Puplication Ethics Statment

Puplication Ethics Statment

Integrity in research publication has become a major issue of debate over the past years. The editors of Academic Science Journal are seriously concerned about the plagiarism or other forms of fraud and misconduct in academic publishing. We consider it an essential part of our ethical responsibilities as editors to be aware of and to meet these challenges and to develop strategies for coping with them. Likewise, our journal is committed to ethical standards in its own editorial policy. The editorial board members of the journal do their best to ensure fair, unbiased, and transparent peer review processes and editorial decisions. Any detected cases of misconduct, whether on the part of authors, reviewers or editors, will be vigorously pursued. It is essential that all who participate in producing the journal, who conduct themselves as authors, reviewers and editors, strictly adhere to the highest level of professional ethical standards. By submitting a manuscript to this journal, each author explicitly confirms that the manuscript meets the highest ethical standards from the author and co-authors including proper statistical investigations and thorough ethical reviews by the data owning organizations. To support and promote integrity in research publication, the editorial board fully endorses the position statements for editors and authors that were published under a Creative Commons license. Source: COPE (Committee on Publication Ethics), http://publicationethics.org/resources/international-standards-for-editors-and-authors .

 

Statement of Authorship

COPE has written an article with advice on how to spot potential authorship problems. Most authorship problems have to do with authorship without the author’s knowledge and unacknowledged authorship. For more information; see https://publicationethics.org/authorship

Every author on ALL submissions must sign a Statement of Authorship.

ALLEGATIONS OF MISCONDUCT

Identification

Unethical practices may be identified and brought to the attention of the editor or publisher at any time. Unethical practices may include, but are not limited to, violations of any of the Ethical Expectations outlined above (e.g., plagiarism, falsification or fabrication, authorship falsification, redundant publication, undeclared COI, etc.). The person reporting the ethical breach must provide sufficient evidence in order for an investigation to be undertaken. All allegations are treated equally and taken seriously until a conclusion has been reached.

Investigation

Initial decisions will be made by the editor in consultation with the dean of College of Science, University of Diyala. To avoid defamation, evidence gathering will be conducted in such a way as to limit the spread of allegations beyond those who need to know. Allegations will be raised in a timely manner. Cases that fall outside of the means of the editor to investigate (e.g., data fabrication or theft) should be referred to the author’s institution with a request for investigation.

Minor Ethical Breaches

Minor misconduct may be dealt without wider consultation. The author should be given an opportunity to respond to any allegations.

Serious Ethical Breaches

In cases of serious misconduct, the employer of the accused may need to be notified. The editor, in consultation with the publisher, editorial board, and/or society governing body, as appropriate, will make a decision on whether this is warranted.

Consequences

Once an ethical breach has been confirmed, one or several of the following will be applied in response. Consequences are listed from least to most severe and will match the severity of the misconduct.

1- Informing the author or reviewer of the breach in misconduct in cases where there seems to be a misunderstanding of ethical standards

2- Sending a more strongly worded letter to the author or reviewer outlining the breach and warning against future behaviour

3- Publishing an erratum notice outlining the breach

4- Publishing an editorial outlining the ethical breach

5- Sending a formal letter to the author or reviewer’s employer or funding agency

6- Undertaking a formal retraction or withdrawal of the work in question from the journal, coupled with informing A&I services and readership of the misconduct

7- Imposing a formal embargo on submissions from an individual for a set period

8- Reporting the misconduct to a regulatory association for review and action

Conflicts of interest

Editor’s responsibilities

The editor should acknowledge receipt of submitted manuscripts within two working days of receipt and ensure an efficient, fair, and timely review process.

The editor should ensure that submitted manuscripts are processed in a confidential manner and that no content of the manuscripts will be disclosed to anyone other than the corresponding author, reviewers, and the publisher, as appropriate.

The editor should recuse himself or herself from processing manuscripts if he or she has any conflict of interest with any of the authors or institutions related to the manuscripts.

The editor should not disclose the names and other details of the reviewers to a third party without the permission of the reviewers.

The editor has the right to make the final decision on whether to accept or reject a manuscript with reference to the significance, originality, and clarity of the manuscript and its relevance to the journal.

The editor should by no means make any effort to oblige the authors to cite his or her journal either as an implied or explicit condition of accepting their manuscripts for publication.

The editor should not use for his or her own research any part of any data or work reported in submitted and as yet unpublished articles.

The editor should respond promptly and take reasonable measures when an ethical complaint occurs concerning a submitted manuscript or a published paper, and the editor should immediately contact and consult with the author. In this case, a written formal retraction or correction may also be required.

Reviewer's Responsibilities

The reviewer who feels unqualified to review the assigned manuscript or affirms that he or she cannot meet the deadline for completion of the review should immediately notify the editor and excuse himself or herself from the process of reviewing this manuscript.

The reviewer should inform the editor and recuse himself or herself from reviewing the manuscript if there is a conflict of interest. Specifically, the reviewer should recuse himself or herself from reviewing any manuscript authored or coauthored by a person with whom the reviewer has an obvious personal or academic relationship if the relationship could introduce bias or the reasonable perception of bias.

The reviewer should treat the manuscript in a confidential manner. The manuscript should not be disclosed to or discussed with others except as authorized by the editor.

The reviewer should approach the peer-review job objectively. Personal criticism of the author is unacceptable.

The reviewer should not use for his or her own research any part of any data or work reported in submitted and as yet unpublished articles.

The reviewer should immediately notify the editor of any similarities between the manuscript under review and another paper either published or under consideration by another journal. The reviewer should immediately call to the editor’s attention a manuscript containing plagiarized material or falsified data.

The process of review is conducted by the  Editorial Board member, or any academic that is deemed capable of reviewing the technical and substantive aspects of a manuscript (including academics outside of the Editorial Board members).

Author's Responsibilities

The author should not submit concurrent manuscripts (or manuscripts essentially describing the same subject matter) to multiple journals. Likewise, an author should not submit any paper previously published anywhere to the journals for consideration. The publication of articles on the specific subject matter, such as clinical guidelines and translations, in more than one journal, is acceptable if certain conditions are met.

The author should present a precise and brief report of his or her research and an impartial description of its significance.

The author should honestly gather and interpret his or her research data. Publishers, editors, reviewers, and readers are entitled to request the author to provide the raw data for his or her research for the convenience of editorial review and public access. If practicable, the author should retain such data for any possible use after publication. 

The author should guarantee that the works he or she has submitted are original. If the author has used work and/or words by others, appropriate citations are required. Plagiarism in all its forms constitutes unethical publishing behavior and is unacceptable. 

The author should indicate explicitly all sources that have supported the research and also declare any conflict(s) of interest. 

The author should give due acknowledgment to all of those who have made contributions to the research. Those who have contributed significantly to the research should be listed as coauthors. The author should ensure that all coauthors have affirmed the final version of the paper and have agreed on its final publication. 

The author should promptly inform the journal editor of any obvious error(s) in his or her published paper and cooperate earnestly with the editor in retraction or correction of the paper. If the editor is notified by any party other than the author that the published paper contains an obvious error, the author should write a retraction or make the correction based on the medium of publication.

 PRIVACY

Upon submission of articles, the author’s name and email address will be used exclusively for the purpose of review, and will not be made available to other parties.