The content of the studies sent to the Harran University Journal of Social Sciences for publication must be compatible with the purpose and scope of the journal. The journal prioritizes publishing articles that qualify as “original research”. However, descriptive studies, systematic literature analyses, meta-analyses and research notes are also accepted for evaluation, provided that they are original.

Ethical Principles

Studies to be sent to the journal must not have been previously published in another journal or included in the publication program and must not have entered the evaluation phase for publication. In order for studies that meet this condition to be evaluated, the similarity screening report (iThenticate or Turnitin) must be uploaded to the Degi system together with the study by the responsible author before the evaluation. The similarity report of the studies must not exceed 20%, excluding the references.

The journal adopts the standards determined by the Committee on Publication Ethics (COPE) in the application of publication ethics. In this context, it refers to the publication ethics flow charts developed by COPE in cases of misuse or violation of publication ethics.

The Journal, due to the blind referee process it has adopted, guarantees the anonymity of authors and referees during the peer review process of the studies evaluated.

The confidentiality of information about the author(s) of the studies is the responsibility of the Journal. However, this information may be shared in a possible investigation in order to investigate possible misconduct. The Journal defines its principles regarding possible misconduct cases within the framework of the guidelines established by COPE and shares them with its stakeholders on its website.

Text recycling, which is the use of sections of a study in multiple publications belonging to the author(s) without being specified, is not acceptable for the Journal. In such cases, the Journal applies the relevant guidelines determined by COPE.

The Journal defends and observes freedom of expression under all circumstances. In addition, the Journal considers any racist, sexist, discriminatory content as hate speech and uses the right to reject studies with such content without taking them into the evaluation process.

In the event of a conflict of interest regarding a study, the Journal clearly sides with intellectual and ethical standards; defines the ethical principles that authors, referees, editors and field editors are obliged to regarding the subject. In the event of a conflict of interest, the Journal suspends the evaluation process of the study until the uncertainty is resolved. In this context, the Journal has the authority to request Ethics Committee Permission, Interviewer Consent Forms and documents that must be submitted from the applicant author(s).

The Journal acts responsibly and sensitively in publishing content that is in the nature of correction, explanation, apology and denial.

The Journal's editor-in-chief and field editors are obliged to follow legal advice in the event that repetitions in a study, i.e. conflicts with another publication, violate intellectual property rights.

Copyright Regulation and Conflict of Interest Principle

Author(s) own the copyright on their own work(s) and the first publication of their work belongs to the Journal. According to the Creative Commons Attribution principles, they allow their work to be shared by citing the author and the Journal as sources.

The journal believes that potential conflicts of interest between its stakeholders will harm scientific publication ethics. The journal expects all stakeholders to act responsibly and in accordance with their obligations in order to detect and prevent conflicts of interest. In this sense, the responsible author must also upload the Copyright Transfer Form to the system with a signature while uploading his/her work to the journal system.

General Principles

Studies prepared in accordance with the journal's writing rules and submitted are first pre-evaluated by the journal secretariat and directed to the journal's Editor-in-Chief and/or field editor. They are evaluated by the editor-in-chief and/or field editor in terms of their originality, methodology, importance of the subject addressed in the study and suitability for the scope of the journal. The editor-in-chief and field editors evaluate the articles independently of the authors' ethnic origin, gender, sexual orientation, nationality, religious belief and political philosophy. Studies that are not deemed appropriate in terms of content or quality are not sent to referees for evaluation and are rejected.

If the submitted work complies with the formal principles, the editor-in-chief and/or field editor submits the work to at least two referees from Turkey and/or abroad for evaluation. If deemed necessary, the referees may request some changes from the author(s) and approve the publication of the work in the Journal only after these changes are made by the author(s).

Open Access Policy

All content of the journal is open access and licensed as Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial 4.0 International (CC BY-NC 4.0) (Licensing is ongoing). In other words, all content of the journal is offered online and free of charge. Readers can read, download, copy, search and provide links to the full text of journal articles without permission from the publisher or author(s), except for commercial purposes.

Processing Fee

All expenses of the journal are covered by Harran University. No submission fee or processing fee is charged for studies sent for evaluation in the journal. In addition, no publication fee is charged for a study accepted for publication in the journal.

Referee Process

The journal has adopted a double-blind referee evaluation process. In addition, during this process, the author and referee are unaware of each other's identities.

If the submitted work complies with the formal principles, the editor-in-chief and/or field editor submits the incoming manuscript to at least two referees from Turkey and/or abroad for evaluation.

The publication decision is made by the editor-in-chief after the arrangements made by the author(s) in line with the requests of the referees and the referee process.

The referees may recommend accepting the work as it is, requesting minor or major corrections, or rejecting it. In case of disagreement between the referees, the work may be referred to other referees.

The referees' evaluations must be objective. During the referee process, the referees are expected to make their evaluations by taking the following into consideration.

• Is the work suitable for the specified article type?

• Does the work have original value in terms of its contribution to science?

• Is the work suitable for publication in an academic journal in terms of subject and content?

• Is there content-title compatibility in the work?

• What is the level of reflection of the abstract of the work?

• Is there compatibility between Turkish and English abstracts?

• What is the level of scientific originality of the article?
• Is the subject, purpose and importance of the study emphasized in the introduction?

• What is the appropriateness of the methods used in the study?
• Are the organization and presentation of the study sufficient?
• Is the study sufficient in terms of language and expression?
• What is the appropriateness and necessity level of the figures, pictures and tables?
• Are the sources sufficient, necessary and up-to-date?

Referees should ensure that all information regarding the submitted studies remains confidential until the study is published and if they notice any copyright infringement or plagiarism on the author's part, they should report it to the editor. If the referee does not feel qualified about the subject of the study or does not seem able to provide timely feedback, they should inform the editor of this situation and ask him/her not to be involved in the refereeing process.

During the evaluation process, the editor clearly states to the referees that the studies submitted for review are the private property of the authors and that this is a privileged communication. Referees and editorial board members cannot discuss the articles with other people. Care should be taken to keep the identity of the referees confidential.