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Category: Publishing activity

Published: 29 September 2018

Created: 29 September 2018

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The Institute of Mediterranean and Oriental Cultures of the Polish Academy of Sciences (IMOC PAS) adopts the following as guidelines on ethical issues:
•    Guidelines of the Committee on Publication Ethics, abbreviated as COPE (https://publicationethics.org/);
•    The Recommendations of the International Committee of Medical Journal Editors (ICMJE), which refer to ethical issues and can be used in journals of an archaeological or historical profile (http://www.icmje.org/recommendations/);
•    The European Charter for Researchers for ethical issues in archaeological and historical research (https://euraxess.ec.europa.eu/jobs/charter/european-charter).

The introduction of the above-listed recommendations will provide an explanation of both the responsibilities and the rules applicable to Authors, Editors and Reviewers. Manuscripts submitted for publication to the IMOC PAS publisher will be analysed taking into account research originality and integrity, while the editing and reviewing processes will be monitored so as to avoid:
- redundant (duplicate) publications;
- plagiarism;
- publications based on fabricated data;
- unjustified crediting of authors or the omission of actual publication authors;
- the occurrence of an undisclosed conflict of interest;
- any other unethical acts that occurred in the course of the manuscript being written, edited or reviewed.

IMOC PAS adopts the following definitions of the above-listed unethical behaviours:

Redundant (duplicate) publication

This is a work in which the Author copies his or her own previously published works. This may adopt various forms: the literal or partial repetition of one’s own publications or sending the editorial board a text already published in another language.
The IMOC PAS publisher only accepts original previously unpublished manuscripts for publication, which have not been submitted for print at any other publishers or institutions. If it is in any way suspected that the Author has not conformed to the above rules, IMOC PAS will take appropriate steps in accordance with COPE recommendations (see https://publicationethics.org/resources/flowcharts).

LINK TO FLOWCHARTS “WHAT TO DO IF YOU SUSPECT REDUNDANT (DUPLICATE) PUBLICATION”  - A, B

Plagiarism

Plagiarism is a form of scientific misconduct, which occurs when a person submitting a manuscript for publication uses another author’s work without his/her permission, without acknowledging authorship or without it having been agreed with the author. Plagiarism may take various forms, from the verbatim copying of texts to paraphrasing. When determining whether a given text is a case of plagiarism, the following definitions will be used:
- verbatim copying – copying a text word for word, in its entirety or significant sections of it, without permission and without attributing the original source;
- close copying – copying a small part of a text word for word without permission and without attributing the original source;
- paraphrasing another author’s academic work without attributing the original source.
In addition, on the issue of the possible extent of citation, IMOC PAS refers to Art. 29 Chapter 3 of the Act on Copyrights and Related Rights (according to Polish legislation (see http://www.prawoautorskie.pl/art-29-prawo-cytatu and https://www.copyrightuser.org/understand/exceptions/quotation/), simultaneously specifying that the publisher understands a citation as constituting a text no longer that half the standard manuscript page, i.e. 900 characters with spaces. The publisher does not approve of the so-called “nested” quotations and selective quoting, while undisclosed quotes will be treated as cases of plagiarism.
If a case of plagiarism is suspected, IMOC PAS will take the appropriate steps in accordance with COPE recommendations (see https://publicationethics.org/resources/flowcharts).

LINK TO FLOWCHARTS “WHAT TO DO IF YOU SUSPECT PLAGIARISM” - A, B

Fabricating data

Fabricating data is a form of scientific misconduct which occurs when a researcher provides or reports research results that did not occur or when he or she freely modifies the results of the conducted research.
If it is suspected that a manuscript submitted to our publishing house contains fabricated data, IMOC PAS will take the appropriate steps in accordance with COPE recommendations (see: https://publicationethics.org/resources/flowcharts).

LINK TO FLOWCHART “WHAT TO DO IF YOU SUSPECT FABRICATED DATA” - A, B

The unfounded addition of authors or omission of actual authors

The IMOC PAS publisher adopts the definition of a manuscript author in accordance to the one provided by the Recommendations of International Committee of Medical Journal Editors; according to this source, the Author is a person who:
- has made a substantial contribution to the conception or design of the work; or the acquisition, analysis or interpretation of data for the manuscript;
- drafted the manuscript or revised it critically for important critical content;
- gave final approval of the version to be published;
- agreed to be accountable for all aspects of the work in ensuring that questions related to the accuracy or integrity of any part of the manuscript are appropriately investigated and resolved.
It is contrary to this definition to list the so-called guest authors or gift authors. These are people who contributed to the manuscript but not to a significant degree or who were not involved in the research and preparation of the manuscript at all. IMOC PAS also considers the phenomenon of the so-called ghost writers to be unethical, i.e. the omission of people on the list of authors when they should have been acknowledged as such (e.g. due to their role in data acquisition, or the analysis and interpretation of data). IMOC PAS also acts towards eliminating ghost-writers, who were commissioned to write texts but are not listed as their authors.
In order to ensure fair and uniform rules concerning issues linked to authorship, IMOC PAS applies procedures according to those recommended by COPE (see https://publicationethics.org/resources/flowcharts).

LINK TO FLOWCHARTS “WHAT TO DO IF YOU SUSPECT UNFOUNDED ADDITION OF AUTHORS OR OMISSION OF ACTUAL AUTHORS” - A, B, C, D and FLOWCHART “WHAT TO DO IF YOU SUSPECT GHOST, GUEST OR GIFT AUTHORSHIP”

Undisclosed conflict of interest

A conflict of interest occurs when the formal and content-based assessment of a submitted manuscript might be distorted due to an existing relationship between the Authors and any people responsible for reviewing the submitted text or preparing the manuscript for publication. A conflict of interest may result from a financial or personal factor.
A conflict of interest is partially excluded in the case of journals in which anonymous reviews are applied. However, both the editorial board’s employees and the reviewers are obligated to immediately report any information about the occurrence of a conflict of interest to IMOC PAS’s Editor-in-chief, the series Editor or the Head of the Publishing Department, at every stage of working on manuscript publication.
If an undisclosed conflict of interest is suspected, the IMOC PAS publisher will apply procedures in accordance with COPE recommendations (see https://publicationethics.org/resources/flowcharts).

LINK TO FLOWCHART “WHAT TO DO IF A REVIEWER SUSPECTS UNDISCLOSED CONFLICT OF INTEREST (Col) IN A SUBMITTED MANUSCRIPT” and “WHAT TO DO IF A READER SUSPECTS UNDISCLOSED CONFLICT OF INTEREST (Col) IN A PUBLISHED ARTICLE"

Other unethical acts

All complaints, comments and remarks that might indicate the occurrence of unethical acts during the writing, editing or reviewing of manuscripts (e.g. the appropriation of ideas or data from the evaluated manuscript) and publications are investigated by the Editor-in-chief, the series Editor or the Editor of a specific text, in accordance with COPE procedures (see https://publicationethics.org/resources/flowcharts).

LINK TO FLOWCHARTS “WHAT TO DO IF YOU SUSPECT A REVIEWER HAS APPROPRIATED AN AUTHOR’S IDEAS OR DATA”, “HOW TO RESPOND TO WHISLE BLOWERS WHEN CONCERNS ARE RAISED DIRECTLY” and “HOW TO RESPOND TO WHISTLE BLOWERS WHEN CONCERNS ARE RAISED VIA SOCIAL MEDIA”

All the flowcharts linked in these guidelines constitute material created by the Committee on Publication Ethics (COPE: https://publicationethics.org/), used in accordance with the Creative Commons Attribution-Non-commercial-No Derivative Works license (http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/3.0/):
FLOWCHARTS (https://publicationethics.org/resources/flowcharts). Originally prepared for COPE by Liz Wager from Sideview (www.lizwager.com) © 2015 Committee on Publication Ethics (CC BY-NC-ND 3.0).
/Translated by Miłosława Stępień/