letter the place you clarify the way you’ve addressed reviewers’ suggestions, you’ll be bumped as much as settle for or settle for with minor revisions.
🛑 Reject — Meaning there’s both a deadly flaw within the paper or it’s utterly irrelevant to the venue you’ve chosen. I’ve had outright rejections earlier than and they are often discouraging. An excellent place to start out is the reviewers’ detailed suggestions to know how one can enhance the research or the paper. I’ve had rejections that ended up being accepted in the long run, so don’t throw work out simply due to a rejection!
5. Don’t Panic!
Rejections are regular, iterations are regular, it’s all a part of the method! Nearly all of my papers got here on the finish of my second 12 months and through my third 12 months of the PhD. For those who’re simply beginning out, merely put publishing as a long run aim and focus first on structuring the diploma when it comes to research and carrying these out nicely. Submitting papers on completely different research can also be an effective way to get suggestions and catch any points early on, as a substitute of getting a nasty shock afterward in your protection/viva, or when it’s too late to repeat a research. By taking it as an opportunity to study and get suggestions, you’ll realise that you simply all the time profit from submitting a paper, even when the end result is a rejection for now.
I’m a final-year PhD pupil at Imperial School London. My PhD mission noticed me develop a framework and toolkit for collaboratively designing conversational AI that’s higher aligned with human values.
You’ll be able to take a look at the official web page for my mission on the Imperial College London website. You may as well take a look at this different article I wrote explaining the details of my PhD project.
I’ve arrange this Medium account to publish attention-grabbing classes I’ve learnt and snippets of my analysis as I work on my PhD mission. My aim is to unfold information and details about my work in a method that makes it comprehensible to anybody and everybody.
