Publication Ethics

Publication Ethics

The Journal of Applied Engineering Science and Technology (JAEST) is committed to maintaining high standards of publication ethics, research integrity, transparency, fairness, and accountability throughout the editorial and publication process. These principles apply to authors, reviewers, editors, editorial board members, and all parties involved in scholarly publishing.

What is Publication Ethics?

Publication ethics refers to the principles and standards that govern the responsible preparation, evaluation, dissemination, and correction of scientific and scholarly work. These standards protect research integrity, intellectual property, authorship rights, transparency, and the reliability of the scholarly record.

Ethical publication requires that research be reported honestly, accurately, transparently, and without fabrication, falsification, plagiarism, inappropriate manipulation, or unauthorized republication.

Importance of Publication Ethics

1. Maintaining research integrity: Ethical standards help ensure that published findings are accurate, reliable, reproducible, and trustworthy.
2. Protecting intellectual property: Ethical publishing protects the rights of authors and prevents plagiarism, improper attribution, and unauthorized use of scholarly work.
3. Ensuring fairness: Editorial and peer-review decisions must be based on scientific quality, originality, relevance, and scholarly merit, without discrimination or inappropriate influence.
4. Building trust: Ethical conduct strengthens confidence among authors, reviewers, readers, institutions, and the wider scientific community.
5. Promoting transparency: Authors and editors should disclose relevant information concerning research methods, funding, authorship, conflicts of interest, corrections, and other matters that may influence interpretation of the work.

Responsibilities of Authors

• Research must be conducted ethically, responsibly, and in accordance with applicable institutional, national, and international regulations.
• Authors must report results honestly and must not fabricate, falsify, manipulate, or selectively misrepresent data.
• Methods should be described clearly and sufficiently to allow other researchers, where appropriate, to understand, verify, or reproduce the work.
• Submitted manuscripts must be original, must not contain plagiarism, and must not have been published previously or be under simultaneous consideration by another journal.
• Authors must appropriately acknowledge and cite all sources, ideas, methods, data, figures, tables, and text originating from other works.
• Authors are collectively responsible for the accuracy, integrity, and content of the submitted and published work.
• Authorship must accurately reflect substantial intellectual and scientific contributions to the work.
• All listed authors must approve the submitted manuscript and the final version accepted for publication.
• Individuals who do not meet authorship criteria must not be listed as authors. Contributions that do not justify authorship should be acknowledged appropriately.
• Authors must disclose all relevant sources of funding, financial support, sponsorship, or institutional assistance.
• Authors must disclose any actual, potential, or perceived conflicts of interest that could influence the research, interpretation, or publication of the manuscript.
• If applicable, authors must state whether artificial intelligence or AI-assisted tools were used in the preparation of the manuscript and describe the nature and extent of their use. AI tools cannot be listed as authors.
• Authors must obtain appropriate ethical approval for research involving human participants or animals when required and must clearly report such approval in the manuscript.
• Authors must promptly notify the journal if they discover a significant error or inaccuracy in their submitted or published work and cooperate with the editor in issuing a correction, retraction, or other appropriate notice.

Originality and Plagiarism

All manuscripts submitted to JAEST must represent original scholarly work. Plagiarism, self-plagiarism, duplicate publication, data fabrication, data falsification, inappropriate image manipulation, and other forms of research misconduct are not acceptable.

The journal may use plagiarism-detection software or other screening tools as part of the editorial assessment process. Manuscripts found to contain substantial plagiarism or other serious ethical violations may be rejected, withdrawn, or retracted, depending on the stage of publication.

Authorship and Contributorship

Authorship should be limited to individuals who have made substantial contributions to the conception, design, execution, analysis, interpretation, drafting, or critical revision of the research.

All authors should be able to identify their contribution to the work and must accept responsibility for the integrity and accuracy of the published article. Ghost authorship, guest authorship, and honorary authorship are not acceptable.

Conflicts of Interest

Authors, reviewers, and editors must disclose any financial, professional, institutional, personal, academic, or other relationships that could reasonably be perceived as influencing their judgment.

Where no competing interests exist, authors may be required to provide a declaration confirming that no conflict of interest exists.

Funding Disclosure

Authors must identify all sources of financial or material support related to the research. Where applicable, the role of the funding body in study design, data collection, analysis, interpretation, manuscript preparation, or publication decisions should be disclosed.

Responsibilities of Reviewers

• Fairness and objectivity: Reviewers must provide honest, objective, evidence-based, and constructive assessments.
• Confidentiality: Manuscripts received for review must be treated as confidential documents. Reviewers must not share or discuss the manuscript with unauthorized persons.
• Conflict of interest: Reviewers must disclose any conflict of interest and should decline the review when impartial evaluation cannot be guaranteed.
• Expertise: Reviewers should accept assignments only when they possess appropriate expertise to evaluate the manuscript.
• Timeliness: Reviewers should accept review invitations only when they are reasonably able to complete the evaluation within the requested time.
• Plagiarism and misuse: Reviewers must not appropriate, reproduce, disclose, or use unpublished information obtained through peer review for personal advantage.
• Ethical concerns: Reviewers should notify the editor of suspected plagiarism, duplicate publication, fabrication, falsification, unethical research practices, or other serious concerns.
• Constructive review: Reviewer reports should be professional, respectful, clear, and useful to both authors and editors.

Peer-Review Integrity

JAEST applies a peer-review process intended to ensure independent, objective, and scientifically rigorous evaluation of submitted manuscripts. Reviewers are expected to evaluate manuscripts solely on their scholarly quality, originality, methodology, significance, clarity, and relevance to the journal's scope.

The journal uses a double-blind peer-review model, in which the identities of authors and reviewers are concealed from one another during the review process.

Responsibilities of Editors

• Editors are responsible for maintaining the integrity and quality of the journal's published scholarly record.
• Editorial decisions must be fair, impartial, independent, and based on the scientific merit and relevance of the manuscript.
• Editors must not discriminate on the basis of nationality, gender, institutional affiliation, ethnicity, religion, political belief, or other irrelevant personal characteristics.
• Editors must ensure that submitted manuscripts undergo appropriate and fair peer review.
• Editors must protect the confidentiality of submitted manuscripts, authors, and reviewers.
• Editors must disclose and appropriately manage potential conflicts of interest.
• Editors should promote transparency, complete reporting, and responsible research practices.
• Editors must investigate credible allegations of plagiarism, fabrication, falsification, duplicate publication, authorship misconduct, reviewer misconduct, or other publication-ethics violations.
• Editors should issue corrections, expressions of concern, withdrawals, or retractions when necessary to preserve the integrity of the scholarly record.
• Editors should ensure that studies involving humans or animals comply with appropriate ethical standards and approvals.
• Authors and reviewers must be clearly informed of the journal's expectations and ethical responsibilities.

Research Involving Human Participants or Animals

Research involving human participants, human data, animals, or biological materials must comply with relevant ethical requirements and institutional regulations. Authors should provide the name of the approving ethics committee or institutional review board and the approval reference number where applicable.

Informed consent must be obtained when required, particularly when identifiable personal information, images, or clinical data are included.

Data Integrity and Research Records

Authors are expected to maintain accurate research records and, where appropriate and legally permissible, provide access to supporting data needed to verify the published findings.

Fabrication, falsification, selective manipulation, inappropriate omission, or deliberate misrepresentation of research data constitutes serious misconduct.

Corrections, Retractions and Expressions of Concern

JAEST is committed to preserving the accuracy of the scholarly record. When significant errors or ethical concerns are identified after publication, the journal may publish a correction, corrigendum, erratum, expression of concern, retraction, or other appropriate notice.

Retractions may be considered when findings are unreliable because of misconduct or serious error, when plagiarism or redundant publication is confirmed, or when serious ethical violations have occurred.

Corrections and retractions should remain permanently linked to the original article whenever technically possible.

Handling Allegations of Research and Publication Misconduct

Allegations of research or publication misconduct will be considered seriously and handled confidentially, fairly, and impartially. The journal may request explanations, documentation, raw data, ethical approvals, or other evidence from authors or relevant institutions.

Where appropriate, JAEST may contact authors' institutions, research integrity offices, funding agencies, or other relevant bodies when serious misconduct is suspected.

Duplicate and Redundant Publication

Authors must not submit substantially the same manuscript to more than one journal simultaneously. Manuscripts that substantially reproduce previously published work without appropriate disclosure, justification, and citation may be rejected or retracted.

Artificial Intelligence and AI-Assisted Tools

Authors remain fully responsible for the accuracy, originality, integrity, and reliability of all content submitted to JAEST, including content prepared with the assistance of artificial intelligence tools.

Where AI-assisted tools have made a substantive contribution to manuscript preparation, authors should transparently disclose the nature and extent of their use. AI systems or tools cannot meet authorship criteria and must not be listed as authors.

Copyright and Licensing

JAEST is an open-access journal. Copyright and licensing conditions are stated separately in the journal's copyright and open-access policies. Authors and readers should consult the current journal licensing information for the applicable Creative Commons licence.

The licensing terms displayed on the published article and journal website constitute the authoritative licence applicable to that publication.

Complaints and Appeals

Authors may submit reasonable appeals concerning editorial decisions or complaints regarding editorial procedures, ethical matters, peer review, or publication practices.

Appeals and complaints will be reviewed objectively and, where appropriate, by an editor who was not directly involved in the original decision.

Confidentiality

Editors and reviewers must maintain the confidentiality of manuscripts, correspondence, reviewer reports, and other information obtained during the editorial and peer-review process, except where disclosure is required to investigate suspected misconduct or comply with legal obligations.

Editorial Independence

Editorial decisions are made independently and are not influenced by commercial, financial, institutional, political, or personal interests. The Editor-in-Chief and editorial team retain responsibility for decisions concerning the scholarly content published by the journal.

Contact Regarding Ethical Concerns

Questions, complaints, allegations of publication misconduct, or concerns relating to research integrity may be submitted to the JAEST editorial office.

Email: jaest@univ-biskra.dz