About the Journal
Aims and Scope
SOCIOBIOLOGY publishes high-quality articles that significantly advance knowledge of Entomology, with an emphasis on social insects. Articles previously submitted to other journals are not accepted. SOCIOBIOLOGY publishes original research papers and invited review articles on all aspects of the biology, evolution, and systematics of social and pre-social insects (Ants, Termites, Bees, and Wasps). The journal is expanding its scope to include articles on other social arthropods. Papers may cover a range of subjects, such as ecology, ethology, morphology, population genetics, physiology, toxicology, reproduction, sociobiology, caste differentiation, economic impact, and pest management.
Short notes are also published, but we are more interested in manuscripts that address biology, ecology, sociality, behavior, and genetics, with at least an essential experimental/sampling component and quantitative/statistical analysis. We will not accept simplistic notes describing new records of species occurrence.
Articles and short notes that are only descriptive or anecdotal and of local interest will not be accepted.
Peer Review Process and Publication Deadline
The Associate Editors receive the manuscripts, which are then checked for plagiarism. They then conduct an initial evaluation of the relevance of the scientific contribution. This initial evaluation can take up to seven days. Then, initially approved manuscripts are forwarded to Section Editors and assigned to two ad hoc referees for a double-blind peer review. Reviewers must conclude their evaluation within four weeks of assignment. The authors have four weeks after initial acceptance to submit final revised versions. Then, the section editors make the final decision and send the manuscript to the copyediting staff. Accepted articles will be published continuously a few weeks after the final acceptance. This editorial flow is expected to result in a publication time of four to six months from submission.
Internal Ethics Compliance
Editors are not involved in decisions about manuscripts submitted by themselves or work colleagues, or that refer to products or services in which the editor is interested. Submissions in this situation are subject to the journal's regular review policies, and the editor's role does not confer any privilege related to the journal's relevance.
Publication Frequency
Quarterly (in March, June, September, and December)
However, articles are published continuously within each quarter.
Publication Fees
Sociobiology does not charge APCs or submission fees.
Open Access Policy
Sociobiology is financially supported by a public state university that receives endowments from the State treasurer. The costs of editing the journal are covered by public money. Furthermore, editors spend part of their public-funded work hours on journal management. Therefore, if the financial support comes from public funds, both the authors and the readers should benefit. The editorial board considers that scientific knowledge funded by public funds cannot be appropriated privately at any stage of the editorial process.
That is why this journal provides immediate access to its content on the principle that publicly funded scientific knowledge must be freely available to the public to support greater global knowledge exchange.
All content is freely available to users and their institutions without charge, under a Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 International (CC-BY-4.0). Users are allowed to read, download, copy, distribute, print, search, or link to the full texts of the articles or use them for any other lawful purpose without asking the publisher's or the author's prior permission. This follows the BOAI definition of open access.
Copyright
Authors retain copyright and grant the journal the right of first publication, with the work simultaneously licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution License that allows others to share the work with an acknowledgment or authorship and initial publication in this journal.
Indexing, abstracting, and permanent preservation
Sociobiology is indexed and abstracted by:
Web of Science; SCOPUS; CAB Abstracts; DOAJ, CORE, Biological Abstracts; Zoological Records; Google Scholar; WorldCat, among others.
The archive of papers published online since 2012 is permanently preserved in the LOCKSS archival system through the PKP PN procedure.
Journal History
The journal Sociobiology was founded in 1975 by Dr. David Kistner and is published by California State University, Chico, to provide a more timely forum for publishing high-quality papers by researchers on social animals. The series has grown substantially since its first publication, and advances in computer-based technologies have also improved quality. Over the years, most papers have dealt with, but are not limited to, various aspects of the biology of social insects, including bees, wasps, termites, ants, and many associated species.
Commencing with Volume 60 (2013), the editorial and production offices were located at Feira de Santana State University in Bahia, Brazil. SOCIOBIOLOGY relies on peer-reviewed manuscript evaluation, scientific excellence of published articles, free-of-charge publication, and open access to all published papers.
