It is a tremendous honor and privilege to serve as Editor of Communication Monographs – a premier journal in the communication discipline. It is also a tremendous responsibility, and I am grateful to my colleagues for entrusting the stewardship of this prestigious journal to my care. As the lyrics from Semisonic remind us, the beginning of my Editorship comes as my predecessor, Dr. Tamara Afifi, transitions out of an illustrious term as Editor-in-Chief of the journal. Under her guidance, the journal raised its impact factor, published innovative and socially impactful findings, and maintained a highly selective acceptance rate of 10%. As a member of her editorial board, I witnessed firsthand her editorial acumen – her ability to be fair but firm in upholding the standards of the journal, to help authors bring the best out of their own work, and to be truthful yet courteous and kind when rendering editorial decisions. She has also been a tremendous mentor and resource to me as I transition into this important role. On behalf of the discipline, I thank Dr Afifi and her editorial board for their thoughtful and tireless contributions to the journal. I will never forget the first time I submitted a manuscript (from my dissertation, no doubt) to a top tier journal in our field. When I received the decision letter, I was not only disappointed that my work had been rejected, but I was confused by the criterion used to arrive at the final decision. Before providing a set of thoughtful and insightful suggestions, both the Editor and the reviewers said that my work was well-written, that the methods were appropriate and well executed, and that the findings were potentially publishable. Yet, in the end, they decided that my work should be submitted to an alternative journal, as the contributions of my research did not rise to the level of a top tier journal. Looking back at that important moment in my early career, I now know that they were right. My manuscript was good, but not great scholarship – it did not pass the bar or exceed the expectations set for premier scholarship in our field. I also know that I am not alone, as I have heard countless stories from other colleagues in the field who have received similar decision letters at different points in their career. So what is the bar? How might we differentiate good from great communication scholarship, especially given that the latter is what we typically seek to publish in our premier journals? As was the experience of my predecessor, Dr Afifi, I too learned in graduate school that Communication Monographs is one of the “gold standards” for publishing communication research. It showcases work that begins with a great idea, asks important questions, frames those questions using a strong theoretical rationale, addresses them with rich data sets and appropriate methods, and produces findings that make a substantial contribution and possess potential for social impact. Although it might be tempting to view these criteria as formulaic for success, the truth is they can be highly subjective within the minds of different editors and reviewers. Thus, I will attempt to address the larger question of what the “bar” will be during my Editorship by using these criteria as a starting point for differentiating

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什么是酒吧？区分优秀与优秀的沟通奖学金

担任通信专着的编辑是一种巨大的荣誉和特权，这是通信学科的首要期刊。这也是一项巨大的责任，我感谢我的同事们将这本享有盛誉的期刊的管理权交给了我。正如 Semisonic 的歌词提醒我们的那样，我担任编辑的开始是在我的前任 Tamara Afifi 博士从该杂志主编的杰出任期中过渡出来的。在她的指导下，该杂志提高了影响因子，发表了具有创新性和社会影响力的研究成果，并保持了10%的高选择性接受率。作为她的编辑委员会成员，我亲眼目睹了她的编辑敏锐度——她能够公平但坚定地维护期刊的标准，帮助作者充分发挥自己的工作，在做出编辑决定时要诚实、礼貌和友善。在我过渡到这个重要角色的过程中，她对我来说也是一个巨大的导师和资源。我代表学科，感谢 Afifi 博士和她的编辑委员会对期刊的深思熟虑和不知疲倦的贡献。我永远不会忘记我第一次向我们领域的顶级期刊提交手稿（毫无疑问来自我的论文）。当我收到决定信时，我不仅对我的工作被拒绝感到失望，而且对用于得出最终决定的标准感到困惑。在提供一套深思熟虑和有见地的建议之前，编辑和审稿人都说我的工作写得很好，方法合适且执行得很好，并且研究结果有可能发表。然而，最后，他们决定我的工作应该提交给其他期刊，因为我的研究贡献没有上升到顶级期刊的水平。回顾我早期职业生涯中的那个重要时刻，我现在知道他们是对的。我的手稿很好，但不是很好的奖学金——它没有通过标准或超出我们领域对一流奖学金的期望。我也知道我并不孤单，因为我从该领域的其他同事那里听到了无数的故事，他们在职业生涯的不同阶段收到了类似的决定信。那么什么是酒吧？我们如何区分优秀和优秀的传播奖学金，特别是考虑到后者是我们通常寻求在我们的主要期刊上发表的内容？正如我的前任 Afifi 博士的经历一样，我在研究生院也了解到，传播专着是出版传播研究的“黄金标准”之一。它展示了从一个伟大的想法开始的工作，提出了重要的问题，使用强大的理论基础来构建这些问题，用丰富的数据集和适当的方法解决这些问题，并产生做出重大贡献并具有社会影响潜力的发现。尽管将这些标准视为成功的公式化标准可能很诱人，但事实是，在不同的编辑和审稿人的脑海中，它们可能是非常主观的。因此，我将尝试通过使用这些标准作为区分的起点来解决更大的问题，即在我担任编辑期间“标准”是什么