Tables & Figures (jmf-tables-figures)
Exhibits are where an expert reviewer checks whether the family result is real. At JMF they also cost
pages: the manuscript page limit (~35 pp.; ~25 for brief reports) includes the abstract, text,
tables, and figures. So every exhibit must pull its weight, and many supporting tables belong in
supplementary/online materials.
When to trigger
- Designing the main results table/figure or a key descriptive exhibit
- Deciding what belongs in the article vs. supplementary materials
- A reviewer found an exhibit unclear, mislabeled, or non-self-contained
- Trimming to the page limit by moving exhibits to supplementary files
Principles
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Self-contained, modified APA. A reader should understand each exhibit from its title, notes, and
labels alone. Follow JMF's modified APA table/figure conventions: descriptive title, clear notes,
significance and abbreviations defined, sample size and units stated.
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Show magnitude and uncertainty. Report effect sizes and confidence intervals, not stars alone;
for models, prefer marginal effects / predicted values that a family-science reader can interpret
(e.g., predicted probability of divorce by duration).
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Right exhibit for the design. Survival curves for time-to-event; growth-trajectory plots for
panels; APIM path diagrams for dyads; family-structure and decomposition charts for demography.
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Accessible. Colorblind-safe palettes; legible in grayscale; no chartjunk or needless 3D.
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Descriptive table first. Family papers typically open results with a clear sample-descriptives
table (by group/family structure) — make it informative, not a data dump.
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Reproducible. Each exhibit is generated by the master script; numbers match the deposited
materials exactly (see
jmf-transparency-and-data-policy).
Manage the page budget
- Keep the few exhibits that carry the argument in the article; move full model tables, robustness
grids, balance tables, and measurement detail to supplementary materials.
- A reader should be able to follow the family story from the main exhibits alone.
Execution bridge (StatsPAI / Stata MCP)
Generate exhibits from the fitted result, not by retyping numbers (the usual source of
body-vs-supplement drift). Full map: execution-with-mcp. JMF is quantitative family demography/sociology; emphasize identification, selection, and decomposition methods.
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Tables:
etable (multi-model columns) or did_summary_to_latex straight from the
result_id.
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Figures:
plot_from_result / enhanced_event_study_plot / event_study_table —
axis units and the SE/clustering note baked in.
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Every note names the estimator + clustering and states the effect size in
interpretable units.
See a full fitted-result → exhibit chain in the JF execution walkthrough.
Anti-patterns
- Tables that require the prose to be intelligible (not self-contained)
- Significance stars with no effect size, interval, or substantive meaning
- Cramming every robustness check into the main text (blows the page budget — use supplements)
- Color-only encoding that fails in grayscale or for colorblind readers
- Exhibit numbers/values that don't match the deposited code output
Exhibit pass for Journal of Marriage and Family
Treat this skill as an executable review pass, not a prose hint. First lock the family process, population/sample frame, measurement validity, and longitudinal or comparative leverage; then judge whether the current manuscript answers the venue's real reader: family scholars who inspect measurement, household process, longitudinal design, and implications for family theory.
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Do the pass: For every table or figure, state the estimand or object, sample or case base, uncertainty display, and one sentence the exhibit proves for the venue audience.
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Return a ledger: give
claim / evidence / risk / manuscript location rows, so the next agent can edit rather than rediscover the issue.
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Sibling guard: compare against Demography for population-process emphasis, Social Forces for general sociology, Child Development for child-centered outcomes; if a sibling owns the contribution, recommend re-routing before polishing format.
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Stop condition: do not give submission-ready advice until the pack's
resources/official-source-map.md has been checked for volatile rules and the manuscript has one concrete fix for the largest venue-specific risk.
Output format
【Main exhibit】what it shows + why a figure/table
【Self-contained?】title + labels + notes + N/units present (modified APA)? [Y/N]
【Magnitude shown?】effect size + interval / predicted values? [Y/N]
【Accessible?】grayscale-legible + colorblind-safe? [Y/N]
【Article vs supplement】split decided, page-budget impact noted
【Reproducible?】generated by master script, matches package? [Y/N]
【Next】jmf-writing-style
Supplementary resources
