Publication Ethics

Introduction

Ethical standards for publication exist to ensure high-quality scientific publications, public trust in scientific findings, and that people receive credit for their work and ideas.

Scientific Steps Group is committed to maintaining high standards through a rigorous peer-review together with strict ethical policies. Any infringements of professional ethical codes, such as plagiarism, fraudulent use of data, bogus claims of authorship, should be taken very seriously by the editors with zero tolerance.

Submission

Manuscripts should be submitted by one of the authors. Submissions by anyone other than one of the authors will not be accepted. The submitted paper, or any translation of it, must neither be published, nor be submitted for publication elsewhere. Violations of these rules will normally result in an immediate rejection of the submission without further review.

When a new submission is received, a couple of checks will be done at the publisher’s office:
Initial check of format and completeness
Initial check for the publication status
Initial check of author’s background
Initial check for Plagiarism
Check for machine produced manuscript

Plagiarism
The Editor in Chief of the journal is responsible for the final decision regarding acceptance or rejection of papers.

Plagiarism

The authors, the editor, the members of the Editorial Team and the Scientific Committee, and the peer reviewers of the manuscripts follow the international ethical standards (http://publicationethics.org) in order to seek respect for the identity of the manuscript author and avoid the fabrication of results, falsification or omission of data and, above all, plagiarism.

Authors must not use the words, figures, or ideas of others without attribution. All sources must be cited at the point they are used, and reuse of wording must be limited and be attributed or quoted in the text.

Papers submitted to SSG must contain original material. An Initial Plagiarism Check is carried out for every manuscript submitted to SSG journals. The check starts with a Google search which is built into SSG’s Paper Submission and Manuscript Tracking System.

SSG use the Turnitin system to detect textual copy in the resources coming from the internet. Plagiarism will be understood as the identical copy of a part of a text where the source from which that information has been taken is not clearly identified. In the case of using paraphrasing, similarly, it should be cited as appropriate as indicated by the regulations of the publication manual of the American Psychological Association (APA) in its seventh edition.

For manuscript submissions, a plagiarism percentage exceeding 20% would serve as an immediate indicator of a submission which has been deliberately plagiarized by the author.

Manuscripts that are found to have been plagiarized from a manuscript by other authors, whether published or unpublished, will be rejected and the authors may incur sanctions. Any published articles may need to be corrected or retracted.

Ethical Guidelines and Resources

Scientific Steps Group’s Ethical Guidelines: [SSG’s Ethical Guidelines]: Please download the SSG Ethical Guidelines for detailed information on our policies and procedures.
Committee on Publication Ethics (COPE): [https://publicationethics.org/]: COPE provides valuable resources on publication ethics, including guidelines, case studies, and best practices.
In cases of serious misconduct or ethical concerns, appropriate actions, such as retractions or expressions of concern, will be taken in accordance with the guidelines provided by the Committee on Publication Ethics (COPE).
International Committee of Medical Journal Editors (ICMJE): [https://www.icmje.org/]: ICMJE offers ethical guidelines specifically for medical journals.

At SSG, we encourage all stakeholders involved in the publication process to familiarize themselves with our publishing ethics guidelines. By maintaining ethical practices, we aim to provide a trusted and reliable academic publishing environment.

Publishing malpractice

In exceptional cases, SSG may remove an article from online publication where we believe it is necessary to comply with our legal obligations or if publishing malpractice is found. This includes, without limitation, where we have concerns that the article is defamatory, violates personal privacy or confidentiality laws, is the subject of a court order, or might pose a serious health risk to the general public. In these circumstances, we may decide to retract the article and publish a notice that clearly states why the full article has been removed.

Some of the responsibilities of the participants are:
Editors (as): will supervise the publication processes, following the highest ethical standards. They will ensure that the articles are reviewed by peer specialists in the field. Clearly inform about the Publication Norms.

Authors (as): will present results of rigorous, transparent and ethical research processes, assuming responsibility for published research. They should describe their research methods in such a way that the scientific community can corroborate or replicate the data. They will refrain from sending the manuscript simultaneously to two or more journals. They will disclose the sources of financing and the relevant conflicts of interest, when they exist, and will declare if there is a conflict of interest.

Reviewers (as): undertake to report possible fraud or plagiarism of the evaluated research. Being able to refrain from using the information present in the manuscripts that they review until they are not published in the journal. They will evaluate the articles rigorously, objectively and in the established time. They will base their observations and make when appropriate, contributions to improving the quality of the manuscript.

Declaration of Conflicts of Interest

For Authors

Authors must declare all potential interests in a ‘Conflicts of interest’ section, which should explain why the interest may be a conflict. If there are none, the authors should state “The author(s) declare(s) that there are no conflicts of interest regarding the publication of this paper.” Submitting authors are responsible for coauthors declaring their interests.

Authors must declare current or recent funding (including article processing charges) and other payments, goods or services that might influence the work. All funding, whether a conflict or not, must be declared in the ‘Funding Statement’.

The involvement of anyone other than the authors who 1) has an interest in the outcome of the work; 2) is affiliated to an organization with such an interest; or 3) was employed or paid by a funder, in the commissioning, conception, planning, design, conduct, or analysis of the work, the preparation or editing of the manuscript, or the decision to publish must be declared.

Declared conflicts of interest will be considered by the editor and reviewers and included in the published article.

For Reviewers

Reviewers should be asked at the time they are asked to critique a manuscript if they have conflicts of interest that could complicate their review. Reviewers must disclose to editors any conflicts of interest that could bias their opinions of the manuscript, and should recuse themselves from reviewing specific manuscripts if the potential for bias exists. Reviewers must not use knowledge of the work they’re reviewing before its publication to further their own interests.

For Editors and Journal Staff

Editors who make final decisions about manuscripts should recuse themselves from editorial decisions if they have conflicts of interest or relationships that pose potential conflicts related to articles under consideration. Other editorial staff members who participate in editorial decisions must provide editors with a current description of their financial interests or other conflicts (as they might relate to editorial judgments) and recuse themselves from any decisions in which a conflict of interest exists. Editorial staff must not use information gained through working with manuscripts for private gain. Editors should publish regular disclosure statements about potential conflicts of interests related to their own commitments and those of their journal staff. Guest editors should follow these same procedures.

Editors are not involved in decisions about papers they have written themselves, or which have been written by family members or colleagues at the same institution. The peer review and final decision on such submissions is handled independently of the relevant Editor by SSG’s own Editorial Office. Reviewers are provided with on-screen guidelines on how to approach the review process in an ethical and non-biased manner.