Journal of Depression And Therapy
Aims and Scope
Depression is rarely studied on its own. This journal publishes research on depressive disorders and on the therapies that address them, and reads each manuscript by the relation it examines — depression set against a mechanism, a treatment, another diagnosis, a stage of life, a social circumstance, a system of care, or a way of measuring it.
- ISSN
- 2476-1710
- DOI Prefix
- 10.14302
- License
- CC BY 4.0, copyright retained by the authors
What the Journal Is For
The remit follows the name. Depression sets the subject: depressive disorders and depressive symptoms across their forms, severities and courses, in clinical and non-clinical populations. Therapy sets the second half: the treatments that address depression, how they work, for whom, and how they reach the people who need them.
Both halves run from the fundamental to the applied. A study of a candidate mechanism in a laboratory model and a study of collaborative care in a primary-care network are each within the remit, and neither is asked to become the other. The journal publishes biological, psychological, behavioral, social and interdisciplinary research, and reads each manuscript on the terms its own field sets.
Work is placed here by its subject rather than by its immediate clinical application. A manuscript that advances understanding of depression, or of its treatment, belongs in the journal whether or not it reports a clinical outcome.
The Scope, Read as a Relation
Each group below is a way depression is studied. The left term stays fixed; what changes is what it is held against. The groups are the journal's subject areas, and the topics inside them show the range of each area rather than close it.
Depression alongside Mechanism and Cause
Work that asks how depressive states arise and what sustains them. Laboratory and clinical mechanism studies are evaluated using methods appropriate to the research question. Mechanistic findings can advance understanding of depression independently of a demonstrated treatment effect.
- Neural circuits and neuroimaging
- Neuroendocrine, immune and inflammatory signaling
- Genetics, epigenetics and gene–environment interaction
- Candidate biomarkers and their validation
- Preclinical models and pharmacological probes
- Cognitive and affective mechanisms
- Rumination, self-referential processing and emotion regulation
- Stress, adversity and developmental origins
- Sleep, circadian and metabolic contributions
Depression alongside Treatment and Therapeutic Process
The second half of the journal's name. Work here reports a treatment, or examines how a treatment works, for whom, and over what course.
- Psychotherapies and their mechanisms of change
- Pharmacotherapy, including novel and repurposed agents
- Ketamine, psychedelic-assisted and other rapid-acting approaches
- Neuromodulation, including rTMS, tDCS and ECT
- Behavioral, exercise and lifestyle interventions
- Digital, remote and blended delivery
- Combination therapy, sequencing and stepped care
- Treatment-resistant depression
- Personalized treatment selection and precision psychiatry
- Adherence, discontinuation and adverse effects
- Expectancy, placebo response and the therapeutic alliance
Depression alongside Another Diagnosis
Depression is commonly recorded beside a second condition, and telling the two apart is often the scientific question.
- Bipolar and related mood disorders
- Anxiety, trauma-related and obsessive-compulsive conditions
- Substance use and behavioral addictions
- Chronic physical illness, including renal, cardiac, metabolic and oncologic disease
- Neurological and neurodegenerative disease
- Pain and functional somatic conditions
- Apathy, fatigue and negative-symptom overlap
- Differential diagnosis and diagnostic boundaries
- Suicidal ideation, hopelessness and self-harm risk
Depression alongside Development and Life Stage
The same disorder presents and is treated differently across the life course. Work here is anchored in a stage, a population or a caregiving context.
- Children and adolescents
- Young adults and student populations
- Perinatal and parental depression
- Caregivers, families and couples
- Older adults and cognitive aging
- School, university and workplace settings
- Underserved and hard-to-reach populations
- Cross-cultural and international samples
Depression alongside The Social World
Depression is patterned by circumstance. Work here examines environmental, economic and social conditions using quantitative, qualitative or mixed methods.
- Social support, isolation and loneliness
- Disability and functional limitation
- Employment, unemployment and working conditions
- Poverty, deprivation and socioeconomic position
- Housing, neighborhood and environmental exposure
- Discrimination, stigma and minority stress
- Migration, conflict and displacement
- Culture, belief and help-seeking
Depression alongside Care Systems and Access
How depression care reaches people, and what becomes of it in practice.
- Prevention and early intervention
- Screening, case-finding and triage
- Primary care and collaborative care models
- Task-sharing and non-specialist delivery
- Implementation science and quality improvement
- Access, equity and unmet need
- Service organization and the mental-health workforce
- Health economics of depression care
- Policy and guideline evaluation
Depression alongside Measurement and Method
Studies whose contribution is the instrument, the design or the analysis. Methodological work is a subject in its own right here, not only a means to a clinical result.
- Diagnostic criteria and classification
- Rating scales, psychometrics and measurement invariance
- Ecological momentary assessment and digital phenotyping
- Patient-reported and functional outcomes
- Trial design, including pragmatic and adaptive designs
- Longitudinal, cohort and registry analysis
- Network, computational and predictive modeling
- Qualitative and mixed-methods research
- Evidence synthesis, meta-analysis and reproducibility
Subject Fit and Evidence Are Judged Separately
Two questions are asked of every manuscript, and they are asked independently: is the subject within the remit, and does the evidence support the claim being made.
Subject fit accommodates diverse designs. Laboratory studies, clinical trials, observational studies, cohort and registry analyses, single cases, qualitative studies, measurement work, replications, evidence syntheses and conceptual papers are assessed using standards appropriate to their questions and contributions.
The evidence required is set by the claim. A study that reports an association is assessed as an association study. A manuscript that claims a causal effect, a predictive relationship, efficacy, or a use in clinical care is assessed against the design, sample and analysis that such a claim requires, and is expected to state the limits of what it establishes.
Adequacy is assessed against the design and the question. A single case, a qualitative study and a multi-site trial each carry their own standard, and reporting follows the guideline that matches the design. For manuscript preparation guidance, consult the Instructions for Authors.
Where the Boundary Falls
Scope is decided by the relation a manuscript carries to depression or to its treatment, and that relation is judged substantively rather than by vocabulary. Work on a related condition, on a shared mechanism, or on a therapy developed elsewhere belongs here when it has a clear and developed bearing on depression or on depressive symptoms; the word itself need not appear in the title.
Three kinds of manuscript fall outside the remit
- Clinical or laboratory research in which depression appears only as one recorded variable among many and is not itself examined.
- Treatment research focused solely on another condition, without a developed connection to depression, depressive symptoms or their treatment.
- Studies of services, instruments or populations that address neither depression nor its therapy.
Authors who are uncertain where a manuscript falls are welcome to send a title and abstract to the editorial office at [email protected] before submitting.
How a Submission Is Assessed
All submissions undergo initial editorial screening. Manuscripts that meet the journal's scope and minimum requirements proceed to independent peer review.
Single-blind by default; double-blind review is available on request. Manuscripts that proceed to external peer review are normally evaluated by at least two independent subject-matter experts.
Editorial decisions are based on scope, scientific quality, methodological rigor, ethical compliance, reporting quality, and relevance to the journal.
Editor-in-Chief
Roberto Maniglio, Associate Professor of Clinical Psychology at the Università del Salento, Lecce, whose research covers affective and anxiety disorders, victimization, parenting and family dysfunction. The full board is listed on the Editorial Board page.
Bringing Work to the Journal
A manuscript should explain its substantive connection to depression or its treatment, the question it addresses, and the approach used to develop or evaluate its contribution.
Contributions may take forms such as research articles, reviews, case reports, perspectives and brief reports. Clinical trials, systematic reviews, methodological studies and case series contribute within the journal's subject areas. The published record also includes editorials. Consult the Instructions for Authors for preparation guidance; the editorial office can advise on the appropriate submission category.
- Primary Route ManuscriptZone oap.manuscriptzone.net
- Alternative Route Simple manuscript submission form openaccesspub.org/manuscript-submission-form
- Assisted Route Editorial office [email protected]
Authors must use only one submission route for the same manuscript.