Submission Preparation Checklist

As part of the submission process, authors are required to check off their submission's compliance with all of the following items, and submissions may be returned to authors that do not adhere to these guidelines.

• Have you checked the journal's website for instructions to authors regarding specific formatting requirements for submission?
• The manuscript is original, not previously published, and not under concurrent consideration elsewhere.
  
• The submission has not been previously published, nor is it before another journal for consideration (or an explanation has been provided in Comments to the Editor).
• The submission file is in OpenOffice, Microsoft Word, or RTF document file format.
• Where available, URLs for the references have been provided.
• The text is single-spaced; uses a 12-point font; employs italics, rather than underlining (except with URL addresses); and all illustrations, figures, and tables are placed within the text at the appropriate points, rather than at the end.
• The text adheres to the stylistic and bibliographic requirements outlined in the Author Guidelines.
• Figure have been prepared at a resolution sufficient to produce a high-quality image.
  
• All illustrations, figures, and tables are numbered and placed within the text at the appropriate points, rather than at the end.
  
• Unnecessary abbreviations were eliminated and necessary ones were explained in tables and figures in the table notes and figure captions or legends.