Art 7 Art and Communication Journal is a peer-reviewed scientific journal that prioritises compliance with scientific ethics in the processes of knowledge production, research, and data collection, ensuring impartial and reputable publication. In this context, the ethical policies applicable to all stakeholders, including authors, referees, and editors, who bear responsibility for the publication, have been prepared based on the principles of the Committee on Publication Ethics (COPE) and the Higher Education Institutions Scientific Research and Publication Ethics Guidelines.
Actions Contrary to Scientific Research and Publication Ethics
• Failing to acknowledge the individuals, institutions, or organisations that provided support for research conducted with their assistance, or their contributions, in publications resulting from such research.
• Using theses or studies that have not yet been submitted or defended and accepted as a source without the permission of the owner.
• Failing to comply with ethical rules in research conducted on humans and animals, failing to respect patient rights in publications.
• Acting contrary to the provisions of relevant legislation in biomedical research involving humans and other clinical research,
• Sharing information contained in a work assigned for review with others prior to publication without the express permission of the author,
• Using resources, premises, facilities, and equipment provided or allocated for scientific research for purposes other than those intended,
• Making unfounded, inappropriate, and deliberate allegations of ethical violations,
• Publishing data obtained without the explicit consent of participants in surveys and attitude studies conducted as part of scientific work, or without the additional permission of the institution if the research is to be conducted at an institution,
• Harming animal health and ecological balance in research and experiments,
• Failing to obtain the necessary written permissions from the competent authorities before commencing research and experiments,
• Conducting research and experiments in violation of the relevant provisions of legislation or international agreements to which Turkey is a party.
• Failure by researchers and officials to comply with the obligation to inform and warn relevant parties about potentially harmful practices related to scientific research,
• Failure to use data and information obtained from other persons and institutions in scientific studies to the extent and in the manner permitted, failure to respect the confidentiality of this information and failure to ensure its protection,
• In the evaluation and publication processes of articles submitted for publication, editors and reviewers are required to act in accordance with the principles of impartiality, confidentiality, objectivity, and transparency in academic publishing. In these processes, any potential conflicts of interest that may arise between authors, reviewers, or editors must be clearly stated.

Ethics Committee Approval
Our journal requires that all studies in scientific fields requiring ethics committee approval have obtained the relevant ethics committee decision. In this context, information regarding ethics committee approval (committee name, date, and decision number) must be clearly stated in the article text.
In line with the regulations implemented by Ulakbim TR Index since 2020, studies without ethics committee approval are not considered for publication in our journal.

Studies Requiring Ethics Committee Approval
Studies requiring ethics committee approval in our journal include the following:
• All research conducted using qualitative or quantitative approaches involving data collection from participants through methods such as surveys, interviews, focus group studies, observation, and discussion techniques,
• Retrospective studies within the framework of the Personal Data Protection Law.
For such studies to be considered for evaluation, the relevant ethical committee approvals must have been obtained and clearly stated in the article text.

Plagiarism Checking
Articles submitted to our journal for publication are scanned using iThenticate, Turnitin or intihal.net software to confirm that they have not been previously published and do not contain plagiarism. The acceptable similarity rate for our journal is 20%. If plagiarism is detected in an article submitted to or published in our journal, our journal acts in accordance with COPE principles.

Use of Artificial Intelligence
The use of artificial intelligence in studies submitted to our journal is acceptable in processes that do not affect the originality of the article, such as literature review or language control. However, the use of artificial intelligence must be carried out within the framework of ethical rules and must not be used for unethical purposes such as fabricating data or manipulation.
For studies involving the use of artificial intelligence, it is mandatory to inform our journal of this situation during the article submission stage. All responsibility regarding the use of artificial intelligence lies with the authors themselves.

Privacy Statement
All personal data submitted to our journal is protected. Data belonging to authors, referees, and other individuals is not shared with third parties or institutions.

Correction, Retraction, Expression of Concern
Editors may consider publishing a correction if minor errors are found in a published article that do not affect the findings, interpretations, or conclusions. Editors should consider retracting an article when major errors/violations invalidate the findings and conclusions. COPE guidelines are taken into account regarding corrections, retractions, or expressions of concern.

Protection of Intellectual Property Rights
Our journal is responsible for protecting the intellectual property rights of all published articles and defending the rights of the journal and the author(s) in the event of possible infringements.

Conflicts of Interest
Our journal ensures that the publication process is completed independently and impartially, taking into account conflicts of interest between authors, reviewers, and other editors.

Complaints and Appeals to Our Journal
You may email any complaints or appeals regarding content, procedures, or policies under the responsibility of our journal or its editorial board members to art7@beu.edu.tr. Complaints and appeals submitted to our journal are carefully reviewed and evaluated in accordance with COPE principles.

RESPONSIBILITIES OF STAKEHOLDERS

Responsibilities of Publishers
• To act in accordance with the principles of impartiality, transparency, and ethics at all stages of the publication process.
• Not to interfere with the independent decision-making processes of editors.
• To clearly present the journal's publication policy, open access conditions, copyright, and ethical principles on its website.
• Conduct necessary investigations into publication ethics violations (plagiarism, etc.) and proceed according to COPE guidelines.
• Ensure confidentiality in the peer review process.
• Ensure the digital archiving and long-term accessibility of articles.

Responsibilities of Editors
• Make publication decisions based on scientific merit, originality, and peer reviewer opinions.
• Keep the identities of reviewers and authors confidential from each other.
• Refer articles to at least two independent reviewers with subject expertise.
• Refrain from participating in the evaluation of articles where the editor or editorial board has a conflict of interest.
• Take immediate action in cases of corrections, retractions, or ethical violations.
• Evaluate authors' appeals through a fair process.
• To be responsible for implementing and updating the journal's ethical policies.
• To conduct the timing, communication, and decision-making processes transparently during the publication process.

Authors' Responsibilities
• To declare that the submitted work is original, scientific, and compliant with ethical principles.
• To commit that the article has not been previously published and is not simultaneously submitted to another journal.
• Ensure that all authors have made a meaningful contribution to the article and have approved it.
• Cite all sources used appropriately.
• Clearly state any funding, conflicts of interest, or support information.
• Respond to referee or editor feedback on a scientific basis.
• Verify or provide access to data when required.
• Immediately notify the editor of any errors discovered after publication.

Responsibilities of Reviewers
• Strictly adhere to the principle of confidentiality during the review process.
• Complete the review objectively, constructively, and in a timely manner.
• Inform the editor if there is a personal or institutional conflict of interest.
• Evaluate the scientific content, methodological accuracy, and citation appropriateness.
• Inform the editor when ethical violations (plagiarism, etc.) are detected in the article.
• Focus on scientific quality without being influenced by factors such as language, country, or author identity.

PUBLICATION POLICIES

Article Evaluation Process
All articles submitted to our journal are evaluated scientifically using a double-blind peer review method. During this process, the author does not know which reviewer has been assigned to their work, and similarly, the reviewer does not know who wrote the article.

Initial Review
Manuscripts submitted to our journal are expected to have a maximum similarity rate of 20% as determined by Turnitin, iThenticate, or intihal.net. Manuscripts with a similarity rate exceeding the specified threshold will be returned to the author. Submitted manuscripts will be forwarded to the subject editors after undergoing the necessary checks in similarity detection software. Manuscripts will be evaluated according to the journal's template and writing rules. After the necessary revisions are made, they will be sent to the editor to initiate the peer review process. However, manuscripts that do not comply with the journal's purpose and scope, are weak in terms of language and expression in both Turkish and English, contain critical scientific errors, lack originality, or do not meet publication policies will be rejected before this stage. The author(s) of the rejected work will be sent an information letter explaining the reasons for rejection within one month of the submission date at the latest.

Peer Review Stage
Studies that have completed the initial evaluation stage are sent to two (2) reviewers in the field. If one reviewer accepts and the other requests major or minor revisions, the study is returned to the author and requested to make the necessary changes within a specified period. The revised study, which the reviewer wishes to see again, is resubmitted to the reviewer by the field editor. The reviewer fills out the evaluation form again at this stage. If the reviewer's decision is positive, the article qualifies for publication in the journal. If one of the reviewers' reports is positive and the other is negative, the work is sent to a third reviewer. The decision on whether to publish the work is made after the third reviewer's report. Our reviewer database is constantly updated, and reviewers are selected with care to ensure that there is no relationship between them and the author, taking into account their areas of expertise.
The points we expect our referees to consider when evaluating articles are as follows: originality and contribution to the literature, potential interest to a wide range of social scientists and/or practitioners, potential interest to a wide readership, comprehensive evaluation of the existing literature, adequacy of methodology, analysis and interpretation, and a clear, concise and fluent style of expression.

Reviewers are expected to communicate their evaluation of the work and their decision regarding its publication. Reviewers have four options for their decision:
ACCEPT: Publication of the work as submitted.
MINOR REVISION: Publication of the work after necessary revisions.
MAJOR REVISION: Publication of the work after the necessary revisions have been rechecked by the referee.
REJECTED: Publication of the work is not appropriate based on the evaluations made.

Final Evaluation
The final decision for all articles that have reached the publication stage with positive reviews from at least two referees is made by the Chief Editor. The editor's decision is communicated to the author along with the referees' recommendations.

Archiving, Open Access and Copyright Policy
Works published in our journal are digitally archived in LOCKSS. Our journal also allows authors to archive versions of their work on their own websites, institutional websites and other repositories. As the journal is open access, there is no embargo period.

Authors retain the copyright (including commercial rights) of their work published in our journal, and their work is licensed under Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial 4.0 International (CC BY-NC 4.0). All works published in our journal are published as open access under the CC BY-NC 4.0 licence. Articles published in our journal can be accessed free of charge at https://dergipark.org.tr/en/pub/art7/archive.

Licence Scope
As long as you comply with the licence terms, the licence holder cannot revoke these freedoms (the specified rights).
You are free to:
1) Share: Copy and redistribute the work in any medium or format.
2) Adapt: Remix, transform, and build upon the existing work.
Under the following conditions:
3) Attribution: You must give appropriate credit, provide a link to the licence, and indicate if changes were made. You may do so in any reasonable manner, but not in any way that suggests the licensor endorses you or your use.
4) Non-Commercial: You may not use this material for commercial purposes.
There are no additional restrictions: You may not apply legal conditions or technological measures that would legally restrict the use of the permissions granted by the licence.

Special Issue Publication Policy
Upon the request of the Editorial Board, a special issue may be published once a year. Articles submitted for inclusion in the special issue are first subject to an editorial pre-review. They are then examined for compliance with the journal's writing rules and similarity scanning is performed to prevent plagiarism. After these stages, they undergo a peer review process using a double-blind model.

Fee Policy
Article publication and the execution of article processes in the journal are free of charge. No processing fee or submission fee is charged under any name for articles submitted to the journal or accepted for publication.

Advertising and Sponsorship Policy
Advertising and sponsorship are not accepted in our journal. All expenses of our journal are covered by the Publisher.