Our journal management adopts the COPE principles, WAME recommendations, and international top-tier publishing (Nature ve Elsevier) standards. The following policy text has been prepared on the basis of transparency, accountability, and confidentiality.

1. Policies and Rules for Authors

Authors are ultimately responsible for the integrity, accuracy, and originality of the work.

A. Authorship 
No Artificial Intelligence (AI) tool, such as ChatGPT, Claude, Gemini, or similar, can be listed as an author. Authorship requires taking legal and ethical responsibility (accountability) for the accuracy and integrity of the work. Since AI tools cannot assume this responsibility, they cannot meet the ICMJE and COPE authorship criteria.

B. Transparency and Declaration 
Authors must explicitly declare if they use AI technology in any of the processes of writing the article, data analysis, code generation, translation, language checking, or image generation. The following information must be provided in the "Materials and Methods" section of the article, or in the "Acknowledgements" section if there is no methods section, or in the 'Information' section included in our journal template:

• The name of the AI tool used (e.g., ChatGPT, Gemini).
• Its version (e.g., GPT-4, Gemini Pro).
• The manufacturing company (e.g., OpenAI, Google).
• The purpose for which it was used (e.g., literature review, language translation).

Note: A declaration is not required for standard spell-checking (e.g., Word spell check), but advanced generative AI-based editors must be declared.

C. Content Responsibility and Verification 
The accuracy of outputs generated by AI is entirely the responsibility of the author. AI tools may fabricate non-existent sources (hallucination), provide incorrect information, or produce biased content. Authors are obligated to verify every piece of information and reference in the AI output from original sources. The author is responsible for any potential plagiarism or error.

D. Visuals and Graphics 
The use of Generative AI tools in the creation or alteration of scientific figures, graphics, or photographs is prohibited. However, if the subject of the study is directly on image generation with AI (e.g., the design of AI algorithms), this is permitted provided it is explained in detail in the methods section.

2. Policies and Rules for Reviewers

The peer review process is based on the principle of absolute confidentiality.

A. Confidentiality and Data Security 
Reviewers must strictly not upload the full text, abstract, data, or visuals of the articles sent to them for review to ChatGPT or similar online AI platforms. Data uploaded to these platforms may be used for model training, and this constitutes a violation of the author's privacy, copyrights, and unpublished data. According to COPE principles, this action is an ethical violation.

B. Writing the Review Report 
Review reports must be based on human expertise and a critical perspective. Having all or part of the review report written by AI is prohibited. AI cannot judge scientific nuances and the original value of the study like an expert.

3. Policies and Rules for Editors

Editors are obligated to ensure the security of the publication process.

A. Decision-Making Process 
Editorial decisions (Accept, Reject, Revise) must never be left entirely to AI-based tools or algorithms. Editors may use decision support systems, but the final decision and responsibility always belong to the editor.

B. Use of AI Detection Tools 
Editors may scan submitted articles with various software (e.g., Turnitin) to understand whether they are AI-generated. However, since the probability of these tools yielding 'false positive' results is high:

• The article must not be rejected based solely on the detection tool result.
• In suspicious cases, the author should be contacted, human review should be conducted, and an author declaration should be obtained.

C. Reviewer Selection and Communication 
In accordance with the principle of confidentiality, editors must not upload unpublished article contents to publicly available AI tools for the purpose of finding reviewers or writing letters.

                                                                                                                         Example of Author Declarations

"During the preparation process of this article, [Tool Name / Version, e.g., ChatGPT-4] was used for the purpose of [Intended Use, e.g., improving language fluency and editing]. All content generated using this tool has been reviewed, verified, and appropriately edited by us. The authors bear full responsibility for the final version of the study."

"No artificial intelligence tool was used at any stage during the preparation process of this article."