Publication Ethics

The ethics statement of the JATSS is based on the Code of Conduct guidelines of The Committee on Publication Ethics (COPE), available at www.publicationethics.org .This journal follows the COPE Core Practices, availabe at    https://publicationethics.org/core-practices   

In addition, the Journal's policy on ethical oversight follows the principles of best practice and transparency for scientific publications of the The Committee on Publication Ethics (COPE), Directory of Open Access Journals (DOAJ), Open Access Scientific Publishing Association (OASPA) and World Association of Medical Editors (WAME).

Scope of Ethical Rules Regarding Author(s), Reviewer(s) and Editor

Relationship with the Author(s) and Ethical Responsibilities of the Author(s)

Authorship Process

The author(s) submitting an article to JATSS are expected to comply with the following ethical responsibilities:

We consider and assume that all authors submitting manuscripts conduct their research in ethical manner. If proven otherwise during our initial editorial review and/or double-blind reviewers, the manuscript under consideration will not be published.

Decisions to accept or reject a manuscript for publication are based solely on the article's importance, originality, clarity, and relevance of the work to the journal's mandate. See also GUIDELINES: A Short Guide to Ethical Editing for New Editors, p.4, Retrieved December 25, 2022 from

https://publicationethics.org/resources/guidelines/short-guide-ethical-editing-new-editors 

Not only the corresponding author, but all authors of the article are included in the communication (i.e., all authors are informed that the submission has been received).

While it is a principle that the manuscript sent for publication are checked by the editors and reviewers as quickly as possible, the publication process of the manuscript sent a short time before the publication of the journal should not be expected to be completed on time. The peer review process can always lead to unexpected extensions. For this reason, when sending a manuscript to be published in the journal, it would be appropriate to send it at least one month before the publication date of the next issue.

The author information form (This is the last page of the Journal’s Article Template) should include a statement that research and publication ethics are complied with while preparing the article.

The author(s) are obliged to wait for the result of the reviewer evaluation process.

All articles submitted to JATSS are evaluated by subjecting to a double-blind peer-review process.

Authors will not be discriminated against for any factor other than the quality of their research. Double-blind reviewing process will be applied without exceptions.

JATSS does not charge a fee authors at any stage of the publication process.

This decision will be reviewed at the beginning of each calendar year. In case of change, it will be announced on the web page of the journal two months before the first issue of that year.

The Copyright Transfer Agreement Form should be signed by all authors and scanned and uploaded separately by selecting the "Copyright Transfer Agreement" option under the File Content to Upload button together with the article during the article submission to the Journal of Applied and Theoretical Social Science.

• Author(s) Duties
• Reporting standards

In research articles, the author(s) of the research should present a clear explanation of the results of the study, followed by an objective discussion of the importance of the study. The article should contain sufficient details and references to allow others to benefit from the research.  Review articles should be clear, objective and comprehensive. Distorting the truth or deliberately using false statements constitutes unethical behavior and is unacceptable. The manuscripts submitted by the authors are expected to be original. All authors must contribute significantly to the research.  Authors should cite the sources they used in their articles correctly and should prepare their articles in accordance with the "Author's Guide" determined by the journal.

• Data Access, Data Storage and Reproducibility

 The author(s) may be asked to submit raw data of their research along with the manuscript.  In case raw data is requested from the author(s) within the framework of the evaluation processes, the author(s) should be ready to present the expected data and information to the editorial and advisory board, the field editor and (if necessary) the reviewer(s) who evaluated the article.  The author(s) must have a document showing that they have the right to use the data used, the necessary permissions for the research/analysis, or the consent of the experimental subjects.

• Originality and Plagiarism

 Author(s) should take care to submit completely original research to the journal.  If they have used words from the research of others, they should quote them appropriately. References should be made to the publications directly used in the preparation of the article.  If the similarity rate of the article is more than 20%, the article is returned to the author(s) together with the IThenticate report.

• Submitting Multiple, Duplicate, Redundant, or Simultaneous Manuscript/Article

 Articles describing essentially the same research should not be published as a primary publication in more than one journal.  Therefore, for consideration the author(s) should not submit a manuscript previously published in another journal.

If articles submitted to JATSS have been submitted to other journals before and rejected, information should be given about previous submissions  (for example, the name of the journal, and reviewer(s) comments should be reported to JATSS)

 An article should not be submitted simultaneously for publication to a journal other than JATSS. This is not an acceptable behavior in terms of publication ethics.  The current application must be rejected before an article can be submitted for publication in any journal. Originals or translations of articles published elsewhere are not accepted for publication in JATSS.

 If the article is produced from a master's thesis, doctoral thesis or a project of which the authors are the coordinator, this should be stated in the text of the article.  Individuals who have worked on the project as researchers or scholarship holders can only publish under their own names with the written permission of the executive.  Though it is possible in some cases to extract more than one article from a single research, in such a case it is essential that each one has a unity in itself and different from the others.

• Authorship Criteria in the Article Submitted to the Journal

 In the articles sent to the journal, only the names of people who are qualified as authors should be included, and people who do not make a meaningful contribution to the content should not be specified as authors.  The corresponding author must ensure that all co-authors are included in the list of authors. It is mandatory for each author to declare their contribution to the research and publication.

These contributions include preparation process of the manuscript, the collection of data, the writing the manuscript, submission, revision and resubmission process.

 (For detailed information, see: Author Scoring Form). The author(s) declare that they have seen and approved the final version of the article by completing and signing the Author Scoring Form in the author's guide section of the journal web page and that they agree with the other author(s) about submitting it for publication.

Apart from the co-authors of the article, if one person or more people provide support on the issues including typing the manuscript on the computer, entering the data into the computer, correcting the spelling errors, etc., this person or people should not be reported as the author. However, they should be thanked in the “Acknowledgements” section of the article. Acknowledgments should be included as a separate section at the end of the article before references.

Key Principles of Using AI-Related Applications in Academic Publishing

According to publication policy of the JATSS, the author or authors must be accountable for the work and responsible for its validity, accuracy, and integrity. Therefore:

1. Preparing any portion of an article using AI-related applications is not allowed, including the creation of the abstract or the literature review.
2. The generation or reporting of results using AI-related applications is not allowed.
3. The in-text reporting of statistics using AI-related applications is not allowed.
4. The submission or publication of images produced by AI-related applications it is not allowed.
5. In order to improve the language and readability of an article, it is acceptable to copy-edit it using AI-related applications. This is because these applications make use of pre-existing author-created content rather than creating entirely new content, mimicking standard tools already used to improve spelling and grammar. The author or authors are still accountable for the original work.

• Disclosure and Conflicts of Interest

For all studies submitted for publication, If any, situations that may constitute a conflict of interest and relations, It should be explained in a disclosure letter addressed to the editor-in-chief, and this letter should be uploaded to the journal system together with the manuscript.  In this letter, the author(s) should clearly clarify any conflicts of interest that could be considered as affecting the comments and conclusions in the article.

 Examples of potential conflicts of interest that need to be disclosed are the author(s) fee, educational grants or other funds, etc., in preparing the article. external financial support, personal or professional relationships and affiliations, consultancy, company partnership or shareholding, paid expert testimony, patent right, licensing regulations, memberships to various non-governmental organizations that may suggest biased information or beliefs on the subject. For detailed information, see. Discussion Document on handling competing interests. Retrieved January 03,2023from

https://publicationethics.org/resources/discussion-documents/3-handling-competing-interests-january-2016 

If a research was carried out with external support, the people, institutions or organizations that supported the publication should be listed (with their contributions in detail).

 All sources of financial support received for the study should be disclosed by giving a grant number.

• Acceptance of Resources

 While preparing their articles, the author(s) should cite books, academic journals, dissertations, regulatory legislation, government paperworks, congress, symposium papers, reports, publications on academic publication websites, which are accepted as the main sources of a scientific study.

• Use of Subjects and The Studies Requiring the Permission of the Ethics Committee

Regulations regarding what type of research requires ethical approval differ around the world. In some countries, all studies require ethical approval, while in other countries there is no such practice. This may lead to the submission of articles containing studies that do not meet the requirements set by the journals for independent ethical approval, and the rejection of the article due to misunderstanding of local regulations.

COPE has made recommendations regarding the criteria that editors who review such an article should apply during editorial review. Considering these suggestions, the principles that can be followed by JATSS are listed below. For detailed information, see. Guidance for Editors: Research, Audit and Service Evaluations, p.1-2, Retrieved February 01,2023 from https://publicationethics.org/resources/guidelines-new/guidance-editors-research-audit-and-service-evaluations  

All kinds of research conducted with qualitative or quantitative approaches that require data collection from the participants by using survey, interview, focus group work, observation, experiment, interview techniques,

Use of humans and animals (including material/data) for experimental or other scientific purposes, 

Clinical studies on humans,

Research on animals,

Retrospective studies in accordance with the protection of Personal Data

Important Information about Ethics Committee Permission

• Indicating that the "Informed Consent Form" was received in the case reports,
• Obtaining and specifying permission from the owners for the use of scales, questionnaires, photographs belonging to others,
• Indication of compliance with copyright regulations for the intellectual and artistic works used,
• If an ethics committee permission and / or legal / special permission is required in articles to be published in journal,  the following information should be clearly stated in the document: name of the Institution, the date and number of the decision, and the decision about request of permission.
• If the study requires the use of human and animal subjects, it should be clearly stated that the study was carried out in accordance with international declarations, guides etc.

 If in doubt about local laws or regulations, editors may ask the author(s) to provide an explanatory letter or a letter about the research from the individual research ethics committee or research ethics officer in that country to clarify this issue.  

• Author(s) Participation in the Peer Review Process

The author(s) are obliged to participate in the peer-review process and to cooperate fully by responding promptly to the editor-in-chief or field editors' requests for raw data, explanation and proof of ethics approval and documentation of copyright permissions.

 Author(s) must comply with copyright regulations for Copyrighted materials (including the Web) used. All legal, financial and penal responsibility in this matter belongs to the author(s).

In case of "revision required" decision by the reviewer(s), the author(s) should respond to the comments of the reviewer(s) in a timely and orderly manner without skipping any suggestions and criticisms of the reviewer(s).

 The author(s) are required to upload the text of the article on which they have edited in a different color and the author's reply to reviewer form to the journal system. If they do not review and re-upload their articles to the journal by the given deadline, the article will be rejected.

• Fundamental Errors in Published Articles (Retractions and Correction

 All authors are responsible for removing or correcting any errors they see before their articles are published. After their article is published, they should immediately notify the editor-in-chief of the journal or field editors when they notice significant errors or inaccuracies in their published work.  Corresponding authors are obliged to cooperate with the editor-in-chief or field editors of the journal to correct the typo(s) in the article or to retract the article.  All authors are obliged to request the removal or correction of errors they see within five working days after their articles are published.  If the editor-in-chief or field editors learn from a third party that a published article contains a material error or inaccuracy, they ask the author(s) to immediately correct or withdraw the article or fulfill the obligation of the author(s) regarding the accuracy of the article.

See for more detailed information about the authorship and contributorship policies of the journal, Retrieved February 05,2023 from https://publicationethics.org/authorship?utm_source=website&utm_medium=pdf&utm_campaign=pot 

Relations with the Reviewers and the Ethical Responsibilities of the Reviewers

• Double Blind Reviewer Method Process

 The article is taken into the reviewer evaluation process by the relevant field editor to be assigned by the editor-in-chief.

 Who will be appointed as the reviewer is determined by taking the opinion of the relevant field editor and, if necessary, the relevant member(s) of the publication and advisory board. Reviewers are appointed by the field editor.

 The manuscript, which passes the controls in the pre-examination process successfully, enters the blind peer-review process. The editor-in-chief or field editor conducts mutual correspondence with the reviewer(s). It is the primary preference for the relevant field editor to carry out the mutual correspondence.

All manuscripts sent to the journal are evaluated using the double-blind method, where the names of the reviewer(s) and author(s) are mutually hidden. The reviewers are not informed about the identity of the author(s) and authors are not informed about the identity of the reviewers.

Reviewer(s) cannot communicate directly with the author(s), evaluations and comments are communicated through the journal's editorial structure. In this process, evaluation forms and reviewer comments on  full texts of articles are sent to the author(s) by the field editor through the mechanisms created on the web page.

The manuscripts considered positive by one reviewer and negative by the other reviewer are sent to a third one

A faculty member working in the same institution as the author cannot be a reviewer.

The reviewer should only accept to evaluate studies related to the fields they have sufficient knowledge and experience.

 Reviewers should adhere to the principles of confidentiality and impartiality while making their evaluation.

If the reviewers think that they are facing with a conflict of interest during the evaluation process, they should inform the relevant JATSS editor and act in accordance with the decision taken, and if necessary, withdraw from the reviewing of the article.

Reviewers should protect the studies they have reviewed in accordance with the principle of confidentiality and should not share them with anyone except those approved by the JATSS editors.

The relevant documents are under the responsibility of the reviewers even after the article is published. It is the reviewers obligation to store them in a safe location.

Reviewers should make the evaluation objectively only in relation to the content of the study. Nationality, gender, religious beliefs, political beliefs and commercial concerns should not be allowed to influence the evaluation.

Evaluations should be made in a constructive and courteous language. Hostile expressions and ridicule and insulting personal comments should not be made. The chief editor or the relevant field editor does not make any corrections on the report written by the reviewer(s), including typographical errors, grammar and language usage errors.  It is accepted that even such a correction may change the opinion or judgment of the reviewer(s) about the quality, content or intellectual validity of the article.

 Reviewer(s) who make hostile, defamatory, emotional, offensive, unethical or inappropriate comments and refuse to correct them will be notified that this is unacceptable and removed from the reviewer pool.

 The style, language quality and comments used by the reviewers in their reports should be constructive, courteous and clear.

See. COPE Guidelines: Editing peer reviews,s.4. Retrived February 10, 2023 from https://publicationethics.org/sites/default/files/editing-peer-reviews-cope-guideline.pdf       

Reviewers voluntarily spend their time and expertise advising the editor and author(s) for improvement of the manuscript. For this reason, reviewer(s) who request revision of the article are given the opportunity to see and approve the final revised version of the article if they request it again.

The details of the review evaluation process are explained under a separate heading on the JATSS website.

• Reviewers Duties
• Contribution to Editorial Decisions

The peer-review process is central to academic publishing. Peer review helps editors make editorial decisions.

• Quickness

Reviewer can accept or reject the review request within the time given to it. If the reviewer does not respond to a review request within 7 days, a reminder will be sent via e-mail. During this period, he/she accepts or refuses to be an reviewer. If no response is received within 3 days after the reminder, the appointment of the review will be cancelled. A new reviewer is appointed. The reviewer who thinks that he/she will not be able to complete the reviewing within the time given to him/her or who feels inadequate to evaluate an article manuscript sent to him/her, should immediately reject the invitation to review and inform the field editor or chief editor.

• Confidentiality

All articles accepted for peer review should be considered confidential; It should not be shown to others or discussed with others by the reviewer. This condition also applies to reviewers who decline the invitation to review the manuscript.

• Objectivity Standards

Reviewer reviews should be done objectively. The issues identified should be clearly stated with supporting implications. Thus, the report written by the reviewer should help the author(s) to improve their articles.

• Acceptance of Resources

Reviewers should indicate in their report if there are published studies that are not cited by the author(s) but will help the author(s) improve their article. The author(s) should be asked to cite these studies. A reviewer should also notify the editor-in-chief or field editor if he or she detects any significant similarity or overlap between the article under review and any other work (published or unpublished) of which he or she has personal knowledge.

• Disclosure and Conflicts of Interest

Reviewers who have conflicts of interest arising from competition, partnership or other personal and professional relationships and affiliations with any author, company or institution in connection with the work described in the content of the article are required to report this situation to the editor-in-chief or field editor and, if necessary, leave the reviewering position according to the editor's decision.

In such a case, reviewers should immediately inform the field editor or editor-in-chief so that they can contact alternative reviewers and send a review invitation.

Unpublished content found in a submitted article should not be used in the reviewer's own research. Privileged information or ideas obtained through peer review must be kept confidential and not used for the reviewer's personal advantage. This also applies to reviewers who decline an invitation to review.

See. For all policies regarding peer review procedures, Retrived February 15, 2023 from https://publicationethics.org/peerreview?utm_source=website&utm_medium=pdf&utm_campaign=pot

• Editors' Duties
• Integrity Enforcement and Editorial Independence

The editor-in-chief and the field editor review the submitted articles without considering the race, gender, sexual orientation, ethnic origin, nationality, political opinion, institutional affiliation, religious belief of the author(s).

Editors should review articles only if the article complies with the scope and publication policy of the journal, compliance with the Journal Article Template, use of academic style, originality, spelling and language, plagiarism control, and etc.

The journal's editor-in-chief and field editor will decide whether an article is good enough for publication based on similarity reports, double-blind peer-reviews, and legal requirements. For the details of the process, please see the Details of the Reviewer Evaluation Process.

The Editor-in-Chief has full authority over all editorial content of the journal and the timing of its publication.

• Confidentiality

The Editor-in-Chief and field editors will not disclose any information about the manuscripts submitted to the journal to anyone other than the relevant author(s), reviewers, potential reviewers.

• Disclosure and Conflicts of Interest

The editor-in-chief, field editors, editorial and advisory board member(s) consulted for the article cannot use unpublished material revealed in a submitted article for their own research purposes without the express written consent of the author(s).

The information obtained from the submitted manuscripts will be kept confidential by the Editor-in-Chief, field editors and members of the editorial and advisory board and will not be shared with third parties for their own research projects or for personal gain in any way.

See. Data Sharing and Repeatability Policies. Retrived February 15, 2023 from

https://publicationethics.org/data?utm_source=website&utm_medium=pdf&utm_campaign=pot

Editors or anyone from the editorial staff who has any relationship (positive or negative) with the author(s) will not be part of the review, acceptance and publication process of this manuscript. If this person is the Editor-in-Chief, he/she will appoint another editor to the article and will not interfere with the process.

See details for policies to be followed on conflicts of interest/Competing of interest. Retrived February 15, 2023 from

https://publicationethics.org/competinginterests?utm_source=website&utm_medium=pdf&utm_campaign=member-booklet

See details for policies to be followed regarding with allegations of misconduct. Retrived February 15, 2023 from https://publicationethics.org/misconduct?utm_source=website&utm_medium=pdf&utm_campaign=pot  

• Publication Decisions

The article is taken into the review evaluation process by the relevant field editor to be assigned by the editor-in-chief.

Who will be appointed as a reviewer is determined by taking the opinion of the relevant field editor and, if necessary, the member(s) of the relevant publication and advisory board.. Reviewers are assigned by the field editor.

All manuscripts submitted for publication are subject to peer review by at least two reviewer who are experts in their fields.

The article is evaluated in terms of its compliance with the scope of the journal and its publication policy, its compliance with the Journal Article Template, its use of academic style, originality, its importance for researchers and readers, spelling and language, not being libelous, copyright infringement, plagiarism control, etc., and incoming revier reports, then publication decision is made.

The Editor-in-Chief may meet with the field editor or reviewers while making the publication decision.

The subject is also explained on the JATSS website under the title of the details of the reviewer evaluation process.

• Participation and Cooperation in Investigations

When there is any complaint (plagiarism, detection of republishing of an article that was previously published elsewhere, excluding an author who contributed to the article and submitting the article for publication to the journal, publication by the researcher and/or scholar using data without the knowledge of the project coordinator in articles produced from the project, etc.). .) complainant(s) can make a complaint by sending an e-mail to editor.jatss@iccsor.com .

Chief editor and field editors; carefully examines complaints from author(s), reviewer(s) or readers. If the complaint is made by contacting the field editor, he/she informs the editor-in-chief abıut the situation. The subject of the complaint is investigated with a constructive and enlightening attitude. Necessary explanatory answers are given to the interested parties.

Any unethical publishing behavior reported regarding a manuscript or published article will be reviewed, even if it occurs years after publication.

If the editors or someone outside of the journal organization detects conduct, it should be brought to the attention of the editör-in-chief. Claims without evidence will not be considered. If there is evidence, the accused person will be contacted by the Chief Editor and given a chance to justify his/her behavior. If the unwanted behavior is not intentional and can be corrected, the person wil be given a chance to correct it. If evidence-based  unethical behavior is intentional, the person in question, whether it is an author, a reviewer or a member of editorial staff and a member of the journal’s editorial and advisory board, will no longer be a  part of the Journal. If he/she is an author and/or reviewer, future works will not be accepted. If this person is part of the editorial and advisory board or editorial staff, they will be removed from the staff. If the unethical behavior has legal consequences, proper authorities will be informed.

 For the procedure to be followed for complaints and objections, see. Retrived February 20, 2023 from

https://publicationethics.org/appeals?utm_source=website&utm_medium=pdf&utm_campaign=pot

 If the ethical concern is found to be well-founded during the investigation, a statement on the subject will be published in the journal. If the ethical violation is finalized at the end of the investigation, the article will be removed from publication.

Note: JATSS will act in accordance with the COPE Workflow Charts for Basic applications. Latest versions of the complete set of flowcharts available in English and Turkish. Retrived April 12, 2023 from

https://publicationethics.org/resources/flowcharts/turkish-all-flowcharts.