Publication Policy
• IDRAK (Journal of Religious Studies) is an academic, refereed journal published twice a year (June and December).
• IDRAK (Journal of Religious Studies) is an independent, double-blind peer-reviewed, open access and online journal that aims to publish original research articles, book reviews, research notes, symposium reviews and translated articles in the field of religious studies (Social and Humanities/Religion).
• IDRAK (Journal of Religious Studies) is an academic journal in which spelling and plagiarism control, pre-evaluation, blind peer review, proofreading and editing processes are carried out.
• Articles submitted to IDRAK for publication are subjected to double blind peer review by at least two referees.
• The journal's publication policy is based on nationally and internationally recognized academic standards.
• Manuscripts can be submitted up to 2 months before the publication period of the journal. Articles whose refereeing or editorial review processes have not been completed by the publication date of the journal may be postponed to the next issue.
• All manuscripts are subjected to pre-evaluation and blind review processes. The pre-evaluation process takes approximately 15 days and the refereeing process takes approximately 30 days. These deadlines may be extended from time to time due to delays caused by the referees.
• Submitted manuscripts must not have been previously published or submitted to more than one journal simultaneously.
• No more than one work by the same author can be published in one issue. The same author cannot have two consecutive publications in one year.
• The number of authors publishing from within the institution in each issue cannot exceed 25% of the articles in that issue.
• Manuscripts will be checked for compliance with the ethics committee decisions required by TR Index. Within this framework:
For studies/articles that require data collection from individuals using scales, questionnaires, interviews and other data collection tools, it is mandatory to obtain approval from the Ethics Committee of the university to which the author is affiliated. The approval document should be attached to DergiPark as an additional file.
• In articles with multiple authors, the contribution rates of the authors must be reported.
• IDRAK (Journal of Religious Research) does not charge any fee to the authors for the article evaluation and publication process. Authors are also not paid any fee.

Declaration on Publication Ethics and Publication Abuse
It is important that all stakeholders (authors, reviewers and editors) involved in the publication process of the journal comply with the standards for ethical principles. Guidelines and policies published by the Committee on Publication Ethics (COPE) as open access should be taken into consideration.
All manuscripts submitted to IDRAK must be original, unpublished, and not under review in another journal. Each manuscript is subjected to double-blind review by one of the editors and at least two reviewers. Plagiarism, duplication, false authorship/ denied authorship, research/data fabrication, article slicing, sliced publication, copyright infringement and concealment of conflict of interest are considered unethical behaviors.
All articles that do not comply with accepted ethical standards are removed from publication. This includes articles that contain possible irregularities or improprieties detected after publication.

Ethical Principles
IDRAK (Journal of Religious Research) observes the highest standards in research ethics and adopts the international principles of research ethics defined below. It is the responsibility of the authors to ensure that the articles comply with ethical rules.
• The principles of integrity, quality and transparency must be ensured in the design, review of the design and conduct of the research.
• The research team and participants should be fully informed about the purpose of the research, its methods and possible anticipated uses, and the requirements and risks, if any, of participation in the research.
• Confidentiality of information provided by research participants and confidentiality of respondents must be ensured. The research should be designed to protect the autonomy and dignity of the participants.
• Research participants should take part in the research voluntarily and should not be under any coercion.
• Harm to participants should be avoided. The research should be planned in a way that does not put participants at risk.
• Research independence must be clear and explicit; any conflict of interest must be stated.
• In experimental studies, written informed consent must be obtained from participants who decide to participate in the research. Consent must be obtained from the legal guardian of children and those under guardianship or those with confirmed mental illness.
• If the study will be conducted in any institution or organization, approval must be obtained from this institution or organization that the study will be conducted.
• In studies with a human element, it should be stated in the “method” section that “informed consent” has been obtained from the participants and ethics committee approval has been obtained from the institution where the study is conducted.

Plagiarism
Articles uploaded to the journal are scanned for plagiarism using at least one of the following software programs: Intihal.net, Ithenticate, Turnitin. Authors are informed if plagiarism/self-plagiarism is detected. If necessary, editors may check the article for plagiarism at various stages of the evaluation or production process. High similarity rates can lead to rejection of an article before or even after acceptance. This rate should be less than 20%.
IDRAK (Journal of Religious Research) expects all stakeholders to carry the following ethical responsibilities within the scope of publication ethics.

1. Responsibilities of Authors
• All named authors must contribute significantly to the research. There should be no unfair authorship.
• Actions such as plagiarism and forgery, distortion, slicing, etc. that are contrary to scientific research and publication ethics should be avoided.
• All data in the article must be real and authentic.
• All authors must ensure that retractions and errors are corrected.
• The bibliography list must be complete.
• The same research should not be published in more than one place. Submitting the same article to more than one journal simultaneously with a request for publication is a behavior that does not comply with publication ethics.
• For research conducted with support, the persons, institutions or organizations providing support and their contributions to the research should be indicated.
• Authors should not take referee reports as personal criticism; they should correct them within academic boundaries and, if necessary, respond to criticism according to academic criteria.
• Authors should submit their manuscripts in accordance with the journal's editorial guidelines.

2. Responsibilities of Referees
• Must be impartial and unbiased in the evaluation process.
• If the subject of the work is outside their field of study, they should not accept the review offer.
• Referees are given 14 days for article evaluation. Referees who request additional time may be given additional time if the publication process of the journal is appropriate.
• Reviewed articles are not shared with others by the referees, and the referee cannot use the information and data in the work in his/her own work before the work is published.
• Reviewers should not be in conflict of interest with the research, authors and/or research funders.
• Referee evaluations must be objective. They should be based on the academic competence of the manuscript and should not criticize the personalities of the authors.
• Reviewers are expected to provide explanations to support their evaluations. In this respect, they are expected to fill out the necessary forms carefully.
• Even if the author's ideas contradict the referee's ideas, they should respect the author's ideas to be included in the literature.
• Reviewers should cite relevant published but not cited works.
• Reviewers should not put their personal approaches and value judgments ahead of academic style and scientific objectivity, and should be constructive in their criticism.

3. Responsibilities of the Editors (Editor-in-Chief and Deputy Editors)
• Articles submitted for publication are evaluated according to purely academic criteria. Authors' affiliation, gender, religion, religion, race, ethnicity, institutional affiliation, etc. are not used as criteria in the evaluation of articles.
• Editors have full responsibility and authority to accept or reject an article.
• Editors should not be in a conflict of interest regarding the articles they accept or reject.
• Only articles and translations that will contribute to the field should be accepted.
• Support the publication or withdrawal of corrections when errors are found.
• Keep the names of the referees confidential and prevent plagiarism/fake data, especially those that violate publication ethics.
• The contents of articles submitted to IDRAK but not published cannot be used by the editor and Editorial Board.

Correction, Retraction, Expression of Concern
Editors may consider publishing a correction if minor errors are identified in the published article that do not affect the findings, interpretations and conclusions. Editors should consider retracting the manuscript if there are major errors/violations that invalidate the findings and conclusions.
Editors should consider issuing a statement of concern if there is a possibility of research or publication misconduct by the authors; there is evidence that the findings are unreliable and that the authors' institutions have not investigated the incident; or the potential investigation seems unfair or inconclusive. COPE guidelines regarding correction, withdrawal or expression of concern are taken into account.

Ethical Violation Notifications
If readers notice a significant error or inaccuracy in an article published in IDRAK or have any complaints about the editorial content (plagiarism, duplicate articles, etc.), they can send an e-mail to idrak@giresun.edu.tr. These complaints will be carefully reviewed by the editorial team and feedback will be provided.