Ethical Principles and Malpractice Statement

Studies in the Technology, Innovation and Special Education Research Journal (TISER) adhere to the highest standards in research ethics and follows the principles of international research ethics as defined below.

The authors are responsible for the compliance of the manuscripts with the ethical rules.

  • Principles of integrity, quality and transparency should be sustained in designing the research, reviewing the design and conducting the research.
  • The research team and participants should be fully informed about the study and requirements of the research and risks of participation in research.
  • The confidentiality of the information provided by the research participants and the confidentiality of the respondents should be ensured. The research should be designed to protect the autonomy and dignity of the participants.
  • Research participants should participate in the research voluntarily, not under any coercion.
  • The independence of research must be clear, and any conflict of interest must be disclosed.
  • In studies with human subjects, approval of research protocols from ethics committees or an equivalent official document must be available upon request. Manuscripts that report the results of the experimental investigation with human subjects must include a statement that informed consent was obtained after the procedure(s) had been fully explained. In the case of children and those under wardship or with confirmed insanity, authors are asked to include information about whether the legal custodian’s assent was obtained.

The relevant duties and expectations of authors, reviewers, and editors of the journal are set out below. Below is a summary of our key expectations of editors, peer-reviewers, and authors.

1. Authors’ Responsibilities

Reporting Standards: Authors should precisely present their original research, as well as objectively discuss its significance. Manuscripts are to be edited in accordance to the submission guidelines of the journal.

Originality: Authors must certify that their work is entirely unique and original.

Redundancy: Authors should not concurrently submit papers describing essentially the same research. Submitting the same paper to more than one journal constitutes unethical publishing behavior and is unacceptable.

Acknowledgement of Sources: Author(s) should acknowledge all sources of data used in the research and cite publications that have influenced their research.

Authorship of the Paper: Authorship should be limited only to those who have made a significant contribution to conceiving, designing, executing and/or interpreting the submitted study. All those who have significantly contributed to the study should be listed as co-authors. The corresponding author should also ensure that all the authors and co-authors have seen and approved the final submitted version of the manuscript and their inclusion as co-authors.

Data Access and Retention: Authors should retain raw data related to their submitted paper, and must provide it for editorial review, upon request of the editor.

Fundamental Errors in Published Works: When an author discovers a significant error or inaccuracy in his/her submitted manuscript, the author must immediately notify the editor.

Conflict of Interest: All the authors are asked process to declare any potential conflicts of interest for the submitted manuscript while preparing their title pages. This conflict of interest may include any financial, personal, or other relationships or funding sources. All forms of financial support should be acknowledged in author’s contribution.

2. Editors’ Responsibilities

Publication Decision: Editors should be accountable for everything published in their journals and strive to meet the needs of readers and authors. Editors’ decisions to accept or reject a paper for publication should be based on the editorial board’s reviews and paper’s importance.

Review of Manuscripts: The editor ensures that each manuscript is initially evaluated by the editor, who may make use of appropriate means, to examine the originality of the contents of the manuscript and ensure the quality of the material they publish, recognizing that journals and sections within journals will have different aims and standards.

Fair Review: Editors should strive to ensure that peer review at their journal is fair, unbiased and timely. The editor ensures that each manuscript received is evaluated on its intellectual content without regard to authors’ sex, gender, race, religion, citizenship, etc.

Confidentiality: The editor and any editorial staff must not disclose any information about a submitted manuscript to anyone other than the corresponding author, reviewers, potential reviewers, other editorial advisers, and the publisher, as appropriate. The editor must ensure that information regarding manuscripts submitted by the authors is kept confidential.

Disclosure and Conflicts of Interest: Editors should require reviewers to disclose any potential competing interests before agreeing to review a submission. If an author who is at the same institution as one of the editors submits a manuscript, the review process is carried out by another editor who works at a different institution. The same policy for authors’ conflicts of interest is applied when any of the editors are the authors of a submitted manuscript. Submissions from members of the Editorial Advisory Board are subject to the same blind reviewing and confidentiality requirements.

3. Reviewers’ Responsibilities

Confidentiality: Manuscript reviewers, the editor and the editorial staff must not disclose any information regarding submitted manuscripts. All submitted manuscripts are to be treated as privileged information. Editors should provide guidance to reviewers on everything that is expected of them including the need to handle submitted material in confidence.

Acknowledgement of Sources: Reviewers must ensure that authors have acknowledged all sources of data used in the research. Any statement that an observation, derivation, or argument had been previously reported should be accompanied by the relevant citation. A reviewer should also call to the editor’s attention any substantial similarity or overlap between the manuscript under consideration and any other published paper of which they have personal knowledge.

Standards of Objectivity: Review of submitted manuscripts will be conducted objectively. The reviewers shall express their views clearly, with supporting arguments. Personal criticism of the author is inappropriate.

Promptness: If a reviewer believes it is not possible for him/her to review the research reported in a manuscript within the designated guidelines, or within stipulated time, he/she should notify the editor, so that the accurate and timely review can be ensured.

Conflict of Interest: All reviewers should have no conflict of interest with respect to the research, the authors and/or the funding bodies. If there are any potential conflicts of interest, reviewers are asked to declare these. If a conflict of interest arises, the editor will reassign the paper to another reviewer.

4. Change or Modification of Published Paper

Withdrawal: Papers published will be withdrawn if authors noticed significant errors. Before accepting withdrawal request, editorial board and Editor-in-chief should talk with authors sufficiently. If a paper were withdrawn,

– Paper in journal database should be removed,

– Link in online publication site should be removed,

– Next phrase or similar phrase to announce the reason should be shown below the paper title in online publication paper list: (This paper was withdrawn because of some technical errors).

Replacement: Before accepting replacement request, editorial board and Editor-in-chief should talk with authors sufficiently, and at least three reviewers should check the advances. If a paper were replaced,

– Paper in journal database should be replaced,

– Link in online publication site should be replaced,

– Next phrase or similar phrase to announce the reason should be shown below the paper title in online publication paper list: (This paper was replaced because authors sent updated version. Contact editor if you want to check old version).

– Old version should be kept separately, and if someone wants to check old version, editor can send the PDF to him/her.

– However, replacement is acceptable only one time, and only for technical advances.

Removal: Papers published will be removed if reviewers, readers, librarians, publishers or other subjects noticed significant errors or plagiarism. Before removing a paper, editorial board and Editor-in-chief should talk with authors sufficiently, and should provide enough time to have authors’ explanation. If a paper were withdrawn,

– Paper in journal database should be removed,

– Link in online publication site should be removed,

– Next phrase or similar phrase to announce the reason should be shown below the paper title in online publication paper list: (This paper was removed because of plagiarism).

5. Penalties

Double Submission: If double submission was found or noticed from other sources, editorial board should check the status. If the double submission was confirmed as intentional thing,

– Review process will be terminated,

– The reason should be sent to reviewers, editorial board and authors,

– All authors’ name will be marked as black list, and these authors cannot submit any paper to TISER for three years.

Double Publication: If double publication was found or noticed from other sources, editorial board should check the status. If the double publication was confirmed as intentional thing,

– This should be reported to editorial board and authors,

– This should be sent to publisher published same (or very similar) paper,

– Paper will be removed according to the “Removal” part.,

– All authors’ name will be marked as black list, and these authors cannot submit any paper to TISER for five years.

Plagiarism: If plagiarism (including self-plagiarism) was found or noticed from other sources, editorial board should check the status. If the plagiarism (including self-plagiarism) was confirmed as intentional thing:

– This should be reported to editorial board and authors,

– This should be sent to publisher published same or similar paper,

– Paper will be removed according to the “Removal” part,

All authors’ name will be marked as black list, and these authors cannot submit any paper to TISER for five years.

All the Editors, authors, and reviewers, within we agree upon standards of proper ethical behavior and accept the responsibility for fulfilling the following duties and responsibilities, as set by the COPE Code of Conduct for Journal Editors (http://publicationethics.org/resources/guidelines).