Fabrication, falsification or selective reporting of data with the intent to mislead or deceive is unethical, as is the theft of data or research results from others. The results of research should be recorded and maintained to allow for analysis and review. Following publication, the data should be retained for a reasonable period and made available upon request. Exceptions may be appropriate in certain circumstances in order to preserve privacy, to assure patent protection, or for similar reasons.
Authorship
All those who have made a significant contribution should be given chance to be cited as authors. Other individuals who have contributed to the work should be acknowledged. Articles should include a full list of the current institutional affiliations of all authors, both academic and corporate.
Plagiarism
Reproducing text from other papers without properly crediting the source (plagiarism) or producing many papers with almost the same content by the same authors (self-plagiarism) is not acceptable. Submitting the same results to more than one journal concurrently is unethical. Exceptions are the review articles. Authors may not present results obtained by others as if they were their own. Authors should acknowledge the work of others used in their research and cite publications that have influenced the direction and course of their study.
Duplicate submission
Simultaneous submissions of the same manuscript to different journals will not be tolerated. The submitted article will be removed without consideration.
Corrections and retractions
All authors have an obligation to inform and corporate with journal editors to provide prompt retractions or correction of errors in published works.
The journal will issue retractions if:
o There is clear evidence that the findings are unreliable, either as a result of misconduct (e.g. data fabrication) or honest error (e.g. miscalculation or experimental error);
o The findings have previously been published elsewhere without proper crossreferencing, permission or justification (i.e. cases of redundant publication);
o It constitutes plagiarism;
o It reports unethical research.
The journal will issue errata if:
o A small portion of an otherwise reliable publication proves to be misleading (especially because of honest error);
o The author list is incorrect (i.e. a deserving author has been omitted or somebody who does not meet authorship criteria has been included).
Other forms of misconduct include failure to meet clear ethical and legal requirements such as misrepresentation of interests, breach of confidentiality, lack of informed consent and abuse of research subjects or materials. Misconduct also includes improper dealing with infringements, such as attempts to cover up misconduct and reprisals on whistleblowers.
The primary responsibility for handling research misconduct is in the hands of those who employ the researchers. If possible misconduct is brought to our attention, we will seek advice from the referees and the Editorial Board. If there is the evidence, we will resolve the matter by appropriate corrections by refusing to consider an author's future work, for a given period, and by contacting affected authors and editors of other journals.
Minor misdemeanors may not lead to formal investigations, but are just as damaging given their probable frequency, and should be corrected by teachers and mentors.