Journal of Asian Midwives (JAM)

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Publication Ethics and Malpractice Statement

The Journal of Asian Midwives (JAM) follows the guidelines from the Committee on Publication Ethics (COPE) and the International Committee for Medical Journal Editors (ICMJE) including all aspects of publication ethics and particularly how to handle cases of research and publication misconduct.

To achieve a high standard of ethics for publishers, editors, authors, and reviewers, JAM has adapted COPE. The standard for editors, authors, and reviewers is described in this section. Additionally, we like to stress that the publisher has no authority to compromise the integrity of the contents and can only encourage timely dissemination. 

Authors Responsibility:

Reporting Standard:

The Authors of original research report should give a truthful summary of the work done and an unbiased analysis of its relevance. The paper should appropriately depict the original information. A paper should have enough information and citations to enhance credibility of work. False or deliberately deceptive statements are inappropriate and represent unethical behaviour. 

Data access and retention:

The study's raw data may be requested from the authors along with the publication for editorial review, and authors should be prepared to make the data public, when applicable. In any instance, authors should make sure that such statistics are accessible to other qualified professionals for at least 10 years after publication (preferably through an organizational or subject-based data source, repository or another data centre), provided that participant privacy can be maintained and that legal restrictions on the release of proprietary data would not apply.

Acknowledgement of sources, Originality, and plagiarism check:

  The Authors should submit only genuinely unique work, and properly credit the ideas of others. Publications that had a significant impact on the reported work's nature should also be referenced.

Multiple, duplicate or concurrent publication:

Generally, research studies that fundamentally describe the same study shouldn't be published in more than one publication. Submitting the same work to multiple journals is considered unethical publishing practices and it is not acceptable. 

It is prohibited to submit manuscripts that have been used elsewhere as copyrighted content. Furthermore, papers that are being reviewed by the journal shouldn't be submitted again to works that have copyright protection. However, the authors have rights to the published material, after submission of a work. If their work is published, they provide permission to use it under a CC-BY authorization [http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/3.0/], which permits others to modify the work, copying, sharing, and transmitting it, as well as to use it commercially. 

Paper Authorship:

Authorship should be confined to those who made a major contribution to the study's idea, design, implementation, or explanation. Co-authors should include everyone who made a significant contribution. 

The associated author makes sure that the author list includes all collaborating co-authors and excludes any irrelevant entities. The corresponding author will also confirm that all co-authors have given their consent for the manuscript to be submitted for publication and have approved the final version. 

Conflicts of interest and Disclosure:

  Any financial or other significant conflicts of interest that could be taken to have an impact on the findings or interpretation of a work should be disclosed by all authors in a statement. Disclosure of all funding sources for the project is required. 

Fundamental errors in published works:

When an author finds a substantial error or inaccuracy in a piece of his/her own writing that has already been published, it is the author's responsibility to contact the journal editor or publisher as soon as possible and work with the editor to have the material retracted or corrected in the form of an erratum. 

Editors’ Responsibility:

Publication Decisions:

The editor board of the journal is responsible for deciding which of the articles submitted to the journal should be published. The editor will analyze the manuscripts regardless of the authors' race, gender, sexual orientation, religion, ethnicity, citizenship, or political philosophies. The significance, originality, and clarity of the work will be taken into consideration, as well as the validity and applicability of the study to the journal's field of study. It is also important to consider current legal requirements for plagiarism, copyright infringement, and libel.

Fair Play:

An editor should at any moment evaluate manuscripts for their intellectual content without considering the writers' race, gender, sexual orientation, religion, ethnicity, citizenship, or political philosophies.

Confidentiality:

The editor and any editorial staff must not reveal or share information about a submitted manuscript other than the corresponding author, reviewers, potential reviewers, other editorial advisers, and the publisher.

Review of Manuscripts:

The editor should ensure that each paper must undergo an initial evaluation for originality. Peer review should be properly and judiciously planned by the editor. The material for writers should include a description of the editors' peer review procedures as well as a list of the journal's peer-reviewed sections. The editor should choose peer reviewers who have the sufficient expertise and stay clear of those who have conflicts of interest for papers that are being considered for publication.

Disclosure and conflicts of interest:

Without the author's express written approval, the editor and editorial board members will not use any unpublished materials disclosed in a submitted manuscript for their own research.

Copyright:

The Editors reserve the right to edit or otherwise alter the content. Copyrights for published articles will be retained by the journal however authors have the right to share and use their published articles without removing JAM’s logo. Authors can bring infringement actions if they detect any illegal use of JAM’s articles.

Plagiarism:

The publisher and the journal have a policy of “Zero Tolerance on the Plagiarism”. All submissions will be checked by anti-plagiarism software before being sent to the reviewers. Plagiarism, including duplicate publication of the author’s own work, complete or partial without proper citation will be regarded as ethical misconduct. The Editors reserve the right to reject manuscripts if such misconduct is detected.

Reviewers Responsibility:

Contribution to Editorial Decisions:

Peer review supports the editor in editing judgements and may also help the author in improving the article through editorial communications with the author.

Standards of Objectivity:

Reviews should be conducted with objectivity. It is inappropriate to make personal remarks about the author. Referees should clearly and persuasively state their viewpoints.

Promptness:

Any designated referee who feels unqualified to assess the research provided in a manuscript or knows that it will be impossible to complete the review promptly should inform the editor and withdraw from the review process.

Confidentiality:

Any manuscripts that are submitted for review need to be handled as confidential documents. Except with the editor's permission, they should not be displayed or discussed with other people.

Acknowledgement of sources:

Reviewers should point out instances where relevant published work cited in the study has not been referenced. If observations or arguments obtained from other publications are accompanied by the appropriate source, they should make that clear. Any significant resemblance or overlap between the manuscript under consideration and any other published paper of which they are personally aware must be reported to the editor by the reviewers.

Disclosure and conflict of interest:

Confidential information or ideas obtained through peer review must be kept private and not used for personal benefit. Reviewers should not consider manuscripts in which they have competing, collaborative, or other relationships or connections with any of the authors, companies, or institutions associated with the papers.

Authorship and Contributor-ship:

According to the International Committee of Medical Journal Editors Recommendations for Conducting, Reporting, Editing, and Publication of Scholarly Work in Medical Journals (ICMJE Recommendations 2013) to determine authorship following four standards should be used:

1. The authors must have contributed significantly to the idea or design of the work, or they must have played a key role in gathering, analyzing, or interpreting the data used in the work.

2. The authors must have made a significant contribution to the work's drafting or critical revision as a result of significant intellectual content.

3. The authors should be engaged in the approval of the final published version.

4. There must be agreement among the authors regarding who is accountable for all the aspects of the work. As a result, they would be able to justify any doubts about the integrity and accuracy of any part of the work.