---
name: ajps-tables-figures
description: Use when building tables and figures for an American Journal of Political Science (AJPS) manuscript. AJPS counts table/figure headers and notes toward the word limit, and the deposited code must regenerate every exhibit exactly for third-party verification. Designs self-contained, reproducible exhibits; it does not run the analysis.
---

# Tables & Figures (ajps-tables-figures)

Exhibits are where an expert reviewer checks whether the result is real — and at AJPS they carry two
extra constraints. First, the **headers and notes of tables and figures count toward the word limit**
(the body, notes, and printed captions are all in scope; references and online SI are not). Second,
every exhibit must be **regenerated by the deposited code**, because a third-party verifier re-runs it
against the main-text numbers. So each exhibit must earn its words *and* its reproducibility.

## When to trigger

- Designing the main results table/figure or a key descriptive exhibit
- Deciding what belongs in the article vs. the online Supporting Information (SI, <= 20 pages)
- A reviewer found an exhibit unclear, mislabeled, or not self-contained
- Trimming to the word cap by moving exhibits to the SI

## Principles

1. **Self-contained.** A reader understands each exhibit from its title, axis/column labels, and note
   alone — state units, sample, N, and what the estimate is. (Keep notes tight: they count as words.)
2. **Figures over dense tables for effects.** Coefficient/forest plots, marginal-effects and
   predicted-probability plots, event-study and RD plots show magnitude and uncertainty better than a
   wall of coefficients. Show intervals.
3. **Accessible.** Colorblind-safe palettes; legible in grayscale; no chartjunk, no 3D. Reviewers must
   parse it fast.
4. **Main text vs. SI.** Keep the few exhibits that carry the argument in the article; move balance
   tables, full specifications, and robustness grids to the **Supporting Information** (<= 20 pages,
   uploaded as "Appendix"). This is also how you fit under 10,000 / 4,000 words.
5. **Reproducible and labeled to the code.** Each exhibit is generated by the master script; numbers
   match the deposited package exactly (the verifier re-runs it — see
   `ajps-replication-and-verification`). Name code by exhibit ("Files to Reproduce Table 1").

## Discipline-specific exhibits
- Maps for geographic/spatial variation; network diagrams where structure is the point.
- Conjoint AMCE plots; survey-experiment treatment-effect plots.
- For qualitative/multi-method work: timelines, causal-process diagrams, evidence tables linking claims
  to sources.

## Anti-patterns

- Tables that need the prose to be intelligible (not self-contained)
- Significance stars with no effect size or interval
- Bloated exhibit notes that quietly eat the word budget
- Cramming every robustness check into the main text instead of the SI
- Exhibit values that the deposited code cannot regenerate (verification fails)

## Output format

```
【Main exhibit】what it shows + why a figure/table
【Self-contained?】title + labels + note + N/units present? [Y/N]
【Word-budget】caption/notes counted toward the limit? [Y/N]
【Accessible?】grayscale-legible + colorblind-safe? [Y/N]
【Article vs SI】split decided (SI <= 20 pp)
【Reproducible?】generated by master script, matches package? [Y/N]
【Next】ajps-writing-style
```

## Supplementary resources

- [`../../resources/external_tools.md`](../../resources/external_tools.md) — plotting/mapping/network packages
- [`../../resources/official-source-map.md`](../../resources/official-source-map.md) — word-count rule (includes table/figure headers and notes) and 20-page SI limit