Publication Ethics according to COPE instructions:
This journal is committed to upholding the integrity of the scientific record. The journal will follow the best guidelines on how to deal with potential acts of misconduct.
Ethical Obligations of AJSWS Editors and Reviewers
The ethical obligations and responsibilities of editors and reviewers of AJSWS are summarized as follows:
Editors and reviewers should declare any conflict of interest with author, or any organization referred to in any received publication.
The editor in chief is responsible for acceptance or rejection of a manuscript and the reviewers chosen for their experience. However, manuscripts could be rejected without review if the editor consider the manuscript is either inappropriate or out of the scope of the journal or needs extensive editing.
The reviewer gives an honest and unbiased advice to the Editor.
The review process should be transparent, unbiased, and carried out in reasonable time.
The editor and editorial board and staff should keep all details of a submission confidential.
The intellectual independence of authors should be respected by the editors.
The responsibility of the editorial board towards the manuscript authored by a member of the editorial board and submitted to the Journal is to make sure that the manuscript is delegated to a qualified person and that such manuscript would constitute a conflict of interest.
Unpublished information or, arguments should only be used with the consent of the author.
If an editor received convincing evidence that some published materials in a manuscript published by the journal are erroneous, the editor should publish a report pointing out the errors and if possible, the correction.
The author can suggest certain reviewers for the submitted manuscript and the editor may use one or two of the suggested reviewers if he/she feels that their opinion is important for manuscript evaluation. However, the editor can choose other reviewers based on their expertise.
Ethical responsibilities of authors
Authors should refrain from misrepresenting research results which could damage the trust in the journal and ultimately the entire scientific endeavor. Maintaining integrity of the research and its presentation can be achieved by following the rules of good scientific practice, which includes:
The manuscript has not been submitted to more than one journal for simultaneous
consideration.
The manuscript has not been published previously (partly or in full), unless the new work
concerns an expansion of previous work (please provide transparency on the re-use of material
to avoid the hint of text-recycling (“self-plagiarism”)).
A single study is not split up into several parts to increase the quantity of submissions and
submitted to various journals or to one journal over time (e.g. “salami-publishing”).
No data have been fabricated or manipulated (including images) to support your conclusions.
No data, text, or theories by others are presented as if they were the authors own (“plagiarism”).
Proper acknowledgements to other works must be given (this includes material that is closely copied (near verbatim), summarized and/or paraphrased), quotation marks are used for verbatim copying of material, and permissions are secured for material that is copyrighted.
Important note: the journal may use software to screen for plagiarism.
Consent to submit has been received from all co-authors and responsible authorities at the institute/organization where the work has been carried out before the work is submitted.
Authors whose names appear on the submission have contributed sufficiently to the scientific work and therefore share collective responsibility and accountability for the results.
Changes of authorship or in the order of authors are not accepted after acceptance of a manuscript.
Requests to add or delete authors at revision stage or after publication is a serious matter and may be considered only after receipt of written approval from all authors and detailed explanation about the role/deletion of the new/deleted author. The decision on accepting the change rests with the Editor-in-Chief of the journal.
Upon request authors should be prepared to send relevant documentation or data in order to verify the validity of the results. This could be in the form of raw data, samples, records, etc.
If there is a suspicion of misconduct, the journal will carry out an investigation following the AJSWS and Alexandria University guidelines. If, after investigation, the allegation seems to raise valid concerns, the accused author will be contacted and given an opportunity to address the issue. If misconduct has been proven, this may result in the Editor-in-Chief’s implementation of the following measures, including, but not limited to:
If the article is still under consideration, it may be rejected and returned to the author.
If the article has already been published online, depending on the nature and severity of the infraction, either an erratum will be placed with the article or in severe cases complete retraction of the article will occur. The reason must be given in the published erratum or retraction note.
The author’s institution may be informed.