ETHICAL PRINCIPLES AND PUBLICATION POLICY
The Anatolian Journal of Area Studies (AJAS) adopts the principle of publishing in accordance with universal publication rules. In studies prepared within the framework of scientific rules, all components of the publication process—publisher, editors, authors, reviewers, and readers—must comply with ethical principles. AJAS is committed to international standards regarding research and publication ethics. In this context, it has adopted the International Ethical Publishing Principles published by the Committee on Publication Ethics (COPE), Directory of Open Access Journals (DOAJ), Open Access Scholarly Publishers Association (OASPA), World Association of Medical Editors (WAME), and the Council of Higher Education (YÖK). Authors submitting their work to the journal are obliged to meet COPE guidelines and the following ethical principles prepared within this framework.
PUBLICATION ETHICS PRINCIPLES
(1) Ethics committee approval must be obtained for research that requires data collection through quantitative or qualitative methods, such as experiments, surveys, scales, interviews, observations, and focus group studies that require an ethics committee decision. The date and number of the ethics committee decision must be stated in the candidate manuscript. The document showing the ethics committee decision must be uploaded to the system along with the manuscript submission. In addition, information regarding the acquisition of the informed consent form must be included in case reports.
(2) AJAS adopts a rigorous approach of investigation and transparency in cases of misconduct, performing article retractions or corrections when necessary. The primary measures applied by the journal to handle ethical issues and misconduct include: comprehensive evaluation, investigation of allegations (following established protocols based on COPE guidelines), confidentiality, impartiality, and open communication.
Article retraction is considered an extreme measure and is applied only when it is confirmed that a published article contains false information or is affected by unethical behavior such as plagiarism, data manipulation, or serious errors that compromise the reliability of the study. Following the practices recommended by COPE, the journal's retraction policy ensures the integrity of scientific publication and maintains the trust of readers and the academic community.
In the event that minor errors that do not affect the findings, interpretations, and conclusions are detected in the published article, a correction regarding the previously published content may be published without changing the original content.
(3) AJAS respects intellectual property and aims to protect and encourage the original work of its authors. Plagiarized papers run counter to the standards of quality, research, and innovation. Therefore, all authors submitting articles to the journal are expected to comply with ethical standards and avoid plagiarism in any form.
In accordance with publication principles, AJAS checks whether there is plagiarism in the studies submitted for evaluation. Articles that pass the preliminary control are scanned for plagiarism using iThenticate software. If plagiarism is detected, the authors are informed. Editors may, if necessary, subject the manuscript to plagiarism control at various stages of the evaluation or production process. High similarity rates may cause an article to be rejected before or even after acceptance.
If an author is suspected of plagiarism in a submitted or published manuscript, the Editor of the journal first examines the work. Subsequently, the work is reviewed by the Editorial Board. The Journal then contacts the author(s) to send their explanations within two weeks. If no response is received from the author within the specified period, the university with which the author is affiliated is contacted and requested to investigate the allegation. If the article was published in the journal prior to this process, the PDF copy of the article is removed from the website and all links to the article are disabled. The phrase "Plagiarized Article" is added to the title of the published article. The author's account in the journal is disabled.
(4) In case of encountering any behavior that does not comply with the ethical principles regarding editors, reviewers, and authors in AJAS, or an unethical situation regarding a manuscript in the evaluation process, early view, or published state, reporting it via email to ajas@asbu.edu.tr will increase our publication quality.
RESEARCH ETHICS PRINCIPLES
In articles submitted to AJAS, adherence to the research ethics rules specified below is required in accordance with international academic standards:
(1) Full compliance with the principles of scientific integrity, high quality, and transparency must be ensured in the processes of designing the research, reviewing the methodological design, and conducting it.
(2) Researchers must adhere to the principles of scientific honesty. Scientific misconduct activities such as data fabrication, plagiarism, and distortion/falsification must be strictly avoided. Research results, methods, and implementation procedures must be reported faithfully and accurately; misleading statements must not be made to colleagues, funding/sponsor institutions, and the public.
(3) Patent, copyright, and other intellectual property rights must be meticulously respected. Unauthorized use of data, methods, and results must be prevented. All sources and individuals contributing to the research must be properly referenced. Usage rights and official permissions required for archival sources, visual materials, maps, and similar documents subject to copyright or special permission must be obtained before the study is uploaded to the system.
(4) If the research is carried out within any official or private institution/organization or within the scope of fieldwork, the necessary official implementation and application site permissions must be obtained from the relevant institutions before starting the study.
(5) The research team and the participants involved in the study must be fully and clearly informed about the purpose of the research, its methodology, the anticipated possible uses of the findings, the responsibilities required by participation, and potential risks, if any. (Note: Corrected sequence formatting from original text)
(6) Participation in the research must be entirely on a voluntary basis. No financial, moral, or hierarchical coercion, pressure, or guidance should be exerted on the participants.
(7) In field studies and experimental processes, physical, psychological, or social harm to participants must be strictly avoided. The research must be planned and conducted in a way that does not put participants at any risk or keeps these risks to a minimum.
(8) The confidentiality of data and identifying information provided by participants must be fully guaranteed. The research design must be structured in a way that protects the autonomy, personal rights, and human dignity of the participants.
(9) In studies involving human elements and experimental research, a written "Informed Consent Form" must be obtained from the participants. When children, individuals under guardianship, or legally restricted individuals are involved, the written official consent of their legal guardians or parents is mandatory.
(10) Complete transparency must be maintained regarding the financial, academic, or personal independence of the research. If there is any direct or indirect conflict of interest that may influence the research process, results, or publication, this situation must be clearly declared in the manuscript text.
RESPONSIBILITIES OF AUTHORS
Authors submitting work to AJAS are deemed to have accepted the following responsibilities within the framework of academic and ethical standards:
(1) The scientific content, methodological accuracy, and compliance with ethical rules of the submitted articles are entirely the responsibility of the authors.
(2) Studies submitted to the journal must be original, must not have been published previously in any other medium (printed or digital), and must not be simultaneously in the evaluation process of another journal for publication.
(3) The author must guarantee that the submitted work is an original piece that does not violate the intellectual property rights of any other person or institution. No elements constituting irregular citation or plagiarism from other published works, including the author's own previous work, should be included.
(4) All sources utilized in writing the manuscript must be fully referenced in accordance with the journal's formatting guidelines. Observing national and international copyright laws and agreements, the necessary legal permissions for the use of copyrighted materials (visuals, maps, scales, etc.) must be obtained and documented by the author.
(5) Artificial intelligence tools (large language models, AI-driven text and data generators) cannot be accepted as an author of an article and cannot be included in the author list. If AI tools were utilized in the research and writing processes, the name, version, and exact purpose of use of these tools must be transparently declared in the methodology section of the article.
(6) It must be ensured that all persons whose names appear as authors in the study have made an intellectual and active academic contribution to the design, execution, or writing of the research. It is strictly forbidden to add people who do not have a justified academic contribution to the research as authors, or to omit the names of those who have contributed.
(7) In project-based studies, authors must clearly disclose all sources of financial support and funding agency information (including the project number).
(8) In research requiring ethics committee approval (fieldwork involving human or animal elements, surveys, interviews, or observations, etc.), data regarding the relevant permission (committee name, approval date, and number/decision number) must be clearly stated in the article.
(9) If authors detect a scientific or technical error/inaccuracy regarding their work during the evaluation, acceptance, or publication stage, they are obliged to immediately notify the journal editor. In this case, the author must play an active role in the process of retracting, correcting, or publishing a correction note for the article in cooperation with the editor.
RESPONSIBILITIES OF EDITORS
The AJAS Editorial Board and the Editor-in-Chief are obliged to protect the principles of international scientific publishing ethics in all publication processes of the journal and assume the following responsibilities:
(1) Editors have full authority and responsibility to accept or reject a submitted manuscript. Evaluation processes and publication decisions are made solely based on the scientific quality, originality, validity, and suitability of the manuscript to the scope of the journal. Editors act independently of commercial concerns, institutional relations, and personal interests in decision-making processes; they undertake not to have a direct or indirect conflict of interest with the authors of the articles they evaluate.
(2) Editors evaluate all submitted works entirely within the framework of impartiality and equality of opportunity, independent of the authors' race, ethnicity, gender, sexual orientation, nationality, religious belief, academic title, or political philosophy.
(3) In order to maintain the scientific evaluation quality at the highest level, editors ensure that the submitted works pass through a fair, impartial, and timely "double-blind peer review" process. Keeping reviewer and author identities mutually confidential throughout the process is under the guarantee of the Editorial Board.
(4) All information regarding the articles under evaluation (author identities, research content, reviewer reports, and editorial correspondence) is kept strictly confidential. These data cannot be shared with third parties or institutions (except for authors, reviewers, and relevant editorial board members) unless required by a legal obligation or the process itself.
(5) Editors seriously address any allegations and suspicions of ethical violations such as plagiarism, data fabrication, falsification/distortion, duplicate publication, unfair/ghost authorship, or authorship disputes. In such cases, current flowcharts and guidelines of the Committee on Publication Ethics (COPE) are followed. Necessary investigations are meticulously conducted, and official explanations and evidence are requested from the relevant parties (author, institution, reviewer). If the violation is proven, appropriate sanctions such as rejection of the article, retraction from publication, publication of a correction note, or presentation of a expression of concern are applied.
(6) Editors are responsible for auditing the legitimacy, transparency of the purpose of use, and accuracy of the resulting academic findings in studies where the use of artificial intelligence (AI) and generative technologies is declared or suspected. When an unethical or non-transparent use of AI is detected, the study is excluded from evaluation.
(7) The Editor-in-Chief is responsible for the overall quality, academic nature of all content published in AJAS, and the international reputation of the journal.
RESPONSIBILITIES OF REVIEWERS
Reviewers taking part in the AJAS evaluation process undertake to comply with the following ethical principles in order to protect academic impartiality and scientific quality:
(1) Reviewers meticulously examine the works assigned to them in terms of methodology, content, originality, contribution to the literature, and compliance with journal publication policies. They contribute to the decision-making process by offering constructive criticism and suggestions aimed at improving the scientific quality of the study.
(2) Evaluations are conducted solely based on the scientific content of the study, completely independent of the authors' ethnicity, gender, sexual orientation, nationality, religious belief, academic title, or political philosophies. When reviewers detect a direct/indirect conflict of interest, competition, or collaboration between themselves and the research topic, authors, or funding institutions, they are obliged to decline the reviewer duty and immediately notify the editor.
(3) Reviewers cannot share any documents, data, or reviewer reports belonging to the process with third parties; they cannot communicate directly with the authors without the explicit permission and knowledge of the editor.
(4) Reviewer reports must be written in an objective, constructive, and academically courteous language. Insulting, disparaging, personalized, or accusatory expressions must be strictly avoided.
(5) Instead of superficial, vague, and generalized expressions in evaluations, especially in negative (rejection/revision) decisions, the missing, defective, or erroneous points forming the basis of the decision must be clearly revealed with concrete and scientific justifications.
(6) Reviewers conduct reviews by considering the transparency, legitimacy, and reliability of the resulting conclusions in cases where the use of artificial intelligence (AI) is declared in the text they evaluate or where traces of such tools are evident.
ARTIFICIAL INTELLIGENCE POLICY
As its artificial intelligence policy, AJAS adopts the principles of the "Ethical Guideline on the Use of Generative Artificial Intelligence in Scientific Research and Publication Activities in Higher Education Institutions" prepared by the Council of Higher Education (YÖK). Accordingly, maintaining scientific integrity and trust in science is essential in all studies submitted to our journal. Authors, editors, and reviewers are expected to utilize Generative Artificial Intelligence (GenAI) technologies within the framework of transparency, honesty, care, justice and respect, confidentiality, and accountability principles defined in the guideline.
(1) Under no circumstances should GenAI tools be listed as an author or co-author of a scientific article. Authors are entirely responsible for the content, accuracy, and originality of the submitted work. The use of AI tools does not exempt authors from their scientific, ethical, and intellectual responsibilities. The journal strictly prohibits the use of AI to create fake authorship or falsify identity.
(2) It is mandatory to clearly declare within the article (in the methodology section) which functions of GAI were used, at which stages of the research, and to what extent, thereby taking precautions against potential hallucinations, bias, and factual errors.
(3) Developing the core arguments, theoretical contributions, and main theses of the article is entirely the responsibility of the authors. GenAI can only be used as a complementary aid in the writing process; it cannot be used to generate, report, or interpret research findings.
(4) The use of AI tools to generate fabricated, unverifiable, or non-existent references is strictly prohibited. All cited sources must be verifiable, correctly referenced, and approved by the authors in accordance with scientific standards.
(5) GAI can be used to visualize theoretical ideas, conceptual frameworks, or processes. Visuals generated in this manner must faithfully represent the author's own understanding and explanations.
(6) Visuals generated by artificial intelligence can be used to create illustrative or symbolic representations that explain and simplify complex ideas. Such visuals should support the reader's understanding and must not distort or misrepresent the concepts explained.
(7) In cases of ambiguity or concern regarding the use of artificial intelligence, editors should establish transparent communication with authors and request supporting evidence when appropriate. Matters requiring further investigation should be forwarded to the journal management for official review.
(8) Editors are expected to carefully examine authors' declarations regarding the use of artificial intelligence tools and request clarification or additional information when necessary. It is the editors' responsibility to evaluate whether the declared use of artificial intelligence complies with the established policies of the journal.
(9) Reviewers are encouraged to detect potentially undisclosed use of artificial intelligence in the articles they evaluate and to inform editors if they suspect such situations. However, such evaluations must be based on clear and objective evaluation standards.
(10) Under no circumstances should reviewers upload unpublished articles or related documents submitted for peer review into generative artificial intelligence platforms. Doing so may compromise confidentiality and potentially violate intellectual property rights. Evaluation processes must be conducted according to the reviewer's own expertise and knowledge level.
(11) Failure to disclose the use of artificial intelligence tools or using them in violation of the specified guidelines may result in the rejection of the article during the review process. If a policy violation is detected after publication, corrective actions may include retraction of the article or publication of an official correction. Repeated or severe violation of this policy may lead to the rejection of the authors' future submissions to the journal.