1. Publication Ethics and COPE Compliance
The International Journal of Engineering Approaches (IJEA) undertakes to conduct all publication processes in accordance with international ethical standards, based on the reliability, transparency and sustainability of scientific research. The journal bases its editorial policies and practices on the principles of the Committee on Publication Ethics (COPE), aiming to protect academic integrity, impartiality, and scientific integrity at the highest level.

This ethical policy is binding for authors, reviewers, and editors submitting articles to our journal and applies to all stages of the publication process.

2. Ethical Responsibilities of Editors
- Editors are primarily responsible for the academic quality of the journal and the sound functioning of the publication process.
- They evaluate all submitted articles solely on the basis of scientific integrity, originality, methodological soundness, and contribution to the field.
- They make decisions without any discrimination based on author, institution, gender, nationality, political views, or personal relationships.
- They ensure that the double-blind peer review process is conducted impartially and confidentially.
- When there is suspicion of an ethical violation, they fully implement COPE flowcharts; where necessary, they may extend the investigation to independent experts.
- Documents the entire decision-making process to ensure transparency and accountability.
- Monitors the scientific integrity of all published articles; publishes corrections, retractions, or editor's notes when necessary.
- Does not permit any institutional or personal interests to influence the evaluation of articles beyond academic quality.

3. Ethical Responsibilities of Reviewers
IJEA reviewers play a critical role in ensuring the integrity of the scientific process. While the review process is entirely voluntary, IJEA highly values the contribution of reviewers. What is expected of reviewers:
- To conduct the review in complete confidentiality, not to share the content of the article with others, and not to use it in personal work.
- Declining the assignment by informing the editor if the work is outside their area of expertise or if there is a conflict of interest.
- Preparing referee reports in an objective, scientific, evidence-based, and constructive manner.
- Clearly reporting any methodological weaknesses, unethical situations, data inconsistencies, and potential violations identified in the article.
- Complete the review process on time and inform the editor in case of delays.

4. Ethical Responsibilities of Authors
All authors submitting articles to IJEA are deemed to have accepted the following obligations:
- Originality and Scientific Contribution: The article must be original, unpublished elsewhere, and not under review.
- Accuracy of Data and Findings: Data must be accurate, reliable, and verifiable when necessary.
- Author Contribution Statement: All authors listed must have made a meaningful contribution to the work; ‘honorary authorship’ is not accepted.
- Citation: All information and data must be cited according to appropriate scientific citation rules.
- Ethics Committee Approval: Ethics committee approval is mandatory for studies involving human or animal experiments.
- Transparency of the Publication Process: Authors fulfil editorial requests regarding the article process in a timely and accurate manner.

5. Declaration of Conflict of Interest
- IJEA requires the clear disclosure of any potential conflicts of interest.
- Financial support, corporate relationships, consultancy activities, commercial connections or personal relationships that could influence the evaluation process must be declared.
- Editors and reviewers are also obliged to disclose potential conflicts of interest to the journal before accepting an assignment.

6. Funding, Support and Acknowledgements
- All funding sources, project numbers, institutional support or personal contributions used in the study must be clearly stated.
- Individuals who have contributed but do not meet the authorship criteria may be included in the acknowledgements section.

7. Open Data and Research Data Sharing
IJEA supports open science and data transparency. In this context, authors:
- Are encouraged to share their data sets, analysis codes, and materials used on an appropriate open access platform.
- Must anonymise data requiring confidentiality.
- If data sharing is not possible, applicable reasons must be explained in the article.

8. Publication Ethics Violations and Intervention Process
The following situations are considered serious ethical violations:
- Plagiarism (direct quotation or grossly careless citation)
- Fabrication, falsification, or manipulation of data
- Duplicate or redundant publication
- Adding ghost authors or misrepresenting author contributions
- Fake peer review
- Digital manipulation of submitted figures, tables, or graphs
- Copyright infringement
In the event of any suspected violation, the editorial board:
- Conducts a preliminary assessment,
- Requests clarification from the authors if necessary,
- Applies COPE procedures,
- Decides on correction, rejection, or retraction based on the findings.
- The entire process is conducted transparently and systematically.

9. Plagiarism and Similarity Criteria
- All articles submitted for publication in the IJEA journal are scanned using the intihal.net software provided by Dergipark and, where necessary, the iThenticate: Plagiarism Detection Software package before being submitted to the editor for approval.
- The similarity report result should be no more than 25%, excluding references.
- If the similarity ratio is higher, the article is rejected without being considered for evaluation.
- If allegations or suspicions of research misconduct such as plagiarism, citation manipulation, data fabrication, or falsification are detected, action is taken in accordance with COPE guidelines (for submitted manuscript and published article).
- All instances of plagiarism and ethical violations detected at any stage, including self-plagiarism, will result in the article being removed from the review process and rejected.

10. Artificial Intelligence (AI) Usage Policy
IJEA accepts that artificial intelligence tools can be used as auxiliary tools in scientific processes, but:
- AI models cannot be listed as authors.
- If used for purposes such as text generation, summarisation, or analysis suggestions, this must be clearly stated in the methods or acknowledgements section.
- Authors are fully responsible for the accuracy of content, data, or images generated by AI.
- The use of AI in the peer review and editorial processes is prohibited.
- The journal is not responsible for any errors or misdirection that may arise from AI.

11. Open Access Policy
IJEA publishes all articles under a full open access model. Articles are:
- Freely accessible,
- Readable without additional fees,
- Reusable under the CC BY-NC 4.0 licence.

12. Peer Review Process
- The process applied in the journal is entirely based on double-blind peer review.
- Each article is sent to at least two independent reviewers.
- Reviewer reports are evaluated comprehensively by the editor or field editors.
- The editor may appoint a third reviewer if there is a conflict between the reviewers' opinions.
- The peer review system is one of the fundamental elements for ensuring the sustainability of publication quality.

13. Ethics Committee Approval
For studies involving human participants, animal experiments, research containing personal data, and studies requiring institutional permission, approval from the relevant ethics committee is mandatory. The approval document must be clearly stated in the article, including:
- The full name of the committee,
- The approval number,
- The approval date.
For studies not requiring ethics committee approval, this situation must be explained with scientific justification.

14. Retraction, Correction, and Editor's Note Policy
IJEA applies the following practices when appropriate for ethical and scientific accuracy:
- Retraction: Applied when findings are unreliable, ethical violations are detected, or duplicate publications occur. Retraction procedures are conducted transparently in accordance with COPE guidelines.
- Correction / Erratum: Published to rectify minor errors made by the author or the journal.
- Editor's Note / Statement of Concern: Used when an ethical investigation is ongoing.
- Retracted articles are marked in the system for transparency and remain visible.

15. Copyright and Licensing
- Articles published in the IJEA journal are licensed under Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial 4.0 (CC BY-NC 4.0).
- Under this licence, third parties may share, reproduce, and adapt the article for non-commercial purposes; however, they must cite the source.
- Authors retain their copyright; however, they grant the journal the necessary permissions for publication.
- The journal clearly states the licence terms for each article.

16. Archiving Policy
- IJEA is securely archived via the Dergipark system to ensure the long-term accessibility of all published content.
- Each article is kept permanently accessible through the Dergipark infrastructure.
- This archiving policy aims to guarantee readers and researchers continuous and secure access to articles.

17. Disclaimer
The views expressed in the works published in IJEA belong to the authors; the journal, editors, and referees do not accept any legal or scientific responsibility.

18. Contact
For any ethical reports, objections, or information requests:

Email: ijea@amasya.edu.tr
Address: Amasya University, Faculty of Engineering, IJEA Editorial Office, 05000, Merkez/Amasya, Turkey