A. General Principles
1. R&S (Research Studies Anatolia Journal) is a peer-reviewed electronic journal indexed in national and international databases. The journal follows a continuous publication policy; special or additional issues may also be published when necessary.
2. The journal publishes original scientific studies in the fields of Social and Humanities Sciences, including Behavioral Sciences, Industrial Relations and Labor, Public Relations, Economics, Communication, Business, Public Administration, Political Science, International Relations, Operations Research and Management Science. Bibliometric analysis studies are not published.
3. Conference and symposium papers may be published as articles provided that the name, place and date of the event at which they were presented are stated and that they have not been published elsewhere. Authors are responsible for any problems that may arise from such publication.
4. The publication languages of the journal are Turkish and English.
5. Manuscripts submitted to the journal must not have been published previously in any medium and must not be under evaluation by another publication when uploaded to the system.
6. Manuscripts are submitted only through http://dergipark.org.tr/rs. Uploading a manuscript to the system is considered an application for publication, and the evaluation process begins. All procedures from submission to publication are carried out electronically.
7. The printing and publication rights of manuscripts submitted for publication are transferred to the journal. These manuscripts cannot be published in another publication, reproduced, or used without citation without the permission of the journal management. The journal may publish the texts it has published in various media.
B. Journal Policy on Research and Publication Ethics
1. For studies requiring ethics committee approval (studies that involve surveys or scales, interviews or observations, or the use of documents, images, questionnaires, etc. developed by others that require permission), the necessary permissions must be obtained from ethics committees or commissions. The permission details must be stated in the "Ethics, Declarations and Statements" section at the end of the manuscript, and the approval document must also be uploaded to the system. Manuscripts without these permissions are returned to the author at the preliminary review stage.
2. Raw data of studies under peer review must be provided when requested by reviewers. The data must also be made available after publication when required.
3. In determining the ethical principles and responsibilities below, the "Code of Conduct and Best Practice Guidelines for Journal Editors" and the "Code of Conduct for Journal Publishers" published by the Committee on Publication Ethics (COPE) were used.
C. Journal Policy on Manuscript Similarity Reports and Similarity Rates
1. Candidate manuscripts are checked with academic plagiarism detection software (iThenticate, intihal.net, etc.). The author must upload the similarity (plagiarism) report of the manuscript to the system at the time of submission.
2. Manuscripts with a total similarity rate of up to 20% and a rate of up to 5% from a single source are accepted into the evaluation process.
3. Manuscripts with a total similarity rate above 20% or a rate above 5% from a single source are returned to the author(s) at the preliminary check stage.
D. Ethical Rules for Authors
1. Authors guarantee that their work is original. When ideas, wording, images, graphics and tables of other researchers are included in the study, they must be indicated as citations. Quoting without citing the source constitutes plagiarism.
2. Every author named in the study is equally responsible for its content. Omitting the name of a researcher who contributed to the study, or listing as an author someone who did not contribute, is unacceptable.
3. Authors must remain faithful to the findings of their research. Altering findings, fabricating findings or results, and conducting research based on them is unacceptable. Manipulating, deleting or removing data and materials, or leaving out data that are difficult to interpret, undermines trust.
4. A study cannot be submitted to more than one journal at the same time. Authors also cannot submit previously published work to the journal.
E. Ethical Rules for Reviewers
1. Reviewers must be aware that the evaluation process is confidential and must not be shared with third parties.
2. Reviewers must submit an objective, impartial, scientific, clear and constructive evaluation report on the study within the given time.
3. Reviewer reports must also include an evaluation of the scientific quality of the manuscript (the topic addressed, the method used, or the appropriate use of the relevant literature). This evaluation, whether positive or negative, must always be made regarding the content.
4. If reviewers find that a study is plagiarized or has been published elsewhere before, they must inform the editor.
F. Evaluation Process
1. Every manuscript uploaded to the journal system is first evaluated by the editor or associate editors for compliance with writing and publication principles. If the author needs to make corrections, the editors return the manuscript to the author with a request for correction.
2. Manuscripts that do not comply with the writing principles are not sent to reviewers.
3. Manuscripts found suitable in terms of writing and publication principles are forwarded to reviewers. At least two reviewers are assigned to every manuscript approved by the editor. Reviewers are chosen from among people with expertise in the field and discipline that the manuscript represents.
4. The identities of reviewers and authors are kept confidential from each other.
5. The maximum time for reviewers to evaluate a manuscript sent to them is 25 days. If no report is submitted within this period, a new reviewer is assigned.
6. A manuscript that receives two positive reviewer reports in the field evaluation qualifies for publication. A manuscript that receives one positive and one negative report is sent to a third reviewer, and whether it will be published is determined according to the third reviewer’s report.
7. Reviewers may wish to see a manuscript for which they requested corrections once more before it is published. If this request is stated in the report, the corrected version of the manuscript is automatically sent to the reviewer by the system.
8. Authors may object to a reviewer report with reasonable grounds and convincing data. Objections are examined by the journal management, and if deemed appropriate, the opinion of a different reviewer (or reviewers) may be sought.
9. Authors can follow the stage of the evaluation process of their manuscripts through the system using their membership information. Since the system gives the author the right to make changes only once, authors should wait until both reviewer evaluations are completed and the reports are entered into the system, and make all corrections at once according to these reports.
10. Journal editors closely follow the corrections made in line with reviewers’ requests. Accordingly, editors may decide whether a manuscript will be published or not.
11. The journal charges a service fee of 3,000 TL per manuscript. The fee is paid when the manuscript is uploaded to the system, and the payment receipt is uploaded to the system. The payment method and details are given on the Price Policy page.
G. Ethical Rules for Editors
1. Editors evaluate manuscripts solely on the basis of their scientific quality, originality and fit with the scope of the journal. They do not discriminate against authors on the basis of gender, ethnic origin, religious belief, political opinion, nationality or affiliated institution.
2. Editors do not share information about a submitted manuscript or its evaluation process with anyone other than the author, reviewers and the editorial board. They do not use the content of an unpublished manuscript in their own work without the author’s written permission.
3. Editors withdraw from the evaluation process of manuscripts of which they are authors, or for which there is a conflict of interest with the authors or the institutions they are affiliated with; the process for such manuscripts is carried out by another editor.
4. Editors select reviewers according to their subject expertise and do not assign people who have a conflict of interest. They ensure the confidentiality of the evaluation process and that the identities of reviewers and authors remain hidden from each other.
5. The publication decision is based solely on the scientific quality of the manuscript, the reviewer reports and the scope of the journal. Commercial, political or personal pressures do not influence the decision; whether the service fee is paid or not does not affect the outcome of the scientific evaluation.
6. In cases of suspected plagiarism, data fabrication or falsification, duplicate publication and authorship violations, editors follow the relevant COPE procedures: they ask authors for an explanation, notify the relevant institutions if necessary, and suspend the evaluation or publication process of the manuscript concerned.
7. If a serious error, plagiarism or ethical violation is detected in a published work afterwards, editors, in accordance with COPE principles, publish a correction, issue an expression of concern or retract the article. The record of a retracted article is clearly indicated in the journal.
8. Authors’ objections and complaints are handled impartially and transparently.
H. Conflict of Interest
1. A conflict of interest refers to situations in which the financial, personal, academic or institutional relationships of an author, reviewer or editor may influence the conduct, evaluation or publication of a study. Research funding, commercial relationships, consultancy, share ownership, competition, and personal or academic closeness or hostility are examples.
2. Authors state whether there is a conflict of interest in the "Ethics, Declarations and Statements" section at the end of the manuscript. If there is a conflict of interest, its nature is clearly stated. Institutions or organizations that supported the research are stated in the Acknowledgements section, together with the project number if any.
3. Reviewers who think they have a conflict of interest with the author or the subject of the manuscript to be evaluated do not accept the evaluation and inform the editor.
4. The course of action for editors in case of a conflict of interest is set out in Section G.
5. An undisclosed conflict of interest is considered an ethical violation. If it emerges after publication, the correction, expression of concern or retraction described in Section G may be applied.
I. Use of Artificial Intelligence Tools
1. Large language models and similar generative artificial intelligence tools cannot be listed as authors. Authorship requires taking responsibility for the content of the work, and this responsibility belongs only to human authors.
2. If authors have used generative artificial intelligence tools in preparing the study (such as idea development and research design, literature search and summarization, text writing or editing, translation, data analysis and statistics, code writing, or creating images, figures or tables), they state the name and version of the tool, the stages at which it was used, and its purpose and scope in the "Ethics, Declarations and Statements" section at the end of the manuscript. No declaration is required for basic correction tools such as spelling and grammar checkers.
3. Authors are responsible for the accuracy of the content produced by the artificial intelligence tool, for the existence of citations and references, and for ensuring that the content contains no plagiarism or copyright infringement. Authors must verify that every source in the references actually exists and supports the claim in the text.
4. Images, figures and data produced or modified with artificial intelligence must be clearly labeled, with the tool used indicated. They cannot be presented as a substitute for real or experimental data.
5. For confidentiality reasons, reviewers and editors cannot upload a manuscript under evaluation or the content of a reviewer report to artificial intelligence tools. The evaluation report must be based on the reviewer’s own scientific opinion.
6. Undisclosed use of artificial intelligence is considered an ethical violation. In this case, the manuscript may be rejected; if it has been published, the correction, expression of concern or retraction described in Section G may be applied.