The CNS journal was founded in the 2005-2006 academic year by Prof. Dr. Peter Desain and a group of enthusiastic students from the Cognitive Neuroscience Master. Similar initiatives already existed in the United States, but the CNS journal was the first student-run academic journal in The Netherlands. The Members page contains an overview of the past journal board members.
The aim of creating a student-run academic journal was three-fold:
- Firstly, the journal was intended to allow students to gain valuable experience in writing, editing, reviewing and publishing. The Master’s programme in Cognitive Neuroscience intends to prepare students for a research career and writing and publishing findings are vital skills for the scientists of tomorrow.
- Secondly, the journal showcases the research conducted by Master’s students during their internship projects at research institutes and faculties in Nijmegen and abroad. The articles published in the journal thus reflect the most recent scientific developments and trends in Cognitive Neuroscience.
- Finally, the journal serves as an easily accessible archive of the theses written by students in the Master’s programme. All theses are available online and printed issues of the journal can be ordered via this website.
From the start, the journal has been run entirely by students from the Cognitive Neuroscience master programme. The journal board is made up of students with different backgrounds, skills and interests, resulting in a diverse and interdisciplinary team with different areas of expertise. Although the journal is run entirely by students, it aims to follow the same publishing procedures as highly ranked scientific journals.
The first journal board described the process of creating the journal as follows:
“Bringing together the first issue was quite an exciting time. It has been our pleasure to see our initial ideas develop into a first issue that contains the best of our students work in the rapidly developing field of Cognitive Neuroscience. We think you’ll be as excited reading it as we were in creating it !”
With every new issue of the CNS journal, this enthusiasm is passed on to a new generation of CNS students . We hope that you as readers share our interest and excitement!