This journal is committed to upholding the highest standards of publication ethics. All parties involved in the publishing process — authors, editors, and reviewers — are expected to adhere to the following ethical guidelines. These publication ethics are based on the guidelines established by the Committee on Publication Ethics (COPE).

Authors' Ethics

Duties of Authors

• Authors must ensure that the submitted manuscript is original, has not been published elsewhere, and is not under consideration by another journal.
• Authors must accurately present their research findings and must not fabricate, falsify, or inappropriately manipulate data.
• Authors must properly acknowledge the work and contributions of others through accurate and complete citations.
• All persons who have made significant contributions to the research must be listed as co-authors. Individuals who have not contributed should not be listed.
• Authors must disclose any financial or other substantive conflicts of interest that might influence the results or interpretation of their manuscript.
• Authors must promptly notify the editor if they discover a significant error or inaccuracy in their published work and cooperate to retract or correct the paper.

Editors' Ethics

Duties of Editors

• Editors are responsible for deciding which submitted articles should be published based solely on academic merit and relevance to the journal’s scope in governance and fraud.
• Editors must evaluate manuscripts without regard to the authors' race, gender, sexual orientation, religious belief, ethnic origin, citizenship, or political philosophy.
• Editors must not disclose any information about submitted manuscripts to anyone other than the corresponding author, reviewers, and the publisher.
• Editors must recuse themselves from editorial decisions involving manuscripts in which they have conflicts of interest.
• Editors must take reasonable steps to identify and prevent the publication of papers where research misconduct has occurred.

Reviewers' Ethics

Duties of Reviewers

• Reviewers must treat all manuscripts received for review as confidential documents and must not disclose their content to others.
• Reviewers must conduct reviews objectively and present their views clearly with supporting arguments.
• Reviewers must identify relevant published work that has not been cited by the authors.
• Reviewers must notify the editor of any substantial similarity between the manuscript under review and any other published work of which they have personal knowledge.
• Reviewers must decline to review manuscripts in which they have conflicts of interest resulting from competitive, collaborative, or other relationships with the authors.

Publication Ethics

Duties of the Publisher

• The publisher is committed to ensuring that advertising, reprint, or other commercial revenue has no impact on editorial decisions.
• The publisher will assist in communications with other journals and publishers where this is useful to editors.
• The publisher will work with editors to set and maintain the highest ethical standards in publication.
• The publisher must take all reasonable steps to ensure the quality of the material it publishes.