Review Process (jams-review-process)

When to trigger

• Before submitting, to set realistic expectations about JAMS review
• A decision letter arrived and you need to interpret it before responding
• You are unsure who decides at JAMS and what reviewers are told to weigh
• You want to know what conditional acceptance triggers (data/code deposit)

How JAMS review works

• Double-anonymized. Authors and reviewers are concealed from each other; keep every round anonymized, including revised files and any preregistration links.
• Developmental philosophy. JAMS, like the AMS journals, runs a developmental review — area editors and reviewers aim to improve promising papers across rounds, not merely gatekeep. A well-run R&R is the realistic best case; first-round acceptance is essentially unheard of.
• Decision structure. Manuscripts are handled by an Area / Associate Editor under the Co-Editors-in-Chief (Stephanie M. Noble and Charles H. Noble, University of Tennessee, since June 2024 — verified 2026-06-22; re-verify the masthead before submission). Your keyword/area choices in Editorial Manager influence routing, so choose them to reach the right editor and reviewers.
• What reviewers weigh. JAMS's evaluation is dual: (1) a genuine theoretical contribution to a broad marketing-science question, and (2) a clear managerial contribution — what a decision maker should do. Expect probes on construct validity / CMV (survey), endogeneity / identification (secondary data), mechanism and power (experiments), and on whether the contribution is more than a new-context replication.
• Integrity. Springer plagiarism screening; no concurrent submission; research-data and ethics policies apply.

Likely decisions

Reading the decision letter

• Read the AE/editor letter first — it states the path to acceptance and which concerns are decisive ("must address") versus secondary.
• Cluster reviewer comments by theme: theoretical contribution, managerial relevance, construct validity/measurement, identification/analysis, positioning, exposition.
• Flag the gatekeeping themes — any comment touching the theoretical-contribution or managerial-relevance bar is top priority; these are JAMS's twin gates.
• Separate new-data/analysis requests from reframing requests — they have very different timelines.
• Anticipate transparency — if nearing conditional acceptance, prepare the data/code availability statement and any repository deposit.

Calibrate expectations before you submit

• First-round R&R, not acceptance, is the goal. JAMS's developmental review means most successful papers go through two or more revision rounds; budget months, not weeks, between rounds.
• Desk-reject risk is highest on scope and relevance. A paper that is narrow, modeling-first, purely consumer-psychology, or missing a managerial implication is the most common early casualty — fix fit (jams-topic-selection) before submitting.
• Reviewer continuity matters. The same reviewers usually see your revision, so a response that visibly addresses their concern (not a generic improvement) is what advances the paper.
• Routing is partly in your hands. Keyword and area-of-interest choices in Editorial Manager steer the manuscript toward an area editor whose domain matches the paper; a mismatch slows the process and risks an unsympathetic read.

Where JAMS differs from the siblings' processes

• vs. JM (AMA): JM is double-anonymized via ScholarOne with a Coeditor structure and a hard page limit; JAMS runs on Springer Editorial Manager with an area-editor structure and article-type guidance rather than one fixed page cap.
• vs. JMR: JMR enforces exact three-digit p-values and a Web Appendix convention; JAMS emphasizes construct validity and the managerial contribution more than a single statistics-reporting rule.
• vs. Marketing Science / JCR: those weigh modeling rigor or consumer-theory depth respectively; JAMS will not accept a paper strong on one of those but thin on the managerial takeaway.

After the decision: the immediate moves

• Desk reject: re-evaluate fit before resubmitting elsewhere — a scope/relevance desk reject usually means the paper needs jams-topic-selection and jams-contribution-framing work, not a quick reformat.
• Reject after review: mine the reports for the decisive flaw; if it is fixable (identification, validity, a missing study), the work may suit a sibling or a later JAMS resubmission as a new paper — but do not re-submit the same paper to JAMS without a fundamental change.
• R&R (major/minor): move straight to jams-rebuttal; revise the manuscript before drafting the letter, and lead with the editor's decisive concerns.
• Conditional acceptance: finalize the data/code availability statement and any repository deposit, confirm declarations, and complete the production checklist.

Throughout, keep the manuscript and all correspondence anonymized until a decision releases that requirement; reviewers see your revisions, and a slip that reveals identity can compromise the round.

Checklist

• AE/editor letter parsed: decisive vs. secondary concerns identified
• Reviewer comments clustered by theme
• Theoretical-contribution and managerial-relevance comments flagged top priority
• New-data vs. reframing requests separated for timeline planning
• Validity/identification concerns (CMV, endogeneity) mapped to specific fixes
• Conditional-acceptance transparency steps anticipated (data/code statement)

Anti-patterns

• Treating all reviewer comments as equal, ignoring the editor's stated priorities
• De-anonymizing yourself in a response or a revised file
• Reading a major R&R as a near-accept and doing superficial edits
• Neglecting the managerial-contribution comments because the theory comments feel weightier
• Deferring data/code-availability prep until after conditional acceptance

Output format

【Decision】desk reject / reject / major R&R / minor / conditional accept
【Editor priorities】must-address: [...]; secondary: [...]
【Comment clusters】theory / managerial / measurement / identification / positioning / exposition
【Gatekeeper flags】theoretical + managerial contribution comments: [...]
【New data vs. reframing】[...]
【Transparency next】data/code availability + deposit readiness: [...]
【Next step】jams-rebuttal