Publishing ethics
Ethics of scientific publications
The editorial board of the scientific magazine adheres to the printing ethics principles accepted by the international community presented, in particular, in the recommendations of the Committee on Publication Ethics (COPE), the scientific publications ethics Code, and also considers authoritative international magazines and publishing houses’ valuable experience.
In order to avoid unfair practice in printing activity (plagiarism, presentation of false information, etc.), to provide quality of scientific publications, recognition by the public of the scientific results received by the author, each member of the editorial board, the author, the reviewer, the publisher and also the institutions participating in the publishing process must respect ethical standards and rules and to take all reasonable measures for preventing their violations. Observation of scientific publication ethics rules by all participants of this process promotes ensuring the authors’ rights for intellectual property, improvement of the edition quality and excluding of a possibility of unauthorized use of the author's materials for the benefit of individuals.
The main terms used in this regulation:
Scientific publications ethics is the system of professional behaviour standards in relationship of authors, reviewers, editors, publishers and readers in the process of making, distribution and use of scientific publications.
The author is a person or a group of persons (a group of authors) participating in producing of the publication of scientific research results.
The editor-in-chief is a person heading the editorial board and making the final decisions on production and printing of the magazine.
The publisher is a juridical or private person who is carrying out printing of the scientific publication.
The scientific article is a finished and published author's work. Plagiarism is deliberate assignment of authorship of someone else's work of science or art, somebody’s ideas or inventions. Plagiarism can be violation of the author's and legal legislation and patent legislation and that can cause legal responsibility.
The editor is a representative of the scientific magazine or publishing house who is carrying out preparation of materials to be published and supporting communication with authors and readers of scientific publications.
The editorial board is an advisory body from a group of authority persons which assists the editor-in-chief in the choice, preparation and assessment of works to be published.
The reviewer is an expert who is acting on behalf of the scientific magazine or publishing house and carrying out scientific expertize of the author's materials in order to define a possibility of their publication.
The manuscript is the author's work submitted to the editorial board for publication but not published.
The reader is any person who has got acquainted with the published materials.
1. The principles of professional ethics in the publisher’s activity
In the activity the publisher is responsible for publication of the author's works and he must follow to the next fundamental principles and procedures:
1.1. To promote execution of ethical duties by the editorial office, publishing group, editorial board, reviewers and authors according to these requirements.
1.2. To support the editorial board of the magazine in consideration of claims to ethical aspects of the published materials and to help in interacting with other magazines and/or publishers if it promotes to carry out editors’ duties.
1.3. To provide confidentiality of the publication obtained from authors and any information before its publication.
1.4. To realize that activity of the magazine is not a commercial project and does not have the purpose of deriving profit.
1.5. To be always ready to publish corrections, explanations, denials and apologies, when it is necessary.
1.6. To give the magazine editorial office an opportunity to exclude publications containing plagiarism and doubtful data.
1.7. The publishing house (editor) has the right to reject the manuscript or to demand from the author of its completion if it is issued with abuse of regulations, accepted in this magazine and approved by the Publishing house.
1.8. The article, in case it is accepted to publication, is placed in open access; all copyright reserved by authors.
1.9. To place information on the research financial support if the author gives such information to the article.
1.10. In case of finding substantial, grammatical, stylistic and other mistakes the editorial office must undertake all measures to eliminate them.
1.11. To agree with the author the editorial proof made in the article.
1.12. Not to detain the issue of the magazine.
2. Ethical principles, which the author of the scientific publication must follow
Authors (or a group of authors) supplying materials in the scientific magazine realizes that take initial responsibility for novelty and reliability of the scientific research results and they should respect the following principles:
2.1. Authors of the article must represent reliable results of the conducted researches. Obviously wrong or forged statements are impossible.
2.2. Authors must guarantee that the research results, presented in the given manuscript, are completely original. The borrowed fragments or statements must be issued with obligatory indicating of the author and the primary source. Excessive borrowings and also plagiarism in any forms, including not properly made quotes, rephrasing or assignment of the rights to results of somebody’s researches, are unethical and impossible. In case there are borrowings without reference they will be considered as plagiarism by the editorial board.
2.3. Authors must provide only the original facts and data in the manuscript; give enough information for check and revision of experiments by other researchers; not to use information obtained in a private order without open written permission; not to allow fabrication and falsification of data.
2.4. Not to allow duplication of publications (the author must specify in the cover letter that the work is published for the first time). If separate elements of the manuscript have been published earlier, the author must refer to the earlier work and specify differences of a new work from the previous one.
2.5. Authors must not provide the manuscript in the magazine, which has been sent to another magazine and is under consideration and as well as the article which has been already published in another magazine.
2.6. It is necessary to recognize a contribution of all persons who have affected the research course in anyway, in particular, references to works, which mattered when carrying out a research, must be presented in the article.
2.7. Authors must respect ethical standards, criticizing or making remarks concerning researches of the third parties.
2.8. All persons who have made an essential contribution to carrying out the research must be specified as coauthors of the article. It is impossible to specify the persons who did not participate in the research as coauthors.
2.9. Authors must be respectful to the editorial board and reviewers’ work and eliminate the specified defects or explain them with deep arguments.
2.10. Authors must represent and make out the manuscript according to the rules approved by the magazine.
2.11. If the author notices material mistakes or inaccuracies in the article at the stage of its consideration or after its publication, he must notify on it the editorial office of the magazine without delay.
2.12. Authors must provide the editorial board or the publisher with the proof of correctness of the initial article or correct material mistakes if the editorial board or the publisher have learnt about them from the third parties.
3. Ethical principles in the reviewer’s activity
The reviewer carries out scientific examination of the author's materials owing to what his actions must have the impartial character consisting in performance of the following principles:
3.1. The manuscript received for reviewing must be considered as the confidential document, which can not be transferred for acquaintance or discussion to the third parties, who do not have any rights given by the editorial board.
3.2. Reviewers must know that the manuscripts sent to them are the authors’ intellectual property and are the data which are not subject to disclosure. Violation of confidentiality is possible only in case the reviewer reveals unauthenticity or falsification of the materials presented in the article.
3.3. The reviewer must draw the attention of the editor-in-chief to essential or partial similarity of the reviewed manuscript to any other work and also the facts of lack of references to the statements, conclusions or arguments, which have been earlier published in other works of this or other authors.
3.4. The reviewer must present the corresponding published works which are not quoted (in the article).
3.5. The reviewer must give the objective and reasoned assessment to the research stated results and accurately reasonable recommendations. The author’s personal criticism is impossible.
3.6. The reviewer’s remarks and wishes must be objective and basic, directed to increase the manuscript scientific level.
3.7. The reviewer must make decisions on the basis of the certain facts and provide proofs of his decision.
3.8. Reviewers must not make copies of manuscripts for the needs.
3.9. Reviewers have no right to use knowledge of the work content before its publication.
3.10. The reviewer who has no, according to his opinion, sufficient qualification for manuscript assessment or can not be objective, for example, in case of the conflict of interests with the author or the organization, must report about it to the editor with a request to exclude him from reviewing of this manuscript;
3.11. A response on the article is confidential. The full name of the Reviewer is known by the responsible secretary and the editor-in-chief of the magazine. This information is confidential.
4. The principles of professional ethics in the editor-in-chief’s activity
In his activity the editor-in-chief takes responsibility for publication of the author's works and he must follow the next fundamental principles:
4.1. Making decision on the publication the editor-in-chief of the scientific magazine is guided by reliability of data and the scientific importance of the considered work.
4.2. The editor-in-chief must estimate intellectual contents of manuscripts regardless of authors’ race, gender, sexual orientation, religious views, origin, nationality, a social status or political preferences.
4.3. The unpublished data obtained from the manuscripts submitted to consideration should not be used for the personal purposes or be given to the third parties without the author’ written consent. The information or the ideas received during editing and connected with possible advantages must remain confidential and not be used with the purpose of obtaining personal benefit.
4.4. The editor-in-chief must not allow information to be published if there are enough reasons to believe that it is plagiarism.
4.5. The editor-in-chief in his activity promises:
– to improve the magazine constantly;
– to follow the principle of freedom of opinions;
– to try to satisfy the magazine readers and authors’ needs;
– to exclude influence of business or policy interests on making decisions on publication of materials;
– to make the decision on the publication of materials, being guided by the following main criteria: compliance of the manuscript to the magazine subject; relevance, novelty and scientific importance of the submitted article; clarity of reading; reliability of results and completeness of conclusions. The quality of the research and its relevance are a basis for the decision on the publication;
– to take all reasonable measures for quality providing the published materials and protection of personal information confidentiality;
– to consider reviewers’ recommendations at making the final decision on the publication of the article. Responsibility for the decision on the publication completely lies on the magazine editorial board;
– to prove the decision in case of acceptance or rejection of the article;
– to give the author of the reviewed material an opportunity to justify the research position;
– in case of changing the editorial board structure not to cancel the solution of the previous structure on the publication of the material.
4.6. The editor-in-chief together with the publisher must not leave a claim without an answer, concerning the considered manuscripts or the published materials and also in case of a conflict situation to take all necessary measures to restore the violated rights.
5. The guidelines at release of articles
5.1. Observance of publishing ethics by the editorial board.
5.2. Observance of the guidelines at rejection of articles.
5.3. Maintenance of the academic writing integrity.
5.4. Prevention of causing damage to intellectual and ethical standards in case of commercial interests.
5.5. Readiness to publish corrections, explanations, rejections and apologies, when it is necessary.
5.6. Prevention of plagiarism and fraudulent data publication.
6. Conflict of interests
In order to avoid cases of printing ethics violation it is necessary to exclude the conflict of interests of all parties participating in the process of the manuscript publication. The conflict of interests arises in case the author, the reviewer or the associate editor has financial, scientific or personal relations, which can influence their actions. This relationship is called dual obligations, competing interests or competing loyalties.
To prevent the conflict of interests and according to the accepted ethical standards of the magazine the following duties are assigned to each of the parties.
The editor must:
– to give the manuscript for consideration to another associate editor in case the firstly appointed reviewer has the conflict of interests with the author of the submitted manuscript;
– to request information on possibility of the competing interests from all participants of the process of the manuscript publication;
– to make the decision on the publication of information specified in the author’s letter concerning the conflict of scientific and/or financial interests if it is not confidential and may influence the reader or scientific community’s assessment of the published work;
– to provide the publication of amendments if information on the conflict of interests was obtained after the publication of the article.
The author must:
– to specify the place of the work and a source of the research financing.
The reviewer must:
– to report to the editor-in-chief in case there is the conflict of interests (dual obligations, competing interests) and to refuse from examining of the manuscript.
Violations
In case of the situation concerning violation of printing ethics by the editor, the author or the reviewer there must be an obligatory investigation. It concerns published and unpublished materials. The editorial board must demand explanations, not involving persons who may have the conflict of interests with one of the parties.
If the material containing considerable inaccuracies was published, it must be immediately corrected in the form available to readers and the systems of indexing.
