How to dealing with a suspected misconduct

Our publication ethics and publication malpractice statement is mainly based on the rules and regulations provided by the Committee on Publication Ethics (COPE), an organization covering academic journals.

The flowcharts to follow the COPE’s Code of Conducts are available through the link bellow:

https://publicationethics.org/files/Full%20set%20of%20English%20flowcharts_9Nov2016.pdf

A brief description of the process is available bellow:

• Any article misconduct and unethical behavior may be identified and provided to the editor at any time, by anyone.

• Anyone who advises the editor of such behavior should provide sufficient information, documentation and evidence to begin the investigation.

• All allegations would be evaluated by editor-in chief in consultation with the executive editor.

• Initially, all involved parties are requested to provide their description, sufficient information, documentations and evidence.

• The provided evidence will be investigated and if necessary, new evidence will be collected, while avoiding the spread of any allegations.

• Editor will first seek for a response along with documentations and evidence from those who are suspected of misconduct.

• If their response is not satisfactory, the editor will follow up with the relevant employers or institutions or an appropriate organization (perhaps a regulatory agency or national research organization) for further investigation.

• Then, the editor-in-chief and executive editor will conclude whether the evidence suggests that there is a possibility of misconduct by the suspicious individual?

• The editor will take all reasonable attempts to ensure that proper investigation is carried out in relation to the alleged misconduct. If this does not happen, the editor will continue to take all reasonable efforts to obtain the appropriate solution to the problem. This is a heavy but important task.

• All allegations are taken seriously and treated in the same way, until a proper decision or conclusion is obtained.

• The above investigations will be completed even if the authors withdraw their paper.

• In the case of allegations against reviewers or editors, they will be replaced while the matter in investigated.