Please click here to access the ETHICAL CONSENT FORM
International Committee of Medical Journal Editors’ (ICMJE) recommendations and Committee on Publication Ethics’ (COPE) International Standards for Editors and Authors will be used in the evaluation of the manuscripts sent to the Review of Armenian Studies (RAS) journal.
Ethical Tasks and Responsibilities of Authors and Co-authors
1. Studies that require ethics committee decisions;
1.1.1. For research conducted in all scientific fields and for the clinical and experimental cases below on people and animals which require ethics committee decisions;
1.1.2. All kinds of research that are conducted with qualitative or quantitative approaches which require gathering data from participants using questionnaires, interviews, focus group work, observation, experiments, discussion/negotiation techniques
1.1.3. Use of humans and animals (including material/data) for experimental or other scientific purposes,
1.2.1. Clinical studies conducted on humans,
1.2.2. Research conducted on animals,
1.2.3. Retrospective studies in conformity with the law on the protection of personal data, ethics committee approval must be acquired separately, this approval must be indicated in the manuscript and documented.
1.3. Information regarding permission/authorization (committee name, date, and issue no/number) must be included in the manuscript’s “Method” section and additionally in the first/last page.
1.4. During the manuscript upload, the Ethics Committee Approval file must also be uploaded to the system in addition to the manuscript file.
1.5. Moreover, in case reports, information that the informed voluntary confirmation/consent form was signed must be included in the manuscript.
2. It must be indicated in the manuscript whether obtaining legal/exclusive permission is required. If the study contains a practice conducted in an institution, it must be clearly indicated on which date and which decision or issue number the permission was obtained from the relevant institution.
3. For the use of scales, questionnaires, photographs belonging to others, it is necessary that permission is obtained from the owners and that this is indicated in the article through providing the relevant references.
4. It must be stated that intellectual property rights regulations are complied with for the ideas and works of art used in the manuscript.
5. All contributing resources of the study must be stated in the acknowledgement section of the manuscript.
6. The authors of the manuscript submitted to RAS must certify that their manuscript is original and use citation methods for the citations made in their manuscript in accordance with ethical principles.
7. All authors are responsible for all sections of the manuscript.
8. Authors must clearly state any kind of conflict of interest or overlap of interest in their manuscript. In cases where there is no conflict of interest or overlap of interest regarding the subject of the manuscript, this statement must nevertheless be present in the manuscript. The most common types of conflict of interest are financial support, education, or other funding types, personal or institutional relations and memberships.
9. The submitted manuscript must not have been previously submitted to any other journal. It may be submitted to another journal for evaluation when the process is complete in a journal and the relevant manuscript is rejected. Simultaneously submitting the same manuscript to more than one journal constitutes unethical publishing behavior. Moreover, the authors’ manuscript must not been previously published elsewhere.
10. When an author encounters an important error or misstatement or inaccuracy in his/her published work, s/he is responsible for immediately informing the journal editor or publisher of this case and cooperating with the editor to withdraw or correct the manuscript.
11. Researchers who have made significant contribution to the concept, design, performance, data collection and/or analyses in a study, researchers who have participated in the preparation of the manuscript or in its critical revision, and researchers who have approved of the final state of the manuscript and approved its submission must be included into the study as responsible authors. Apart from this, authors who have made other contributions (for instance: technical support, facilitators in writing and editing, general contributions etc.) must not be included to the authors list. However, the contributions by these people must be stated in the acknowledgement section.
12. In the case of a need for processes such as adding an author, changing the author order, removing an author for a manuscript for which the evaluation process has started, an application may be made to the RAS Editorial - Advisory Board with the approval of all the authors. The Editorial - Advisory Board will decide on the application and inform the author responsible of the decision.
Ethical Tasks and Responsibilities of the Editor
1. The editor must come to a decision on the manuscript according to its original value, the objectives of RAS, and ethical rules.
2. The editor should only put manuscripts with high original value, and which adhere to RAS objectives and ethical rules into the evaluation process.
3. So long as there is no significant reason, the editor and field editors must pay regard to the positive views of the reviewer/referee.
4. The requests and views from the authors must be replied to through feedback.
5. Referees must be selected in accordance with the manuscript’s subject.
6. Attention must be paid to preventing conflict of interest and self-interest relationships between the referees and the authors.
7. The editor is responsible for guiding the referees during the manuscript evaluation process and providing the requested information.
8. The editor is responsible for hiding the credentials of the author and referee based on the double-blind review practice.
9. The necessary warnings must be made and measures must be taken so that the referees evaluate the manuscript in a timely, objective, and scientific manner.
10. Effort must be made to increase the number of referees.
11. The editor must pay regard to the opinions and recommendations of the Editorial - Advisory Board regarding the manuscript.
12. The editor’s decisions regarding the manuscript must be independent from the owner and publisher of RAS.
13. The editor is responsible for paying regard to RAS’ publication guidelines, objectives, and international standards regarding the manuscripts of that will be published.
14. The editor is responsible for not conveying the personal information of the manuscript authors to third parties outside of the authors’ consent.
15. The editor is responsible for the protection of human and animal rights in the case of studies being conducted on humans and animals present in the contents of the manuscrpit. The editor is responsible for declining a manuscript in the case of an ethics committee approval not being sent for studies in which an ethics committee report is required.
16. The editor is responsible for protecting the intellectual property rights of all manuscripts that were submitted to and published by RAS.
17. The editor is responsible for providing clear and illuminating responses to the complaints from referees, authors, and readers.
18. The editor is responsible for taking precautions against conflict of interest and self-interest relationships that may occur between authors, referees, and third parties for the completion of the evaluation processes in an objective and autonomous manner.
19. The editor is responsible for the consideration of the feedback from readers, researchers, and implementers regarding the published studies and making the necessary responses and applying the necessary procedures.
Ethical Responsibilities of the Referees
1. Referees are responsible for not evaluating the manuscript in the case of conflict of interest and self-interest relationships.
2. Referees are responsible for the evaluation of the manuscript by paying attention to the guidelines of confidentiality and objectivity.
3. Referees cannot use the manuscript delivered to them for any purpose until the evaluation process is complete and the manuscript is sent for publication.
4. While evaluating the manuscript, referees are responsible for not allowing the authors’ gender, nationality, religious beliefs, or political views to influence the evaluation.
5. Referees must use polite and constructive language while reviewing the manuscript. Comments and statements containing insults, slander, and enmity must be avoided.
6. Referees are responsible for reviewing the manuscript in a timely manner and in accordance with the ethical rules.
TR Index Criteria
Under the ethical rules title, the aspects below should also be abided (please
click here to access the full list of the criteria for the TR Index Application and Evaluation Processes)
1. Ethics committee approvals must be separately acquired for research conducted in all scientific fields including social sciences and for clinical and experimental studies on humans and animals which require an ethics committee decision, this approval must be indicated in the manuscript and documented.
2. Under this title, under separate titles for referees, authors and editors, information must be provided regarding the ethical rules.
3. A statement of accordance with the Research and Publication Ethics must be included in the manuscripts.
4. Ethical principles must be stated in the journal and/or the website under separate titles while referring to national and international standards. For instance; in scientific articles submitted to journals, ICMJE’s recommendations and COPE’s International Standards for Editors and Authors must be paid attention to.
5. In studies that require ethics committee permission/authorization, information regarding the permission (committee name, date, and issue number) must be included in the method section and additionally in the first/last page. In case reports, information that the informed voluntary confirmation/consent form was signed must be included in the manuscript.
6. The copyright regulations for the ideas and works of art used must be abided.
7. At the end of the manuscript; the researchers’ statement of contribution ratio, statement of support, and appreciation if available, and conflict statement must be included.
Note: Retrospective ethics committee permission is not required for manuscripts that have used research data from before 2020, prepared from postgraduate/doctorate studies (must be indicated in the manuscript), applied for publication in the journal the previous year, were approved but not yet published. Please indicate in the declaration form that your study constitutes this case.
November 14, 2022
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