Guideline for Authors

The 4D Journal of Landscape Architecture and Garden Art welcomes submissions on a wide range of topics and methodologies, including manuscripts publishing the results of research on open space design theory, garden history, landscape history, urban heritage, landscape value conservation, urbanism, green infrastructure, climate adaptation; critical design reviews; and research based on the analysis and synthesis of existing research. All publications published in the journal are peer-reviewed, with at least two reviews.

The publications of the 4D journal are usually published in both English and Hungarian. Articles written by foreign authors are published in their entirety in English only, with a summary in Hungarian. Papers should be submitted in proper English (British or American). English language assistance will not be provided, but articles will be published after language proofreading.

Formal requirements

Manuscript submission

Manuscripts should be submitted in docx file format, with only the minimum formatting (headings and subheadings, paragraphs and line breaks), in Arial font. The first submitted version should include all figures and images to give the reviewers and the editor a clear overview of the article.

 

Manuscripts should be uploaded to the journal's website (https://journal.uni-mate.hu/index.php/4D) after registration. As the category of the manuscript, authors can choose between “Articles” and “Reviews”.[1] Articles are considered scientific publications, and unlike reviews, they also have a DOI (Digital Object Identifier).  In the online platform, please be sure to specify:

  • academic degrees, workplace, e-mail addresses of all authors in English and Hungarian;
  • title of the manuscript in English and Hungarian;
  • keywords of the work (maximum 5) in English and Hungarian;
  • abstract of the article, also in two languages;
  • a list of the references cited in the article, in alphabetical order, according to the formal and content requirements specified at the end of the authors' directory;
  • articles published also in Hungarian should be submitted in Hungarian; articles published only in English should be submitted in English, in Microsoft Word format.

 

To ensure anonymous proofreading, the manuscript submitted should not include the authors' names, workplaces or author identifiers. These must be indicated in the online interface. 

When submitting a manuscript, authors must declare that the submitted manuscript complies with the editorial guidelines and ethical policy of the journal 4D Landscape Architecture and Horticulture.

ORC ID

The journal is committed to using the ORCID identifier, and we will not accept manuscripts from authors without it.

The ORCID (Open Research and Contributor Identifier) is an internationally accepted author identification code (e.g. 0000-0002-9139-8370) that provides a unique identifier for the researcher. It is free for researchers to create an ORCID and maintain a profile if they do so individually. For more information on ORCID and registration: https://orcid.org/signin.

 

Recommended paper structure

The maximum length of the article, including spaces, is 19,500 characters.

  • Title:The title should be concise, specific and relevant.
  • Abstract: The abstract should be a total of about 350 words maximum. The abstract should be a single paragraph and should follow the style of structured abstracts, but without headings: 1) Background: place the question addressed in a broad context and highlight the purpose of the study; 2) Methods: describe briefly the main methods applied.  3) Results: summarise the article's main findings; and 4) Conclusion: indicate the main conclusions or interpretations. The abstract should be an objective representation of the article: it must not contain results that are not presented and substantiated in the main text and should not exaggerate the main conclusions.
  • Keywords: Three to six pertinent keywords need to be added in Hungarian and English. We recommend that the keywords are specific to the article, yet reasonably common within the subject discipline.
  • Introduction: The introduction should briefly place the study in a broad context and highlight why it is important. It should define the purpose of the work and its significance, including the specific hypotheses being tested. The current state of the research field should be reviewed carefully and key publications cited. Please highlight controversial and diverging hypotheses when necessary. Finally, briefly mention the main aim of the work and highlight the main conclusions. Keep the introduction comprehensible to scientists working outside the topic of the paper.
  • Materials and Methods: They should be described with sufficient detail to allow others to replicate and build on published results. New methods and protocols should be described in detail, while well-established methods can be briefly described and appropriately cited. Give the name and version of any software used and make clear whether the computer code used is available.
  • Results and Discussion: Provide a concise and precise description of the results, their interpretation as well as the conclusions that can be drawn. Authors should discuss the results and how they can be interpreted from the perspective of previous studies and the working hypotheses. The findings and their implications should be discussed in the broadest context possible and the limitations of the work highlighted. Future research directions may also be mentioned.
  • Conclusions: This section is not mandatory, but can be added to the manuscript if the discussion is unusually long or complex.
  • Tables and figures: 8 to 10 in number and up to 4 pages in size. Tables and figures should be numbered consecutively, and the source should be indicated if the table/figure does NOT reflect the authors' own (!) results or is not the author's own work. If the table/figure is based on external data or articles, the source should be given as Source: based on OECD 2010 or Source: based on Tóth 2001. In all cases, tables and figures must be referred to in the text, and this is indicated in italics. For example: As shown in Table 2... or: The spatial characteristics (Table 2) are given as follows...

The original source of the image must be indicated, even if the image or illustration is not protected by copyright or if re-use is permitted under a licence that allows unrestricted re-use.

Images or illustrations from sources published on other platforms, journals, websites may only be used in 4D journal articles if the author of the submitted manuscript has received the appropriate permission from the copyright owner for republication.

Figures and images must be at least 300 dpi resolution.
Minimum image width (width of 1 cell): 87 mm
Maximum image width (one side): 179.27 mm

  • References: The format of references should be in APA 7th edition (single-spaced bibliography) style. We recommend preparing the references with a bibliography software package, such as EndNote, ReferenceManager or Zotero to avoid typing mistakes and duplicated references. An alphabetically arranged bibliography is required at the end of the article, which is described in detail in the formal requirements.

 

[1] Typically, descriptive manuscripts, personae and plan descriptions are placed in the “reviews” section, but an article based on literature review and comparison of existing research can also be considered as a transition between the two sections. In addition to the scientific research and evaluation methodology, the critical approach and the high proportion of scientific publications used for the research are also taken into account in the evaluation. In some cases, a manuscript submitted to the “scientific articles” section may be reclassified under “reviews” based on an editorial decision or the recommendation of the editor.

 

Blind peer review

Submissions are reviewed by a peer review board to ensure they meet the requirements and professional guidelines and ethical code of the journal. If the manuscript does not meet the required standard or professional expectations, it is rejected without a peer review. Inadequately prepared manuscripts will be returned to the authors for revision. After the preliminary check, the manuscript will be submitted to at least two independent experts for peer review. The referees are Hungarian or foreign experts with significant research and publication records. A double-blind peer review process is used, where the identity of the authors is not known to the reviewers, so authors are asked not to include their names or any personal information in the submitted manuscript. The reviewer's comments are confidential and will only be disclosed with their express consent. Reviewers are requested to provide their review within a maximum of three weeks.

Editorial decision and revision

All the articles, reviews and communications published in 4D go through the peer-review process and receive at least two reviews. The editor will communicate the decision, which will be one of the following:

  • Accept without revisions:

The paper is suitable for publication without any changes.

  • Accept after minor revisions:

The paper is in principle accepted after revision based on the reviewer’s comments. Authors are given five days for minor revisions.

  • Reconsider after major revisions:

The acceptance of the manuscript would depend on the revisions. The author needs to provide a point-by-point response or provide a rebuttal if some of the reviewer’s comments cannot be revised. Usually, only one round of major revisions is allowed. Authors will be asked to resubmit the revised paper within a suitable time frame, and the revised version will be returned to the reviewer for further comments.

  • Another journal is recommended.
  • Publishing not recommended:

If additional evidence and/or research is needed to support the conclusions, the manuscript will be rejected and the authors will be encouraged to re-submit the paper once the necessary evidence and/or research has been provided.

Each of the reviewers' comments must be answered point by point. If the author disagrees with the reviewer, he/she must clearly explain why. Following the correction, the author will be informed of the decision of the reviewers and the editorial board within two weeks.

The final version of the paper should be sent in plain text, indicating in the text the numbered figures and their location, but the figures should be uploaded to the submission library on the website in a separate file, with a resolution of at least 300 dpi in jpg format. A numbered list of the figures, including their title and/or description and an indication of the source, is also requested.

Articles that have been proofread in Hungarian should be translated and uploaded to the website after the proofreading process has been completed.

At the end of the editing process, authors are asked to double-check the title, keywords, abstracts, list of sources and author information on the 4D website.

Acceptance of articles for publication typically takes four months.