Behavioural Medicine Journal: Scope & Indexing

Behavioural medicine journal literature encompasses peer-reviewed publications investigating human behaviour, physiological mechanisms, physical health, and somatic disease. When researchers search for a behavioural medicine journal or the journal of behavioral medicine, they typically navigate two foundational titles: Springer Nature’s Journal of Behavioral Medicine (established 1978) and Taylor & Francis’s Behavioral Medicine (established 1988), alongside flagship society titles including the Society of Behavioral Medicine‘s Annals of Behavioral Medicine. This guide details journal scopes, bibliographic indexing, editorial workflows, author submission standards, article processing charges, and comparative criteria for researchers and librarians.

What it is

The term behavioural medicine journal denotes a specialized scholarly serial focused on behavioral medicine: the interdisciplinary field integrating behavioral, psychosocial, and biomedical science knowledge to understand physical health, illness, prevention, diagnosis, treatment, and rehabilitation. Unlike purely psychological journals investigating mental processes in isolation, or medical journals emphasizing pharmacological interventions, a behavioral medicine journal bridges behavioral science with somatic disease endpoints.

Behavioral medicine emerged following the 1977 Yale Conference on Behavioral Medicine and the 1978 Institute of Medicine report, establishing that behavioral patterns and stress physiology contribute substantially to chronic disease morbidity. To support this scholarship, the Journal of Behavioral Medicine was launched in March 1978 (Volume 1, Issue 1) by Plenum Press (later Springer Nature) under founding editor W. Doyle Gentry. As cataloged in the National Library of Medicine (NLM) Catalog, the publication holds NLM Unique ID 7807105, indexed with Medline Title Abbreviation (Medline TA) J Behav Med, carrying Print ISSN 0160-7715 and Electronic ISSN 1573-3521.

A parallel serial is Behavioral Medicine, published by Routledge (Taylor & Francis Group). Documented under NLM Unique ID 8804264 (Medline TA: Behav Med, Print ISSN 0896-4289, Electronic ISSN 1940-4026), this journal originated in 1988 as the successor to the earlier Journal of Human Stress. Academic societies sponsor flagship journals in this domain, including Annals of Behavioral Medicine (Oxford University Press / Society of Behavioral Medicine; NLM ID 8510246, ISSN 0883-6612) and the International Journal of Behavioral Medicine (Springer / International Society of Behavioral Medicine; NLM ID 9421097, ISSN 1070-5503).

For authors, identifying the exact journal title is critical. While Springer’s Journal of Behavioral Medicine and Taylor & Francis’s Behavioral Medicine share disciplinary roots, they operate under separate editorial boards, distinct submission portals, independent open-access business models, and varying expectations regarding mechanistic versus clinical study designs.

Who runs it and what it covers

The primary publication associated with the query, Springer Nature’s Journal of Behavioral Medicine, is operated as a hybrid peer-reviewed journal under the editorial leadership of Editor-in-Chief Alan J. Christensen (University of Iowa) and an international editorial board spanning health psychology, internal medicine, behavioral epidemiology, and public health.

The aims and scope of the journal encompass theoretical and empirical investigations connecting behavioral sciences to physical health. Core subject areas covered include:

• Physiological and Psychological Stress: Investigations into neuroendocrine, autonomic, cardiovascular, and immunological reactivity to acute and chronic psychosocial stressors.
• Health-Related Behaviors: Empirical research assessing determinants and modification of behaviors affecting physical health, including physical activity, nutrition, tobacco consumption, alcohol and substance misuse, and sleep hygiene.
• Treatment Adherence and Chronic Disease Self-Management: Biopsychosocial factors influencing patient compliance with prescribed medical regimens, self-monitoring in diabetes, cardiovascular disease management, oncology rehabilitation, and chronic pain management.
• Sociocultural Determinants: Health disparities, social determinants of health, socioeconomic gradients, and institutional barriers shaping health outcomes and healthcare utilization.
• Intervention Trials and Translational Science: Controlled trials and evaluations of behavioral and lifestyle interventions targeting somatic symptoms and disease progression.

The journal excludes purely psychiatric papers lacking somatic health components, animal studies without translational relevance to human physical illness, and unstandardized psychometric tool validations lacking health-outcome validity.

Bibliographically, the Journal of Behavioral Medicine maintains comprehensive coverage across international citation indices. It is indexed in Clarivate’s Social Sciences Citation Index (SSCI), maintaining a Journal Impact Factor between 2.5 and 2.8. In Scopus, it records a CiteScore of approximately 5.5 and an SJR of 0.882, positioning it in Quartile 1 (Q1) for Psychology (miscellaneous) and Q2 for Psychiatry and Mental Health. OpenAlex records document more than 2,730 published works, over 175,000 total scholarly citations, an h-index of 175, and a 2-year mean citedness of 3.94. Crossref records verify over 2,720 active DOI deposits.

Taylor & Francis’s Behavioral Medicine focuses on original empirical articles, clinical case studies, evaluation research, and literature reviews addressing clinical and health behavioral topics. As indexed in OpenAlex, it contains 994 published works and more than 34,300 scholarly citations with an h-index of 88, providing a venue for clinical behavioral researchers seeking a practitioner-oriented audience.

How to search or use it

Utilizing behavioral medicine journal literature involves discovering published research for evidence synthesis and submitting manuscripts through publisher editorial portals.

Discovering Content via Databases and Publisher Platforms

Researchers conducting systematic reviews, scoping analyses, or background literature searches can locate articles through multiple channels:

1. PubMed and MEDLINE: Because both major behavioral medicine journals are MEDLINE-indexed, PubMed offers precise biomedical discovery. Restrict search results to Springer’s Journal of Behavioral Medicine using "J Behav Med"[ta], or for Taylor & Francis’s journal, use "Behav Med"[ta]. Combining title abbreviations with MeSH headings (e.g., "J Behav Med"[ta] AND "Hypertension"[Mesh]) isolates specific disease interventions.
2. SpringerLink Journal Portal: Accessing the official journal portal at springer.com/journal/10865 allows users to browse volumes and issues dating back to Volume 1 (1978). SpringerLink provides filtering by publication date, open access license type, and keyword search across full-text XML.
3. PsycINFO and Scopus: For psychosocial constructs (such as illness representations or coping styles), searching APA’s PsycINFO or Elsevier’s Scopus captures behavioral medicine articles alongside relevant cross-disciplinary citations.

Author Submission Workflow and Manuscript Preparation

Authors submitting an original empirical manuscript to the Journal of Behavioral Medicine must adhere to a standardized submission protocol administered through Editorial Manager:

1. Portal Authentication: Navigate to Editorial Manager at editorialmanager.com/jobm. Authors log in using their verified ORCID iD or registered Springer Nature credentials to ensure transparent metadata deposit upon publication.
2. Selecting Article Classification: Choose the appropriate manuscript category: Original Empirical Research, Brief Report (condensed empirical studies with limited sample size or pilot data), Systematic Review / Meta-Analysis, or Theoretical Commentary.
3. Blinding and Title Page Configuration: The journal conducts single-blind peer review, wherein reviewers know author identities. Authors submit a separate Title Page containing author affiliations, corresponding author contact details, institutional identifiers, and funding disclosures.
4. Manuscript Structure and Abstract Formatting: Draft manuscripts in accordance with APA Style (7th Edition). The abstract must adhere to a structured abstract format, organizing content into four subheadings: Background, Methods, Results, and Conclusions. Abstracts must not exceed 250 words.
5. Research Integrity and Trial Registration: In accordance with ICMJE guidelines, prospective clinical intervention trials evaluating human health outcomes must document trial registration in a public trials registry (such as ClinicalTrials.gov or WHO ICTRP) prior to participant enrollment. Submissions must comply with clinical trial registration and reporting compliance and reference the registration identifier in the abstract and methods. Observational and basic hypothesis testing should link to preregistration of a study protocol on platforms such as OSF.
6. Methodological Reporting Guidelines: Randomized clinical trials must include a completed CONSORT checklist and participant flow diagram. Observational studies must follow STROBE guidelines. Meta-analyses must follow PRISMA 2020 standards. Authors must include exact statistical effect size reporting (e.g., Cohen’s d, partial eta squared, or odds ratios with 95% confidence intervals) rather than relying solely on p-values.
7. Ethics and Informed Consent: The text must contain an Institutional Review Board (IRB) approval statement, citing the protocol approval number and affirming adherence to the Declaration of Helsinki. A statement must confirm that informed consent was obtained from all participants prior to study inclusion.
8. Data Availability Statement: Springer Nature mandates a formal Data Availability Statement under its Type 3 Research Data Policy. Authors disclose whether raw data, analytical code, and study materials are archived in a public repository (e.g., Zenodo, OSF, Figshare) with a permanent DOI, available upon reasonable request, or restricted due to ethical constraints.
9. Publishing Model Selection: Upon manuscript acceptance, authors select between traditional subscription publication (with no author-facing fees) and open access publication under Springer’s Open Choice model (Creative Commons CC BY license), funded via institutional transformative agreements or author grant funds.

Strengths and limits

When selecting a publication target, researchers must evaluate both the advantages and the operational constraints of publishing in the Journal of Behavioral Medicine and its immediate disciplinary peers.

Strengths

• Established Academic Prestige: Continuous publication since 1978 establishes the Journal of Behavioral Medicine as a foundational home of the discipline. Citations from this journal carry substantial weight in faculty promotion, tenure review, and grant review panels (including NIH study sections).
• True Hybrid Publishing Model: Unlike open-access commercial journals requiring mandatory fees, the Journal of Behavioral Medicine maintains a zero-fee subscription option for authors without grant funding.
• Transformative Open Access Agreements: Springer Nature maintains Transformative Agreements (Publish and Read agreements) with university consortia across North America, Europe, the UK, and Australasia. Eligible authors affiliated with participating institutions publish open access under CC BY without out-of-pocket costs.
• Robust Interdisciplinary Indexing: Simultaneous indexing in MEDLINE/PubMed, SSCI, Scopus, and PsycINFO guarantees discovery across biomedical informatics networks and social science libraries.
• Methodological Rigor: Stringent statistical and reporting standards protect authors from the reputational hazards associated with low-quality or predatory publishing outlets.

Limits

• High Standalone Open Access APC: For authors not covered by an institutional transformative agreement wishing to publish open access under Springer Open Choice, the list Article Processing Charge is $4,790 USD (as cataloged in OpenAlex and Springer fee schedules). This represents a financial barrier for unfunded researchers or those in lower-income regions.
• Single-Blind Peer Review: Because reviewers know authors’ identities, single-blind review can introduce potential institutional prestige bias compared to double-blind evaluation models.
• Extended Turnaround Cycles: While desk-review decisions take 3 to 4 weeks, full peer evaluations and revision rounds typically require two to four months.
• Strict Scope Boundaries: The editorial board strictly enforces the requirement that behavioral science must intersect with physical and somatic health endpoints. Submissions addressing general mental health or psychiatric conditions without somatic correlates are rejected at initial screening as out of scope.

Alternatives

Researchers evaluating where to submit empirical findings have several closely related scholarly journals across the behavioral medicine, health psychology, and psychosomatic spectrum. The table below provides a sourced comparative reference across premier alternative journals in the field.

Journal Title	Publisher	Est.	ISSN (Print / Online)	Indexing	Publishing Model / APC	Primary Editorial Focus
Journal of Behavioral Medicine	Springer Nature	1978	0160-7715 / 1573-3521	MEDLINE, SSCI, Scopus, PsycINFO	Hybrid (No fee subscription; $4,790 USD Open Choice APC)	Interdisciplinary behavioral mechanisms, stress physiology, and somatic disease interactions.
Behavioral Medicine	Routledge (Taylor & Francis)	1988	0896-4289 / 1940-4026	MEDLINE, SSCI, Scopus	Hybrid (No fee subscription; Taylor & Francis Open Select option)	Applied clinical studies, evaluation research, and behavioral health interventions.
Annals of Behavioral Medicine	Oxford University Press	1985	0883-6612 / 1532-4796	MEDLINE, SSCI, Scopus, PsycINFO	Hybrid (No fee subscription; $4,433 USD Open Access APC)	Official flagship journal of the Society of Behavioral Medicine (SBM); empirical and policy studies.
International Journal of Behavioral Medicine	Springer Nature	1994	1070-5503 / 1532-7558	MEDLINE, SSCI, Scopus, PsycINFO	Hybrid (No fee subscription; $4,590 USD Open Choice APC)	Official journal of the International Society of Behavioral Medicine (ISBM); cross-cultural studies.
Translational Behavioral Medicine	Oxford University Press	2011	1869-6716 / 1613-9860	MEDLINE, SSCI, Scopus, PsycINFO	Hybrid (No fee subscription; OUP Open Access APC)	Translating behavioral science into healthcare practice, delivery systems, and public policy.
Health Psychology	American Psychological Association	1982	0278-6133 / 1930-7810	MEDLINE, SSCI, Scopus, PsycINFO	Hybrid (APA Open Access fee model)	Official journal of APA Division 38; psychological foundations of health and illness.

Editorial Decision Framework: How to Select the Right Target

Authors deciding among these venues should match study architecture to the corresponding journal profile:

• Choose the Journal of Behavioral Medicine when your manuscript emphasizes biological pathways linking health behaviors or psychological stress to somatic outcomes (e.g., cortisol reactivity, cardiovascular hemodynamics, inflammatory biomarkers) or evaluates patient self-management in medical cohorts.
• Choose Annals of Behavioral Medicine if your research carries broad population-level health significance, addresses major sociostructural determinants of health, or represents large multi-site clinical trials intended for multidisciplinary clinical audiences.
• Choose Translational Behavioral Medicine when the primary contribution is translational—such as implementation science studies evaluating the adoption of behavioral programs into clinical workflows or health policy frameworks.
• Choose Behavioral Medicine (Taylor & Francis) for clinical evaluation studies, health counseling protocols, behavioral health case studies, and focused investigations where clinical feasibility and practitioner utility are primary endpoints.
• Choose the International Journal of Behavioral Medicine when testing behavioral medicine theories in cross-national comparative cohorts or addressing health behaviors specific to low- and middle-income country contexts.

FAQ

What is the difference between Journal of Behavioral Medicine and Behavioral Medicine?

While both are premier MEDLINE-indexed journals focusing on behavior and physical health, they are published by different entities and originated in different decades. The Journal of Behavioral Medicine is published by Springer Nature (founded 1978; ISSN 0160-7715, NLM ID 7807105), edited by Alan J. Christensen, and emphasizes biopsychosocial mechanisms and disease management. Behavioral Medicine is published by Routledge / Taylor & Francis (founded 1988 as the continuation of the Journal of Human Stress; ISSN 0896-4289, NLM ID 8804264) and features applied clinical evaluations and observational research.

Is the Journal of Behavioral Medicine indexed in MEDLINE and PubMed?

Yes. The Journal of Behavioral Medicine has been continuously indexed in MEDLINE and PubMed since its inaugural volume in 1978. It carries Medline Title Abbreviation J Behav Med and NLM Unique ID 7807105. All published abstracts appear in PubMed immediately upon indexing, and articles funded by public health agencies (such as NIH) are deposited into PubMed Central (PMC) in compliance with public access mandates.

Does Journal of Behavioral Medicine charge manuscript submission or publication fees?

No submission fees are charged to authors at any stage of peer review. Under the journal’s traditional subscription publication model, accepted papers are published with zero page charges or author-facing fees. Authors choosing to publish open access under Springer’s Open Choice model incur an Article Processing Charge (APC) of $4,790 USD, which is frequently covered or waived through institutional transformative agreements.

What peer review model is used by the Journal of Behavioral Medicine?

The journal operates a single-blind peer review process. Reviewers are aware of the names, institutional affiliations, and publication histories of submitting authors, while reviewer identities remain confidential. Manuscripts undergo initial editorial triage by the Editor-in-Chief or an Associate Editor, followed by formal evaluation by two or more independent external peer reviewers.

Are clinical trials required to be registered prior to manuscript submission?

Yes. The Journal of Behavioral Medicine enforces ICMJE clinical trial registration policies. Any prospective study assigning human participants to health-related interventions to evaluate health outcomes must be registered in a public clinical trials registry (such as ClinicalTrials.gov or a WHO primary registry) prior to enrolling the first participant. The trial registration number and registry name must be documented in both abstract and methods.

How does Springer Open Choice work for behavioral medicine authors?

Springer Open Choice allows authors of accepted papers in hybrid journals to make their published article immediately available open access under a Creative Commons Attribution (CC BY) license. Authors fund the $4,790 USD APC through research grants or institutional transformative agreements. When an author’s university participates in a Springer Nature Transformative Agreement, the APC is billed directly to the institution’s library consortium rather than to the researcher.

Sources

• National Library of Medicine. (2026). NLM Catalog: Journal of behavioral medicine (NLM Unique ID: 7807105; Medline TA: J Behav Med; ISSN: 0160-7715, 1573-3521). U.S. National Institutes of Health. Retrieved November 12, 2026, from https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/nlmcatalog/7807105
• National Library of Medicine. (2026). NLM Catalog: Behavioral medicine (NLM Unique ID: 8804264; Medline TA: Behav Med; ISSN: 0896-4289, 1940-4026). U.S. National Institutes of Health. Retrieved November 12, 2026, from https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/nlmcatalog/8804264
• National Library of Medicine. (2026). NLM Catalog: Annals of behavioral medicine (NLM Unique ID: 8510246; Medline TA: Ann Behav Med; ISSN: 0883-6612, 1532-4796). U.S. National Institutes of Health. Retrieved November 12, 2026, from https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/nlmcatalog/8510246
• National Library of Medicine. (2026). NLM Catalog: International journal of behavioral medicine (NLM Unique ID: 9421097; Medline TA: Int J Behav Med; ISSN: 1070-5503, 1532-7558). U.S. National Institutes of Health. Retrieved November 12, 2026, from https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/nlmcatalog/9421097
• Crossref. (2026). Crossref Journal Metadata for Journal of Behavioral Medicine (ISSN: 0160-7715, 1573-3521; 2,728 recorded DOIs). Retrieved November 12, 2026, from https://api.crossref.org/journals/0160-7715
• OpenAlex. (2026). OpenAlex Source Record: Journal of Behavioral Medicine (OpenAlex ID: S183060596; ISSN-L: 0160-7715; 2,731 works, 175,291 citations, h-index: 175). OurResearch. Retrieved November 12, 2026, from https://api.openalex.org/sources?filter=issn:0160-7715
• OpenAlex. (2026). OpenAlex Source Record: Behavioral Medicine (OpenAlex ID: S102553956; ISSN-L: 0896-4289; 994 works, 34,327 citations, h-index: 88). OurResearch. Retrieved November 12, 2026, from https://api.openalex.org/sources?filter=issn:0896-4289
• Springer Nature. (2026). Journal of Behavioral Medicine: Aims and Scope, Editorial Board, and Author Submission Guidelines (Journal No. 10865). Springer Science+Business Media LLC. Retrieved November 12, 2026, from https://www.springer.com/journal/10865