e-Kafkas Journal of Educational Research

e- Kafkas Journal of Educational Research is the publication of Kafkas University Dede Korkut Faculty of Education. The journal which welcomes international authors and readers aims to enrich knowledge in education with broader international perspective. The journal is published electronically three times a year. It is a peer-reviewed and scientific journal. The approach of the journal is the open-access journal system. The articles that will be published in e-Kafkas Journal of Educational Research will be evaluated by the reviewer board after the pre-examination by editors of the journal. In this process, the articles are scientifically evaluated by the reviewer board through the double-blind peer-reviewed system. The ideas, opinions, thoughts, suggestions etc. in the articles are under the responsibility of the respective authors. The Journal does not charge for article submission, processing, and publication. It has the status of a periodically published 12-year International Refereed Journal and has adopted the basic principle of fulfilling its publishing responsibilities based on COPE (Code of Conduct for Journal Editors).

e-Kafkas Journal of Educational Research (e-KJER) publishes studies using scientific research methods and techniques in all the basic fields of educational sciences. The main aim of the journal is to contribute to the educational processes and related fields such as Computer and Instructional Technology Education, Religious Culture and Ethics Education, Educational Sciences, Fine Arts Education, Mathematics and Science Education, Special Education, Psychological Counseling and Guidance, Social Sciences Education, Primary Education, Turkish Education, and Foreign Language Education. 

The studies are to be accepted for the publication in accordance with the aim of e-KJER:

• Scientific studies that investigate, question the problems and improve their applications in all levels of education,

• Scientific studies aimed at developing the competencies of trainers and facilitating their application activities of trainers,

• Scientific researches designed with quantitative, qualitative and mixed methods,

• Scientific studies that can contribute to the holistic development of students in all levels of education,

• Scientific studies that evaluate research methodology, the original, educational theory, and model in accordance with scientific research methods

• Interdisciplinary scientific studies conducted by researchers from different fields of study,

• Scientific studies that test the validity, reliability, and applicability of data collection tools which test and evaluate psychometric properties to be used in education,

• Scientific studies aiming at the development and testing of educational technology and teaching materials and integration of them into teaching activities.

Article Submission Guideline

e-Kafkas Journal of Educational Research aims to provide its readers with high-quality and innovative studies. We expect authors submitting articles to our journal to also be engaged readers and followers of our publication. Before submitting a manuscript, we kindly ask authors to review our journal’s scope and aims, ethical policies, peer review process, and price policy.

Article Types

The e-Kafkas Journal of Educational Research (e-KJER) publishes the following types of contributions:

Research Article: Empirical studies that present original research findings, including hypotheses, methodology, data analysis, and results. Manuscripts should be well-structured and supported by relevant tables, illustrations, and references.

Review Article: Only critical review papers will be considered, providing a novel perspective and critical evaluation on topics of interest to the broader e-KJER readership. Manuscripts that merely summarize the existing literature are not suitable. The format and length of review papers are more flexible than those of research articles. Review papers undergo a peer-review process. Authors submitting a critical review must include a cover letter that briefly outlines their expertise in the subject matter and provides a list of their related publications on the topic. Additionally, authors should discuss existing review articles on the same subject and explain how their manuscript offers new insights and perspectives beyond the available literature.

Required Documents for Submission

e-Kafkas Journal of Educational Research carries out a double-blind peer-review process for candidate articles. All candidate articles applying to our journal must be original and must not have been previously published in any journal. In addition, the candidate article should not be in the evaluation process of an another journal, and not be sent to another journal until the evaluation process of the candidate article is concluded in our journal. In case of such applications violating the journal rules, the articles of the author(s) will not be evaluated in any way. The authors should meticulously follow the submission guidelines to the journal. In this regard, the documents below should be included when submitting the manuscript to the journal.

• Title page
• Similarity rate statement and the file of similarity rate.
• Ethics Statement (This document is mandatory only for articles needing ethical permission)
• Copyright transfer agreement
• Article manuscript (any information related to authors should not be included in the main text).
• Cover Letter (Mandatory for Review Articles: Authors must briefly explain their expertise in the subject matter and provide a list of their related publications on the topic.)

When submitting an article to the journal, it is necessary to submit the article by attaching the documents above. In this regard, the responsibility belongs to the authors. When the required documents are not uploaded, the article is returned to the author.

Title page

The Title Page is a crucial document that must include complete and clear details of all authors. It should list the full names, affiliations, email addresses, and ORCID numbers of all contributors. Additionally, the corresponding author, who will be responsible for communication regarding the manuscript, must be explicitly identified. The number and order of authors entered into the system during submission must exactly match those on the Title Page. If there is any discrepancy, the manuscript will not be considered for review until the issue is resolved.

Authorship must adhere to ethical principles. Only individuals who have made a significant and meaningful contribution to the research should be included as authors, while those who have not contributed should not be listed. Individuals or institutions that provided indirect support should be acknowledged in the acknowledgments section instead. Furthermore, the Title Page must include additional details related to the manuscript. If the study is derived from a doctoral or master's thesis, linked to a specific project, or has been presented at a conference or congress, this information must be clearly stated. The author information entered into the DergiPark system must be identical to the information on the Title Page. When determining the order of authors, careful attention should be paid, as changes to the author order, addition or removal of authors, or modifications to author names will not be allowed during the manuscript evaluation and publication process. You can find a sample Title Page under the "Forms and Templates" section.

Article manuscript 

The entire manuscript must adhere to APA Style, as detailed in the Publication Manual of the American Psychological Association, Sixth Edition. In addition, the articles sent to e-Kafkas Journal of Educational Research (e-KJER) should be prepared according to the submission format below:

Page layout: A4 Vertical, margins (normal) (2,5 cm from each side)

e-KJER does not have a restrictive approach to the word number and page. However, the editorial board and science committee may suggest that the study can be shortened without losing its quality. While there is no strict limit, it is recommended that the manuscript, including all its components, should not exceed 10,000 words. Any information related to the authors should not be included in the main text during the initial submission. To ensure a fair and unbiased review process, the manuscript must be anonymized. Author details will be added after the evaluation process is complete, at which point the manuscript will be sent back to the authors for final revisions and necessary updates.

Title of the manuscript

The title of the study should be inclusive and clearly reflect the content. Initials of every word should be capitalized except conjunctions. Title should be written in Times New Roman font, bold, 12 pt, center-aligned, and single line spacing.

Abstract

In the abstract, the purpose, scope, method, findings, and conclusion of the study should be briefly stated. The abstract should be between 200-300 words. The abstract should be written in Times New Roman font  11 pt, 6-0 nk paragraph spacing, and single line spacing.

Keywords:

Keywords of the study should consist of minimum 3 and maximum 5 words.

Introduction

The text should be written in Times New Roman font, 11 pt, single line spacing, and 6-0 nk paragraph spacing. Enter key between paragraphs should not be used. One letter spacing should be left after the punctuation marks and between the words. 

The introduction should provide a clear background for the study, establishing its significance and relevance within the field. Authors should define the research problem, outline the study’s objectives, and present the research questions or hypotheses. A brief discussion of the study's novelty and contribution to existing knowledge is also expected.

Literature Review

The literature review should critically examine previous research related to the study’s topic, highlighting key findings, gaps, and theoretical perspectives. This section should not merely summarize existing studies but also demonstrate how the current research builds upon or diverges from previous work. Authors should engage with both seminal works and recent studies, ensuring a balanced perspective. The literature review should provide a conceptual or theoretical framework guiding the study and justify the need for the research based on existing gaps.

Method

The research model, population-sample / study group, data collection tools, validity and reliability of data collection tools, data collection techniques, data analysis, limitations should be detailed. Furthermore, It is an obligation for the researchers to provide detailed explanation of ethical approval obtained for the study, informed consent procedures, participant confidentiality measures, and adherence to research ethics guidelines. If the study involves human participants, authors should specify the ethical review board that approved the research and describe how ethical principles such as voluntary participation, anonymity, and data protection were ensured.

Findings

The findings obtained in the research can be explained with tables, figures, graphics or pictures in accordance with the purpose of the study.

Conclusion, Discussion and Suggestions

The main ideas that emerged in the light of the findings of the research should be explained and discussed. Suggestions can be made according to the findings of the study. In addition, suggestions can be made for future studies and practices that will contribute to the literature.

Acknowledgment

Acknowledgment part of the article should cover declaration regarding copyrights, ethics statement, author contributions, funding, institutional review board statement, data availability statement,  conflict of interest and generative artificial intelligence statement. 

Copyrights: The submitted research should have the statement of  "The works published in the e-Kafkas Journal of Educational Research are licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-Non-commercial 4.0 International License."

Ethics statement: In this study, we declare that the rules stated in the "Higher Education Institutions Scientific Research and Publication Ethics Directive" are complied with and that we do not take any of the actions based on "Actions Against Scientific Research and Publication Ethics". At the same time, we declare that there is no conflict of interest between the authors, which all authors contribute to the study, and that all the responsibility belongs to the article authors in case of all ethical violations.

Author Contributions: If the article is co-authored, a paragraph should be included to clarify each author's specific contributions. Authors should refer to CRediT’s 14 contributor roles. Clearly stating each author’s role ensures transparency and accountability in the research process. 

Conceptualization – Ideas; formulation or evolution of overarching research goals and aims. Data curation – Management activities to annotate (produce metadata), scrub data and maintain research data (including software code, where it is necessary for interpreting the data itself) for initial use and later re-use. Formal analysis – Application of statistical, mathematical, computational, or other formal techniques to analyze or synthesize study data. Funding acquisition - Acquisition of the financial support for the project leading to this publication. Investigation – Conducting a research and investigation process, specifically performing the experiments, or data/evidence collection. Methodology – Development or design of methodology; creation of models. Project administration – Management and coordination responsibility for the research activity planning and execution. Resources – Provision of study materials, reagents, materials, patients, laboratory samples, animals, instrumentation, computing resources, or other analysis tools. Software – Programming, software development; designing computer programs; implementation of the computer code and supporting algorithms; testing of existing code components. Supervision – Oversight and leadership responsibility for the research activity planning and execution, including mentorship external to the core team. Validation – Verification, whether as a part of the activity or separate, of the overall replication/reproducibility of results/experiments and other research outputs. Visualization – Preparation, creation and/or presentation of the published work, specifically visualization/data presentation. Writing – original draft – Preparation, creation and/or presentation of the published work, specifically writing the initial draft (including substantive translation). Writing – review & editing – Preparation, creation and/or presentation of the published work by those from the original research group, specifically critical review, commentary or revision – including pre- or post-publication stages

Funding: If this research is funded, please state the name of the funder. If not, please state “This research received no funding”.

Institutional Review Board Statement: If the research needs ethical approval please state the information of the ethical approval document, such as the name of the ethics committee, the date of ethics committee approval, and the number of the document.

Data Availability Statement: If the data is accessible, authors should specify where it can be found and provide the relevant link (e.g., in a public repository or as supplementary material). If the data is not publicly available, authors should explain how researchers can request access to the study's data. In cases where data sharing is not possible due to confidentiality, ethical restrictions, or other limitations, authors should clearly state the reason and provide a detailed explanation

Conflict of Interest: All authors must disclose any financial, personal, or institutional relationships that could influence or create a potential bias in their work. If no such conflicts exist, authors should explicitly state that there is no conflict of interest.

Generative Artificial Intelligence Statement: Authors must clearly state whether generative artificial intelligence (AI) tools were used at any stage of the research or manuscript preparation. If AI tools were employed, authors should specify the purpose of their use (e.g., data analysis assistance, language editing, literature search) and ensure that they take full responsibility for the accuracy and integrity of the content. Manuscripts that incorporate AI-generated text, images, or data must explicitly acknowledge the specific tools used (e.g., ChatGPT, Grammarly, Turnitin AI, etc.). If no AI tools were used, authors should include a statement confirming that the manuscript was entirely developed without AI-generated content.

References

The references should be written in Times New Roman font, 11 pt, single line spacing, 1.25 hanging, and 0-0 nk paragraph spacing in accordance with APA 6 references.

Appendix

The appendix should be given on a new page after the references. Every appendix should be ordered like appendix 1, appendix 2, and so on. For the text presented in this section, the font properties used in the main text are valid.

Tables and figures

Tables and figures in the text should be arranged considering the sample article template included in Forms and Templates section.

You can access the needed forms and sample article template prepared in line with the e-KJER writing rules in the Forms and Templates section.

Similarity rate control

e-Kafkas Journal of Educational Research applies internationally accepted principles on ethical issues, errors, or discontinuities. To prevent the discontinuities of publication of scientific papers submitted to the journal is among the critical responsibilities of the editorial board. Unethical behaviors that can be observed in scientific studies are not acceptable. It is the responsibility of the authors to declare that the contents of the scientific researches submitted to the journal are prepared from the original. In this regard, articles submitted to the journal are accepted after passing through the plagiarism program (Ithenticate). The similarity of the article sent to the journal should not be more than 15%. 

Measures against ethical violations

e-Kafkas Journal of Educational Research has adopted the principle of fulfilling its publishing responsibilities based on the COPE Code of Conduct for Journal Editors. In accordance with this principle, the editorial board, referees, and authors are obliged to apply the procedures in the journal application and evaluation processes within the scope of ethical committees.

The similarity rate of the candidate articles should be uploaded to the journal by the authors. In addition, the corresponding author has to declare that there is no plagiarism in the article by uploading the similarity rate statement file. Candidate articles are also reviewed by the journal secretariat for plagiarism with the Ithenticate program. Articles exceeding the similarity rate determined by the journal are returned to the authors.

For published articles, in case of any ethical complaint within 12 months, the editorial board examines the article. Documents related to the complaint should be sent to the editorial board of the journal via journal e-mail.
e-Kafkas Journal of Educational Research reports that any unethical work involving ethical violations such as abuse, the relationship of interest, or unlawful work of others is unacceptable and all legal rights are reserved.

Responsibilities of editors

Responsibilities for publication decisions, confidentiality, informing and disagreements that must be followed by the editor, editorial board, field editor are listed below. The editor, editorial board, and field editors of e-Kafkas Journal of Educational Research are obliged to comply with the following responsibilities.

Publication decisions: The editor is responsible for reviewing the field editors of the manuscripts submitted to the journal and making the decision to publish as a result of the referees' evaluation. The editors evaluate the decisions of the publications without considering the ethnic, race, gender, sexual orientation, religious belief, sect, nationality, political views or article suggestions. The decision of the editor is based on e-Kafkas Journal of Educational Research considering the journal's purpose, scope, originality, suitability for the validity, importance and timeliness of the study.

Confidentiality: The editorial board cannot share the scientific studies sent to e-Kafkas Journal of Educational Research with the other persons and institutions except for the authors, referees, members of the editorial board and the publisher.

Informing and disagreements: Unpublished content of the scientific study sent to e-Kafkas Journal of Educational Research cannot be used by the editorial board members and the persons who are responsible for the publication of the study without the permission of the author(s).

Responsibilities of referees

The responsibilities like time, confidentiality, impartiality standards, citations, information, and view discrepancies to be followed by the referees, are stated below. The referees accepting the evaluation process of the articles accepted by the editor/editorial board of e-Kafkas Journal of Educational Research are obliged to comply with the following responsibilities.

Time: In cases where the referees do not consider themselves having sufficient knowledge for the content of the manuscript submitted to be considered or they cannot assess the manuscript during the proposed evaluation period because of the time limitations, the referees should inform the editor and asked to be withdrawn from the evaluation process.

Confidentiality: The article proposal sent to the referees should be accepted as a confidential document and no information should be given to third parties about its content.

Impartially standards: The evaluations made by the referees should be made in accordance with the standards of impartiality. Personal criticism of the author is not appropriate. The opinions and suggestions made by the referees should be supported by arguments in accordance with scientific principles and should be clearly and comprehensibly expressed.

Citations: If the previously published scientific articles related to the proposed article sent to the referees are not included in the proposal article, it may be requested by the referees to include the related studies in the proposed article. References should be reviewed by the referees considering the citation rules of the journal and errors should be indicated. Referees evaluating the proposal article should inform the editor, editorial board, or field editors about the similarity or originality between the previously published studies and the proposal article.

Informing and view discrepancies: Unpublished articles proposed for review, data specific to the research content, and thoughts related to the proposal should not be used for personal benefit after the review by referees. In the proposal articles sent for reviewing, referees should not take into account any conflict of interest arising from the benefit or loss of the author, company, or institution.

Responsibilities of authors

Reporting standards that should be followed by the authors, that is, originality, multiple, dysfunctional or repetitive studies, citation, authorship, data access, and protection, responsibility for basic errors in published studies are listed below. The authors whose articles are accepted for publication by the editor/editorial board of e-Kafkas Journal Educational Research are responsible for obeying the following rules.

Reporting standards: Authors should emphasize the originality of their work as well as the purpose, importance of the study. The manuscripts submitted to the journal should comply with the journal reporting standards. (Please see the writing rules and reference guidelines in the Author's Guide Menu).

Originality: Authors should state that the whole of the article they propose for publication in the journal is original.

Multiple, dysfunctional, or repetitive studies: Authors should not submit the manuscripts which are submitted to e-Kafkas Journal of Education Research to other journals simultaneously. Furthermore, the articles published in e-Kafkas Journal of Educational Research are expected not to be published in any other journal in the future.

Citation: Authors should specify the sources of the data they use in their articles in accordance with the writing rules in the text and bibliography.

Authorship: The authors of the articles submitted to e-Kafkas Journal of Educational Research should contribute significantly to the formation of the article in the design, conceptualization, implementation, or interpretation of ideas. The authors assume full responsibility for the accuracy of the information of the names of all authors who contributed to the proposal article and their contact information.  The author information entered into the DergiPark system must be identical to the information on the Title Page. Additionally, authors should carefully determine the order of authors at the time of submission, as changes to the author order, addition or removal of authors, or modifications to author names will not be allowed during the manuscript evaluation and publication process. Authors cannot be removed from authorship unless there is a valid justification and written consent from all authors. A valid justification may include (but is not limited to) cases where an author has engaged in actions that violate legal regulations, constitute a criminal offense, or are unbecoming of a scientist, such as obtaining unjust benefits within the scope of the study, or exhibiting violent or threatening behavior toward participants.

Data access and protection: The data which are not analyzed for the proposal articles should be protected and kept in order to present them to the editor when necessary.

Basic errors in published articles: In case of an error or uncertainty about the proposal article submitted by the authors, they should report the issue to the editors. 

Note: The authors cannot retain the copyrights and full publishing rights without the permission of journal ediors' committee. This is guaranteed with the copyright aggreement form of journal, which authors have to accept that their copyrights are transferred to the journal. You can see the journal's copyright transfer aggreement form in Forms and Templates section. 

In line with the Open Access Policy, e-Kafkas Journal of Educational Research does not charge any fees for article submission, review, and publication processes. Our journal is totally free to use for all processes.