Publication Ethics and Publication Malpractice Statement

 

The editorial board of our journal follows the ethical standards adopted by the International Scientific Community and is doing everything to prevent any violations of these standards. Our Statement of Publication Ethics, as well as editorial board and editor-in-chief activities are based on the Code of Conduct, taking into account best practices for editors of journals, and the recommendation of the Committee of Publication Ethics.

 

Editors' responsibilities and rights

 

Publication decisions

The editor-in-chief of the journal is responsible for decisions on the articles he has accepted for publication. The decision to accept articles for publication is based on their scientific value, relevance, originality, clarity, literacy and study’s validity, as well as the absence of plagiarism, slanderous allegations, copyright infringement, violations of applicable law, regardless of national or racial affiliation, gender, religious beliefs, sexual orientation, citizenship, political views of their authors.

 

The editor-in-chief has every right to control the editorial content of the journal. He may also, when making a decision, consult with other editors or reviewers.

 

Confidentiality

Any articles received for review should be treated as confidential documents. They should not be disclosed or discussed with anyone other than with the permission of the editor. The editor-in-chief and members of the editorial board will not disclose any information about the submitted article to anyone other than the relevant author, reviewers, potential reviewers, other editorial consultants and the publisher, as the case may be.

 

Disclosure and conflicts of interest

Unpublished materials disclosed in the submitted article will not be used by the editor or members of the editorial board for their own research purposes without the written consent of the author. Privileged information or ideas received by editors during the processing of an article will be kept confidential and will not be used for their personal benefit. Editors themselves refuse to consider manuscripts in which they encounter a conflict of interest arising from competitive, collaborative or other relationships (ties) with any of the authors, companies or institutions associated with documents, instead, they will ask another member of the editorial board to process the article.

 

Involvement and cooperation in investigations

Editors (in conjunction with the publisher and/or society) will take responsive measures when ethical concerns are raised with regard to a submitted manuscript or published paper. Every reported act of unethical publishing behaviour will be looked into, even if it is discovered years after publication. If, on investigation, the ethical concern is well-founded, a correction, retraction, expression of concern or other notes as may be relevant to the case will be published in the journal.

 

Reviewers' responsibilities

 

Contribution to editorial decisions

The peer-reviewing process assists the editor and the editorial board in making editorial decisions and may also serve the authors in improving their articles. Peer review is an essential component of formal scholarly communication and lies at the heart of scientific endeavour. We shares the view that all scholars who wish to contribute to the scientific process have an obligation to do a fair share of reviewing.

 

Promptness

Any selected referee who feels unqualified to review the research reported in a manuscript or knows that its prompt review will be impossible should notify the editor and withdraw from the review process so that alternative reviewers can be contacted.

 

Standards of objectivity

Reviews should be conducted objectively. Personal criticism of the author is inappropriate. Reviewers should express their views clearly with supporting arguments.

 

Acknowledgement of sources

Reviewers should identify cases in which relevant published work referred to in the article has not been cited in the reference section. They should point out whether observations or arguments derived from other publications are accompanied by the respective source. Any statement that is an observation, derivation or argument that has been reported in previous publications should be accompanied by the relevant citation. Reviewers will notify the editor of any substantial similarity or overlap between the manuscript under consideration and any other published article of which they have personal knowledge.

 

Disclosure and conflicts of interest

Reviewers should not consider articles in which they encounter a conflict of interest arising from competitive, collaborative or other relationships or relationships with any of the authors, companies or institutions associated with the documents.

 

Duties of Authors

 

Reporting standards

Authors of original research reports should present an accurate account of the work performed as well as an objective discussion of its significance. Underlying data should be represented accurately in the article. A article should contain sufficient detail and references to permit others to replicate the work. Review articles should be accurate, objective and comprehensive, while editorial 'opinion' or perspective pieces should be clearly identified as such. Fraudulent or knowingly inaccurate statements constitute unethical behavior and are unacceptable.

 

Data access and retention

Authors may be asked to provide the raw data of their study together with the article for editorial review and should be prepared to make the data publicly available if practicable. In any event, authors should ensure accessibility of such data to other competent professionals for at least ten years after publication (preferably through an institutional or subject-based data repository or other data centre), provided that the confidentiality of the participants can be protected and legal rights concerning proprietary data do not preclude their release.

 

Originality, plagiarism and acknowledgement of sources

Authors should ensure that they have written and submit only entirely original articles, and will appropriately cite or quote the work and/or words of others. Publications that have been influential in determining the nature of the reported article should also be cited. Plagiarism takes many forms, from "passing off" another's article as the author's own, to copying or paraphrasing substantial parts of another's article (without attribution), to claiming results from research conducted by others. Plagiarism in all its forms constitutes unethical publishing behaviour and is unacceptable.

 

Multiple, duplicate, redundant or concurrent publication

In general, articles describing essentially the same research should not be published in more than one journal. Submitting the same article to more than one journal constitutes unethical publishing behavior and is unacceptable.

Articles which have been published as copyrighted material elsewhere cannot be submitted. In addition, articles under review by the journal should not be resubmitted to copyrighted publications. However, by submitting a article, the author(s) retain the rights to the published material. In case of publication they permit the use of their work under a CC-BY license [http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/3.0/], which allows others to copy, distribute and transmit the work as well as to adapt the work and to make commercial use of it.

The publication of some kinds of articles (such as clinical guidelines, translations) in more than one journal is sometimes justifiable, provided that certain conditions are met. The authors and editors of the journals concerned must agree to the secondary publication, which must reflect the same data and interpretation of the primary document. The primary reference must be cited in the secondary publication.

 

Authorship of the article

Authorship should be limited to those who have made a significant contribution to the creation of the article. All those who have made significant contributions should be listed as co-authors. The corresponding author ensures that all contributing co-authors and no uninvolved persons are included in the author list. The corresponding author will also verify that all co-authors have approved the final version of the article and have agreed to its submission for publication. All persons who made substantial contributions to the work reported in the article (such as technical help, writing and editing assistance, general support) but who do not meet the criteria for authorship must not be listed as an author, but should be acknowledged in the "Acknowledgements" section after their written permission to be named as been obtained.

 

Acknowledgement of sources

Authors should ensure that they have properly acknowledged the work of others, and should also cite publications that have been influential in determining the nature of the reported work. Information obtained privately (from conversation, correspondence or discussion with third parties) must not be used or reported without explicit, written permission from the source. Authors should not use information obtained in the course of providing confidential services, such as refereeing articles or grant applications, unless they have obtained the explicit written permission of the author (authors) of work related to this activity.

 

Disclosure and conflicts of interest

All authors should at the earliest possible stage (usually by providing a form for disclosing information during submission and inclusion of an article) disclose any conflicts of interest that may be construed as influencing the results or their interpretation in the manuscript. Examples of potential conflicts of interest that need to be disclosed include financial transactions such as fees, educational grants or other financing, participation in a speaker bureau, membership, employment, counseling, ownership of shares or other equity stakes, as well as paid expert testimonies or patent certificates, licensing agreements, as well as non-financial, such as personal or professional relationships, communications, knowledge or beliefs in the subject or materials, that are discussed in the submitted article. All sources of financial support for the work should be disclosed (including a grant number or other reference number, if any).

 

Fundamental errors in published articles

When an author discovers a significant error or inaccuracy in his/her own published article, it is the author’s obligation to promptly notify the journal editor or publisher and to cooperate with the editor to retract or correct the article in form of an erratum.

 

References

Committee on Publication Ethics (COPE). (2011, March 7). Code of Conduct and Best-Practice Guidelines for Journal Editors. Retrieved from http://publicationethics.org/files/Code_of_conduct_for_journal_editors_Mar11.pdf