Publication Ethics

In order to counteract unfair publishing practices, the Assyfa Learning Journal (ALJ) applies general ethical principles applicable in the humanities and social sciences (in particular those defined by the COPE Committee on Publication Ethics and contained in the COPE Code of Conduct), i.e. the principles of scientific integrity, fair play, the principles of confidentiality, avoiding conflicts of interest, not infringing copyrights and not publishing offensive or untrue content.

ALJ monitors compliance with the above principles by Authors, Reviewers and other persons involved in the editorial work.
ALJ adheres to ethical and intellectual standards.
ALJ maintains editorial standards.

Duties of the Publisher

The Publisher ensures that all the necessary copyright for any drawings, illustrations, cartoons etc. for which the copyright is held by the third party has been obtained by the authors;
The Publisher ensures that the electronic Open Journal System used by the journal is regularly updated and protects the personal data of all the users;
The Publisher handles potential complaints of authors, reviewers or third parties regarding the transparency of journal procedures and other allegations of scholarly misconduct, publication of untrue or offensive content as well as infringing intellectual property in line with the principles recommended by COPE—by transparent and impartial proceedings.

Duties of the Editorial Team

The Editorial Team subscribes to an independent and impartial publishing policy;
The Editorial Team appoints the Editor in charge who impartially selects two qualified and independent experts to assess each article admitted for review, based on their best knowledge of the research field concerned;
The Editorial Team avoids conflicts of interest between the roles of Author and Editor by appointing an impartial managing Editor for papers authored by any of the journal Editors;
The Editorial Team requests an additional review, in case of conflicting recommendations of reviewers;
The Editorial Team makes final decisions about accepting or rejecting contributions for publication by ALJ in an open and transparent manner;
The Editorial Team enables reviewers to use appropriate standard forms for their assessment of submissions, provided through the secure OJS system, thus ensuring comparability of reviews;
The Editorial Team ensures the confidentiality and security of personal data as well as of any information concerning the submitted articles, which can be disclosed only to the appropriate parties concerned;
The Editorial Team ensures that any unpublished data disclosed in a submitted manuscript is not used, without a written consent of the Authors, in any of the Editors' own research output;
The Editorial Team publishes a collective list of reviewers for each volume of the journal, but without disclosing reviewers of any particular submission to the journal.
Should any fundamental errors in a published paper be discovered, the Editorial Team will take action that can include, but is not limited to, requiring an erratum or retracting of the paper from Authors.

Duties of Authors

The Authors declare by submitting their article to ALJ that they are familiar with the publication ethics adopted by ALJ;
The Authors must understand that authorship provides credit for a researcher's contributions to a study and carries accountability;
The Authors acknowledge that authorship credit is based on substantial contributions only. Contributors who do not meet all criteria for authorship should be listed in the Acknowledgements section;
Authors is encouraged to provide their Open Researcher and Contributor Identifier (ORCID) ID as part of our efforts to improve transparency and unambiguous attribution of scholarly contributions;
The Authors add the source of funding for research or publication to their submission and must include it in the acknowledgments section;
The Authors must declare any existing or potential competing interests (e.g. financial or personal interests, personal connections between any of the authors and the editors or reviewers, grants received by the authors or institutions) or, if appropriate, must clearly state that there are none. Editors have the right to decline papers where they suspect that the competing interests may have compromised the analyses or interpretations of the given contribution;
The Authors must not submit any work that would include plagiarism or fabricated results;
The Authors declare by submitting their article to ALJ that their work is an original one, not infringing the rights of third parties, prepared independently and not published or submitted anywhere before or simultaneously;
The Authors understand that the data reported in their submissions should be represented objectively and accurately and warrant the conclusions that are drawn in the submissions;
The Authors ensure that all the work of other scholars is acknowledged and properly cited;
The Authors declare by submitting their article to ALJ that they accept the journal’s policy of providing two double-blind, anonymous and external reviews for their submission, which means removing their personal data from the submission text to ensure anonymity of the review;
The Authors submit their contributions in the template provided on the journal website, appropriate for the type of their contribution, to ensure the standard quality of format and bibliographical style, required by the journal;
If the articles are co-authored, all the contributors to the submissions are appropriately acknowledged as co-authors or collaborators; any change in authorship (changing the Author names or adding/dropping an Author) can only be allowed if a valid reason is provided and only if all other authors express their consent; prior to publication, this might entail the restarting of the review process, while after the publication, it is not possible, unless the error in Author names is the sole fault of the Editorial Team;
The Corresponding Author is responsible for ensuring all Authors are listed, have approved the manuscript submission to the journal, and for managing all communication between the journal and all co-authors, before and after publication;
The Authors declare that they have obtained the necessary copyright for any (previously published) figures, drawings, illustrations, cartoons etc. for which the copyright is held by a third party;
The Authors agree to an Creative Commons Attribution 4.0. International License (CC-BY 4.0.) on their work;
The Authors declare the acceptance of the specific data protection rules abided by the journal;
The Authors put their best effort in checking the page-proofs before the publication, as well as updating their affiliation and biographical information to be published on the article website;
The Authors are required to retract the paper or to provide an appropriate erratum if they discover a significant inaccuracy or fundamental error in their published work, contacting the Editors promptly to establish the best ways of rectifying the errors.

Duties of Reviewers

Each contribution submitted to ALJ must go through two external blind peer reviews. Correspondence, book reviews and all forms of published correction may also be peer-reviewed at the discretion of the editors;
The Reviewers follow the general guidelines of objective assessment of submissions provided by the journal as well as specific criteria of assessment of full-length research articles, commentary articles and research notes;
The Reviewers use the secure electronic OJS system to fill in the appropriate review forms, thus ensuring confidentiality and anonymity of their reviews;
The Reviewers decline their duty if they feel there are unqualified to assess the submission or if they are not able to complete the review in the time specified in the review request;
The Reviewers decline their duty if they discover a conflict of interest that could compromise the independence of their assessment;
Two completed reviews of every submitted article will be sent through the electronic OJS system, upon which the Editor appointed by the Editorial Team will make the decision (Accept as is, Accept with minor revisions, Revise and resubmit, Reject and suggest submission to another journal, Reject) and forward the decision together with the anonymised two reviews to the submitting Author.
The Editor appointed to deal with a particular submission will evaluate the strength of the arguments raised by each reviewer and by the authors, and may also consider other information not available to either party. Our primary responsibilities are to our readers and to the scientific community at large, hence the decision based on Reviewer’s recommendation is weighed thoroughly;
Book Reviewers make sure there is no conflict of interest between them and the authors of the books under review; in the opposite case, they should decline their reviewing duty;
The Reviewers are encouraged to contact the ALJ Editors for any questions about the peer-review process, the journal or its editorial policies that are not addressed here.

Scholarly misconduct

ALJ requires the Authors to ensure that their submissions always observe the rights of human subjects. The manuscript must contain a statement that all procedures were performed in compliance with relevant laws and institutional guidelines, that an appropriate institutional committee has approved them and that informed consent was obtained for experimentation with human subjects and their anonymity ensured.
ALJ advises authors that “ghost-writing" (using an unnamed author to write the article without revealing their identity) and "guest/gift authorship" (including an author who has made little contribution to the article among its authors) constitute manifestations of scholarly misconduct;
The submission of the publication to ALJ at the same time as the submission to another journal (“dual submission”) as well as a submission to ALJ of an article previously published in another journal or another publication outlet (“redundant publication”) are considered manifestations of scholarly misconduct too;
ALJ requires information about the sources of financing the publication, the contribution of research institutions, associations and other entities ("financial disclosure");
ALJ documents all manifestations of scholarly misconduct, especially violating the rules of ethics which are considered binding in academia;
Any suspicion of plagiarism or fabrication of data is immediately acted upon by reviewers, editors and editorial assistants – the case is investigated by the Editorial Team and if it is confirmed, the submission concerned is declined without the possibility of resubmission.

Assyfa Learning Journal