Communicating Science, Health, Environment and Risk Division
AEJMC 2025
The Communicating Science, Health, Environment and Risk (ComSHER) Division invites full length paper and extended abstract submissions that represent original research related to science, health, environment, risk, and other topics relevant to the communication of scientific information to the general public or specific populations. ComSHER welcomes submissions from all disciplinary approaches and methodological orientations, including quantitative, qualitative, and mixed methods. ComSHER is committed to highlighting research that showcases diversity, equity, inclusion (DEI), and justice issues and international perspectives.
In any one year, an individual can appear as an author or a coauthor on a maximum of two (2) submitted research papers and/or extended abstracts. If one individual appears on more than two submissions, the ComSHER Executive Committee reserves the right to disqualify some or all of the papers in question from the research competition.
To acknowledge research excellence of ComSHER members, all nonstudent papers will be considered for Top Paper Awards, which are determined by overall reviewer rankings. Authors of awarded Top Papers are invited to present their research on a panel at this year’s conference and honored at the ComSHER Business Meeting. A Top Poster Award is also awarded at this year’s conference.
Further, in honor of former University of Texas doctoral candidate Lori Eason (1957-2002), ComSHER offers the Eason Prize for the top three student papers. The Eason Prize remains the largest overall student award at AEJMC, and includes $500 for first place, $300 for second place, and $200 for third place. Student submissions competing for the top student paper and the accompanying Eason Prize are judged together with other faculty submissions. The Eason Prize submissions cannot be coauthored with faculty and must be clearly identified as an Eason Prize entry on the cover page of the submission. If not identified, they will be disqualified from the competition.
Only full length research paper submissions (not extended abstract submissions) will be considered for the Top Paper or Eason Prize awards. All submissions should follow APA format and the AEJMC Uniform Paper Call Guidelines (no more than 25 pages of double spaced text with 12 point, Times New Roman font, and 1-inch margins, plus references, tables, figures, and appendices). All extended abstract submissions must be labeled as “Extended Abstract” in the title of the submission.
All accepted papers must be presented by a listed author. Authors unable to present must find another person to present their work and let the Research Chairs know in advance. Failure to appear to present can result in author(s) losing eligibility to submit to the Division for one year. Direct questions to Research Chair, Sojung (Claire) Kim, at skim205@gmu.edu.
The Division encourages all submitters to carefully check their submissions for self identifying information of any kind, including metadata embedded in submitted documents. Submissions with any residual identifying information will be rejected without review. Before uploading your submission (including PDF and Word documents), exercise extra diligence to remove all author identification from the document, including any file properties or obvious reference to self-citations. AEJMC’s uniform call for papers includes helpful solutions to self-citation.