• Publication decisions:

The editor of YJES is solely and independently responsible for deciding which of the articles submitted to the journal should be published. The validation of the submitted work and its importance to researchers and readers must always underwrite the decisions.  The editor may refer to the policies of the journal’s editorial board and be constrained by such legal requirements as shall then be in force regarding issues such as libel, copyright infringement, and plagiarism. The editor may confer with other editors or reviewers in making these decisions.

• Peer review:

The editor must ensure that the peer review process is fair and timely.  Submitted manuscripts must be reviewed by at least three external and independent reviewers. If necessary the editor should seek additional opinions. The editor shall select reviewers who have suitable expertise in the relevant field, taking into account the need for appropriate, inclusive, and diverse representation. The editor shall follow best practices in avoiding the selection of fraudulent peer reviewers. The editor shall review all disclosures of potential conflicts of interest and suggestions for self-citation made by reviewers in order to determine whether there is any potential for bias.

• Fair play:

The editor should evaluate manuscripts for their intellectual content without regard to race, gender, sexual orientation, religious belief, ethnic origin, citizenship, or political philosophy of the authors. When nominating potential editorial board members, the editor shall take into account the need for appropriate, inclusive, and diverse representation. The editorial policies of the journal should encourage transparency, and complete and honest reporting. The editor should ensure that peer reviewers and authors have a clear understanding of what is expected of them.  The editor shall use the journal’s standard electronic submission system for all journal communications. 

• Journal metrics:

The editor must not attempt to influence the journal’s ranking by artificially increasing any journal metric. In particular, the editor shall not require that references to YJES articles be included except for genuine scholarly reasons and authors should not be required to include references to the editor’s own articles or products and services in which the editor has an interest.

• Confidentiality:

The editor must protect the confidentiality of all material submitted to the journal and all communications with reviewers unless otherwise agreed with the relevant authors and reviewers. In exceptional circumstances and in consultation with the publisher, the editor may share limited information with editors of other journals where deemed necessary to investigate suspected research misconduct. In addition, the editor must protect reviewers’ identities. Unpublished materials disclosed in a submitted manuscript must not be used in an editor’s own research without the express written consent of the author. Privileged information or ideas obtained through peer review must be kept confidential and not used for personal advantage.

• Vigilance over the Published Record:

The editor should work to safeguard the integrity of the published record by reviewing and assessing reported or suspected misconduct (research, publication, reviewer, and editorial), in conjunction with the publisher. Such measures will include contacting the author of the manuscript and giving due consideration to the respective complaint or claims made but may also include further communications to the relevant institutions and research bodies. The editor shall further make appropriate use of the publisher’s systems for the detection of misconduct, such as plagiarism. Whenever the editor is presented with convincing evidence of misconduct, he/she should coordinate with the publisher to arrange the prompt publication of a correction, retraction, expression of concern, or other correction to the record, as may be relevant.

Reviewer Roles and Responsibilities

Peer review is the most common method for determining the quality of research. Reviewers have substantial responsibilities toward authors, editors, and readers in terms of impartiality in judgment and competence in the topic.

1. Reviewer responsibilities toward authors:

• • Providing timely written, unbiased, constructive feedback on the work’s scholarly merits and scientific usefulness, as well as the reviewer’s documented reason for their perspective.
  • Rating the work’s composition, scientific accuracy, creativity, and interest to the journal’s readers, as well as indicating whether the writing is clear, concise, and relevant.
  • Personal comments and criticism should be avoided.
  • Provide constructive comments in a professional tone with realistic ideas.
  • Don’t propose adding references that aren’t relevant or required. 

2. Reviewer responsibilities toward editors:

• • Inform the editor immediately if he/she is unable to review the article in a timely manner and, if possible, provide the names of alternative reviewers.
  • Notifying the editor of any potential personal, financial, or apparent conflict of interest, and rejecting to review
  • Providing a fair, constructive, and informative critique of the submitted manuscript, which may include supplemental material provided by the author to the journal.
  • Determining the manuscript’s scientific merit, originality, and scope; suggesting ways to enhance it; and, if requested, recommending acceptance or rejection using the editor’s preferred rating scale.

3. Reviewer responsibilities toward readers:

• • Assuring that the techniques and analyses are sufficiently thorough to allow the reader to assess the study’s scientific quality and duplicate the findings.
  • Assuring that the article cites all relevant work by other scientists.

Ethical Responsibilities of Reviewers

1. Confidentiality

• • The article under review should not be shared or discussed with anyone outside the review process.
  • Material submitted for peer review is a confidential communication that must be handled with care to protect the author’s identity and work.
  • Reviewers should not keep copies of submitted manuscripts or use the information included in them for any purpose other than peer review.

2. Constructive critique

• • Positive features of the material under review should be acknowledged, poor aspects should be constructively identified, and improvements should be indicated.
  • A reviewer should explain and justify his/her decision in such a way that editors and authors can comprehend the reasoning behind it.
  • The reviewer should ensure that any previously reported observation or argument is accompanied by a relevant citation and should promptly notify the editor if a duplicate publication is discovered.
  • Reviewers must recognize strengths and provide constructive feedback to assist the author in resolving weaknesses in the work.

3. Impartiality and integrity

• • Reviewer comments and findings should be based on a thorough and objective examination of the facts, free of any personal or professional bias.
  • A reviewer should not use the material available through the privileged communication of peer review for scientific, financial, personal, or other purposes, and every effort should be made to avoid even the appearance of using information received through the review process.
  • Potential reviewers who are concerned about a significant conflict of interest should decline the request to review and inform the editor.

Authorship of the Paper

Authorship should be limited to those who have made a significant contribution to the conception, design, execution, or interpretation of the reported study.  All those who have made substantial contributions should be listed as co-authors. Where there are others who have participated in certain substantive aspects of the paper (e.g. language editing or medical writing), they should be recognized in the acknowledgments section.

The corresponding author should ensure that all appropriate co-authors and no inappropriate co-authors are included in the paper and that all co-authors have seen and approved the final version of the paper and have agreed to its submission for publication.

Authors are expected to consider carefully the list and order of authors before submitting their manuscript. Only in exceptional circumstances will the Editor consider (at their discretion) the addition, deletion, or rearrangement of authors after the manuscript has been submitted and the author must clearly flag any such request to the Editor. All authors must agree with any such addition, removal, or rearrangement.

Authors take collective responsibility for the work.  Each individual author is accountable for ensuring that questions related to the accuracy or integrity of any part of the work are appropriately investigated and resolved.

Multiple, Redundant, or Concurrent Publication

An author should not in general publish manuscripts describing essentially the same research in more than one journal or primary publication. Submitting the same manuscript to more than one journal concurrently constitutes unethical behavior and is unacceptable.

Originality and Acknowledgement of Sources

The authors should ensure that they have written entirely original works, and if the authors have used the work and/or words of others, that this has been appropriately cited or quoted and permission has been obtained where necessary.

Proper acknowledgment of the work of others must always be given. Authors should cite publications that have influenced the reported work and that give the work appropriate context within the larger scholarly record. Information obtained privately, as in conversation, correspondence, or discussion with third parties, must not be used or reported without explicit, written permission from the source.

Plagiarism takes many forms, from ‘passing off’ another’s paper as the author’s own paper, to copying or paraphrasing substantial parts of another’s paper (without attribution), to claiming results from research conducted by others.  Plagiarism in all its forms constitutes unethical behavior and is unacceptable.

Declaration of Competing Interests

All authors should disclose in their manuscript any financial and personal relationships with other people or organizations that could be viewed as inappropriately influencing (biasing) their work.

All sources of financial support for the conduct of the research and/or preparation of the article should be disclosed, as should the role of the sponsor(s), if any, in study design; in the collection, analysis, and interpretation of data; in the writing of the report; and in the decision to submit the article for publication. If the funding source(s) had no such involvement then this should be stated.

Examples of potential conflicts of interest which should be disclosed include employment, consultancies, stock ownership, honoraria, paid expert testimony, patent applications/registrations, and grants or other funding. 

Notification of Fundamental Errors

When an author discovers a significant error or inaccuracy in their own published work, it is the author’s obligation to promptly notify the journal editor or publisher and cooperate with the editor to retract or correct the paper if deemed necessary by the editor. If the editor or the publisher learns from a third party that a published work contains an error, it is the obligation of the author to cooperate with the editor, including providing evidence to the editor where requested.

Image Integrity

It is not acceptable to enhance, obscure, move, remove, or introduce a specific feature within an image. Adjustments of brightness, contrast, or color balance are acceptable if and as long as they do not obscure or eliminate any information present in the original. Manipulating images for improved clarity is accepted, but manipulation for other purposes could be seen as scientific ethical abuse and will be dealt with accordingly.

Hazards and Human or Animal Subjects

If the work involves chemicals, procedures or equipment that have any unusual hazards inherent in their use, the author must clearly identify these in the manuscript.

If the work involves the use of animal or human subjects, the author should ensure that the manuscript contains a statement that all procedures were performed in compliance with relevant laws and institutional guidelines and that the appropriate institutional committee(s) have approved them. Authors should include a statement in the manuscript that informed consent was obtained for experimentation with human subjects.  The privacy rights of human subjects must always be observed.

Data Access and Retention

Authors may be asked to provide the research data supporting their paper for editorial review and/or to comply with the open data requirements of the journal.  Authors should be prepared to provide public access to such data, if practicable, and should be prepared to retain such data for a reasonable number of years after publication. 

Reporting Standards

Authors of reports of original research should present an accurate account of the work performed as well as an objective discussion of its significance. Underlying data should be represented accurately in the paper. A paper should contain sufficient detail and references to permit others to replicate the work. Fraudulent or knowingly inaccurate statements constitute unethical behavior and are unacceptable. Review and professional publication articles should also be accurate and objective.

Submission declaration and verification

Submission of an article implies that the work described has not been published previously (except in the form of an abstract, a published lecture or academic thesis, that it is not under consideration for publication elsewhere, that its publication is approved by all authors and tacitly or explicitly by the responsible authorities where the work was carried out, and that, if accepted, it will not be published elsewhere in the same form, in English or in any other language, including electronically without the written consent of the copyright-holder. To verify originality, your article may be checked by the originality detection service Crossref Similarity Check.

Use of inclusive language

Inclusive language acknowledges diversity, conveys respect to all people, is sensitive to differences, and promotes equal opportunities. Content should make no assumptions about the beliefs or commitments of any reader; contain nothing which might imply that one individual is superior to another on the grounds of age, gender, race, ethnicity, culture, sexual orientation, disability or health condition; and use inclusive language throughout. Authors should ensure that writing is free from bias, stereotypes, slang, reference to dominant culture and/or cultural assumptions. We advise to seek gender neutrality by using plural nouns (“clinicians, patients/clients”) as default/wherever possible to avoid using “he, she,” or “he/she.” We recommend avoiding the use of descriptors that refer to personal attributes such as age, gender, race, ethnicity, culture, sexual orientation, disability or health condition unless they are relevant and valid. These guidelines are meant as a point of reference to help identify appropriate language but are by no means exhaustive or definitive.