I have always had a problem acatually sending off anything I have written with the result that my publication record is abysmal. Yesterday I sent an article off and now I am terrified, perhaps that I will now be found out for the fraud I think I am. How do the rest of you cope with publication and potential or actual rejection? Am I the only one with this paralysing fear?

Oh my God! No one has replied to my post! This means that even in this forum no-one wants my publications!

Hi RA

I guess, after a long-drawn out year of trying to get just one article accepted (revising and discussing) then giving up on it just as it was on the final revision because I had no more time to give to it... I can understand what you're feeling. At the same time, I'm also an editor for a journal, so I can see the other side of things too. Mostly I just treat it as a submit, accept, good; submit, not accepted, try again kind of thing. There are so many variables involved in whether an article is suitable or not. If you've researched your target publication well, have written well and have something interesting to say - you should be okay. *grin* And if you're not - don't worry... look at the feedback you get (assuming you get some) and work with it to improve the article.

... Then resubmit it somewhere where it might fit better. As to the paralytic fear, as with anything that has a value, I find the fear subsides as you try things out more and get used to the parameters of the thing. And the thing to remember is... what journals want is the right article for them, at the right time... and rejection isn't always a rejection of you as a person. It's also as well to remember that publication in peer-reviewed journals are not easily achieved... but they're not impossible either. Practice, patience and perseverence help a lot, I think.

Of course you're a bit nervous about sending your work out into the big wide world, who wouldn't be? The only way to get past the fear is to do it, and keep doing it, and don't worry about pleasing all of the people all of the time. It's all part of the game.

Last thing I published (in a magazine) resulted in a angry letter from someone calling me a "typical scientist" - not sure what to make of that, but at least it got a reaction

I've not got anything to publish