Editorial process is about management of journal content. A detailed process can reflect the integrity and sophistication of a journal. Details about the editorial process, often available on a journal's website or published in the journal, are worth examining before submitting your article. Often included in the process are the:

1. Roles of the editor-in-chief and associate editors
2. Names of editorial board members
3. Details about the reviewing process
4. Timelines for screening manuscripts
5. Appeal options

Included with permission from the editor-in-chief, is a diagram of the Journal of Alzheimer's Disease's (JAD) editorial process:

Censorship

Read the Nature¹ editorial about the mammalian transmissibility of avian flu research that editors at Nature and Science were told not to publish by the US National Science Advisory Board in 2011.

"A paper that omits key results or methods disables subsequent research and peer review ... Where there is a benefit to public health or science, publish! It has been enlightening to see how scientists in this secretive arena see the open scientific enterprise as their best recourse in times of potential trouble."

1. Publishing risky research. (2012). Nature, 485(7396), 5-5.DOI:10.1038/485005a

Editorial process for top impact factor journals, from JCRweb:

Acta Crystallographica Section A

Educational Researcher See: Yussen, S. R., Dillon, D. R., Harwell, M. R., & Hearn, J. C. (2010). A New Ambition for the Journal.

Educational Researcher, 39(1), 3-4. DOI: 10.3102/0013189X09360515

The EMBO Journal

Energy & Environmental Science

Harvard Law Review

IEEE signal processing magazine

Nature