Publication Ethics

Editors guarantee adherence to:

  • scientific paper publication ethics;
  • scientific paper authorship ethics;
  • scientific paper peer review ethics;
  • scientific paper editorial ethics.

​SCIENTIFIC PAPER PUBLICATION ETHICS

Editors:

  1. quarantee consideration of all submitted materials, the Editors’ independence and fair practice in decision-making without any prejudice towards authors basing on respect for authors’ personal rights and intellectual property right;
  2. implement journal’s policy to ensure and maintain a high standard of all published papers; make a substantial new contribution to the national and international science; strive to satisfy readers’ and authors’ needs;
  3. set timeliness, importance, clarity, reliability and soundness of published material as guiding principles of editorial activity;
  4. among basic principles of high quality of published materials are as follows:
    • soundness: the research being reported should have been conducted in an ethical and responsible manner and follow all relevant legislation; authors should take collective responsibility for their work and for the content of their publications;
    • honesty: researchers should present their results honestly and without fabrication, falsification or inappropriate data manipulation;
    • unambiguousness: publications should provide sufficient detail to permit experiments to be repeated by other researchers;
    • completeness of presented materials: review and conclusions of research should be complete and balanced; they should not omit inconvenient, inconsistent or inexplicable findings or results that do not support the authors’ or sponsors’ hypothesis or interpretation;
    • balance: new findings should be presented in the context of previous research;
    • originality: authors should adhere to publication requirements that submitted work is original and has not been published elsewhere in any language; paper should not be submitted concurrently to more than one publication;
  5. implement the Journal’s policy to identify suitably qualified editorial board members who can actively contribute to the development and good management of the journal.
  6. implement the Journal’s policy of constant improvement of review institutions, editorial process and materials’ expert review that ensures that peer review is fair, unbiased and timely.
  7. make the final decision on acceptance or non-acceptance of a paper to be published basing on all comments of peer reviewers; the final editorial decision and reasons for these should be communicated to authors.

SCIENTIFIC PAPER AUTHORSHIP ETHICS

Researchers (paper authors):

  1. should ensure that only those individuals who meet authorship criteria (i.e. made a substantial contribution to the work) are rewarded with authorship and that deserving authors are not omitted;
  2. should agree to be listed and should approve the submitted and accepted versions of the publication; any change to the author list should be approved by all authors including those removed from the list;
  3. should have read and be familiar with the reported work and should ensure that publications follow the principles set out in these guidelines;
  4. should work with the editors or publishers to correct their work promptly if errors or omissions are discovered after publication;
  5. hold responsible for informing the journal promptly if they become aware that the paper submitted, approved for publication or already published requires correcting;
  6. are not allowed to copy references from other publications if they have not read the cited work; authors should represent the work of others accurately in citations and quotations;
  7. previous relevant work and publications, both by other researchers and the authors’ own, should be properly acknowledged and referenced (replication of previous works and their paraphrasing are not allowed: they may be used only as foundation for new conclusions);
  8. data, text, figures or ideas originated by other researchers should be properly acknowledged and should not be presented as if they were the authors’ own; original wording taken directly from publications of other researchers should appear in quotation marks with appropriate citations;
  9. applicable copyright laws and conventions should be followed; copyright materials (e.g. tables, figures or extensive quotations) should only be reproduced with appropriate permission and acknowledgement.

SCIENTIFIC PAPER PEER REVIEW ETHICS

  1. Editors guarantee independent peer review conducted in the way that ensures honesty and objectivity of comment on scientific value of the paper considered for publication.
  2. Editors guarantee ensuring fair and due process of peer review.
  3. Editors may reject a paper without peer reviewing when it is deemed unsuitable for the journal’s readers or is of poor quality. This decision should be made in a fair and unbiased way. The decision should only be based on the Journal’s editorial policy.
  4. Editors use independent peer reviewers’ services for papers that are considered for publication by selecting people with sufficient expertise and avoiding those with conflicts of interest.
  5. Independent peer reviewers are informed of what is expected of them and notified about any changes in editorial policies.
  6. If serious concerns are raised by reviewers about the validity or reporting of academic work, Editors allow authors to respond to the concerns.
  7. Editors protect the confidentiality of authors’ materials and remind reviewers to do so as well.
  8. Editors protect reviewers’ identities.

SCIENTIFIC PAPER EDITORIAL ETHICS

  1. Editors make decisions on accepting or rejecting publications, which makes it very important that this process is as fair and unbiased as possible, and is in accordance with the academic vision of the particular journal.
  2. Information for authors describes requirements for authors as well as the procedure for handling submissions.
  3. To ensure the accuracy of the published data an opportunity to amend or correct errors as soon as possible is provided. If an error makes the work or a substantial part of it invalid, the article is retracted with an explanation as to the reason for retraction (for example, a bona fide error).
  4. In the end of peer review process Editors make decisions with proper comment explaining results of the review.
  5. Editors agree to respond to all allegations or suspicions of research or publication misconduct raised by readers, reviewers, or other editors.
  6. Editors agree to provide authors with the list of requirements. Guidelines are to be updated on regular basis. Editors work in accordance with the system of identity ensurance.
  7. Editors accept information on identified problems and decide on the retraction of paper.
  8. Editorial conflicts of interests should be declared publicly. Editors should not be involved in decisions about papers in which they have a conflict of interest.