Ethics

Ethical Guidelines for Academic Editors

Editors-in-Chief, Editorial Board Members, and Guest Editors, in collaboration with the Editorial Office, are responsible for ensuring the editorial process's integrity. The sections that follow go over specific ethical aspects of their job.

If an academic editor has ethical concerns about a manuscript sent for review or decision, or if they discover a possible ethical breach after publication, they must contact the Editorial Office as soon as possible.

Verifications are made by Managing Editors and Assistant Editors to support academic editors. Editors should, however, report any concerns they have about any aspect. Verifications include the following:

  1. Ethic approval and permissions for research involving human subjects, animals or cell lines.
  2. Plagiarism, duplicate publication and obtaining permission from the copyright holder to include previously published figures or images are all prohibited.
  3. Author background and qualification.

Academic editors should consider the following factors when making a final acceptance decision on a manuscript:

  1. Any facts that could be interpreted as a potential conflict of interest on the part of the author(s) must be disclosed in the paper before submission.
  2. Authors must present their research findings accurately and include an objective discussion of the significance of their findings.
  3. Data and methods used in the research need to be presented in sufficient detail in the paper for other researchers to replicate the work.

 

Ethics in Peer Review

Peer review is a trust-based system. Each party is reliant on the others to conduct themselves professionally, ethically, and confidentially. Learn about the reviewer's, author's, and publication's ethical responsibilities during peer review.

Ethics for reviewers

Reviewers are required to conduct their review of the work unless they are participating in co-review. Misconduct will not be permitted if a review is submitted in the name of another person (actual or fake). In circumstances where identity fraud or impersonation is alleged or suspected, JACTA has the right to request proof of identification.

 Conflicts of interest

To maintain objectivity, you should deliberate about any potential conflicts of interest before agreeing to review, and you should inform the editorial office if you encounter any of the following situations:

  • You are competing directly with the authors
  • You work with one of the authors as a co-worker or collaborator.
  • You are in a position to exploit the authors’ work (commercially or otherwise)
  • You may be legally prohibited due to national sanctions
  • You are in a position that prevents you from providing an objective assessment of the work.

Minor conflicts do not disqualify you from reporting on an article, but they will be considered when the reviewers' recommendations are considered. Major conflicts of interest (particularly those involving a financial commercial interest) will disqualify you.

If you are unable to act as a reviewer due to a conflict of interest, we will select an alternative reviewer.

If the journal is double-anonymous, you may be unsure whether you have a conflict of interest. If you believe there is a reason you should not act as a reviewer, please contact the editorial office, who will be able to investigate and advise you.

 Anonymity and confidentiality

The identities of the reviewers are kept strictly confidential. The reviewers' identities may only be revealed to members of the journal's Editorial Board, who are also required to maintain confidentiality. Reviewers should not reveal their identity to the authors, including sending reports to them directly.

Information and ideas obtained as a reviewer must be kept confidential and not used to gain a competitive advantage.

We also request that you refrain from discussing the papers you reviewed with colleagues until they have been published.

 Objectivity

Reviewers should judge the quality of the research reported objectively, provide fair, frank, and constructive criticism, and refrain from personal attacks on the authors. The reasons for reviewers' decisions should be explained and supported so that authors understand the basis for the comments and judgments.

 Timeliness

If a reviewer is unable to review a paper or can only do so with some delay, they should notify the journal. Reviewers should not obstruct the peer review process unnecessarily, either intentionally or unintentionally.

 Citations

Reviewers are expected to highlight relevant work that has not been cited and use citations to explain where elements of the work have previously been reported. Reviewers should justify any literature references suggested for inclusion in the work when writing a report. Please note that the Editor reserves the right to object to excessive citation suggestions, particularly those referencing the reviewers' work. To protect the anonymity of reviewers, the Editor reserves the right to exclude citation suggestions from reports.

 Suspected author misconduct

Reviewers should report any suspicions of misconduct to the journal staff for investigation. This includes, but is not limited to, suspicions of:

  • Plagiarism
  • Duplicate publication
  • Parallel submission
  • Data fabrication / falsification
  • Image manipulation
  • Incorrect authorship
  • Author conflict of interest
  • Unethical research practices
  • Content that could be considered offensive

  

Ethics for Authors

Summary

Authors wishing to publish their papers in JACTA must abide to the following:

  • Authors should present their research findings accurately and include an objective discussion of their significance.
  • Only those who qualify for authorship should be listed as authors, and their contributions should be noted in the manuscript.
  • Any facts that could be interpreted as a potential conflict of interest on the part of the author(s) must be disclosed in the paper before submission.
  • Data and methods used in the research must be presented in sufficient detail in the paper so that other researchers can replicate the work. Unless there is a compelling reason to the contrary, raw data must be made publicly available.
  • It is not permitted to submit manuscripts to multiple journals at the same time.
  • Original research findings must be novel and have not been previously published, even if they have been published in another language.
  • Any necessary permission to publish must be obtained from the copyright holder for previously published content (including quotations, figures, or tables).
  • Errors and inaccuracies discovered after publication must be immediately reported to the Editorial Office.

This list is not comprehensive, and authors should be aware of local regulations and accepted norms within academic publishing.

 Authorship

Every author mentioned in a journal article should have made a significant contribution to the work reported. It could be in research design or conception, data collection, data analysis, or data interpretation. As an author or co-author, you share responsibility for the article's content.

 It is best to avoid authorship:

  1. Guest authorship: refers to someone who added to the list of authors but did not contribute to the paper's writing.
  2. Ghost authorship: refers to someone who assisted in the paper's writing but is not listed as one of the authors.

 Plagiarism

When citing previous work by others (or your own), please ensure you have:

  • Clearly marked quoted verbatim text from another source with quotation marks.
  • Attributed and referenced the source of the quotation clearly within the text and in the Reference section.
  • Obtained permission from the original publisher and rightsholder when using previously published figures or tables.

Self-plagiarism

Self-plagiarism defines as the repeated reuse of your work, usually without proper citation. It causes repetition in the academic literature and can skew meta-analyses if the same sets of data are published as "new" in data multiple times.  As a result, if you discuss your previous work, make sure to cite it.

Authors should refrain from citing their own previously published works excessively. Citations must be relevant and add value to the article, not solely to increase the author's citation score. When discussing methodologies or literature reviews, authors should limit their use of self-citations.

JACTA employs a plagiarism detection tool to screen for unoriginal content. Authors who submit to JACTA should be aware that their paper may be submitted to Turnitin at any time during the peer-review or production process.

The editor of JACTA will investigate any allegations of plagiarism or self-plagiarism made to a journal. If the allegations appear to be true, we will contact all the paper's named authors and request an explanation for the overlapping material. We may also ask members of the Journal Editorial Board to assist in further paper evaluation and allegations. If the clarification is insufficient, we will reject the submission. We may also decide not to accept new paper submissions in the future.

 Data fabrication / falsification

It is essential that all data is accurate, and representative of your research. Data sharing is more and more prevalent, increasing the transparency of raw data. JACTA encourages you to submit your supplemental data with your article. 

Cases of data fabrication/falsification will be evaluated by the editor of JACTA. We may then ask authors to provide supporting raw data where needed. We may also ask members of the Journal Editorial Board to assist in further paper evaluation and allegations. If the clarification is insufficient, we will reject the submission. We may also decide not to accept new paper submissions in the future.

Conflict of interests

It is essential to be transparent about any conflict of interests, whether they are sources of research funding, direct or indirect financial support, the supply of equipment or materials, or other forms of assistance.

If an author fails to declare a conflict of interest in the journal during submission or review, and this interferes with the actual or potential interpretation of the results, the paper may be rejected or retracted.

Ready to submit your paper? Your ethics checklist

Before you submit, make sure you have:

  • Read the journal's author guidelines and follow any instructions regarding data sets, ethics approval, or statements.
  • Named all authors on the paper, and the online submission form.
  • Referenced all material in the text clearly and thoroughly.
  • Carefully checked data and included any supplemental data required by the journal.
  • Declared any relevant conflict of interests to the journal.
  • Obtained (written) permission to reuse any figures, tables, and data sets.
  • Only submitted the paper to one journal at a time.

Finally, notify all the co-authors once you have submitted the paper.