Publication Ethics and Malpractice Statement

The following Statement is based on Cambridge University Press’ Ethical Standards for publishing and COPE’s Best Practice Guidelines for Journal Editors. It complies with the standards of publication ethics of the University of Presov in Presov.

The editorial board under the leadership of the Editor-in-Chief takes the monitoring of publishing ethics very seriously as a major aspect of the editorial and peer-review process. The editors and Publisher (the Greek Catholic Theological Faculty, University of Presov in Presov) are committed to meeting and upholding standards of ethical behaviour at all stages of the publication process. All involved in the process, i.e. the author, the journal editor(s), as well as the peer-reviewers, are obliged to meet expected ethical standards at all stages in their involvement from submission to publication of an article.

Expectations regarding publishing ethics are clearly stated on the Journal’s official website that sets standards and provide guidelines for best practices in order to meet these requirements. By submitting an article to the Theologos Journal, the author warrants his/her abiding by the set standards and guidelines. A written confirmation of this is required of each author by means of ‘Author’s Warranty and Assignment of Copyright Statement’. 

What follows is a summary of the key expectations of authors, editors, and peer-reviewers:

 

Expected practices/responsibilities of the authors

Authors are expected to maintain accurate records of archival data and/or other type of documents and resources associated with their submitted manuscript, and to supply or provide access to these data, on reasonable request. 

Each author must confirm that the submitted manuscript is not, and for the duration of the review process will not be, under consideration or accepted for publication elsewhere. Where portions of the content overlap with published or submitted content, authors must acknowledge and cite those sources. Upon a request from the editor, a copy of any submitted manuscript that might contain overlapping or closely related content must be given to the editor.

In a signed ‘Author’s Warranty and Assignment of Copyright Statement,’ the author confirms that all the work in the submitted manuscript is original and the submitted text properly acknowledges and cites content reproduced from other sources. 

If a larger text or other types of content are reproduced from other sources, the author acknowledges to have obtained permission to use it in his manuscript. This is the sole responsibility of the author.

Authors further declare that they have obtained permission from human subjects if these have been part of their research (qualitative or quantitative surveys, interviews, mapping of personal files etc.) and respect their privacy.

All authors are obliged to declare any potential conflicts of interest that might inappropriately influence any stage during the publication process.

Finally, authors are expected to notify without delay the journal editor if a significant error in their submitted manuscript or published article is identified and to cooperate with the editor to publish an erratum, addendum, or to retract the paper, where this is deemed necessary.

Authors are entitled to familiarise themselves with the reviewers’ comments on the submitted manuscript; they are not entitled to familiarise themselves with the identity of the reviewers of their manuscript. The author’s identity likewise remains confidential and will not be disclosed to the reviewer, the Publisher, and/or third parties during the review process. 

 

Expected practices/responsibilities of the editors

Editors of the Theologos Journal are expected to be objective and fair way while carrying out their responsibilities, without discrimination on grounds of gender, sexual orientation, religious or political beliefs, ethnic or geographical origin of the authors.

They are to handle all submissions equally, without prejudice or preferential treatment, so that articles are considered and accepted solely on their academic merit.

Editors are further expected to adopt and follow reasonable procedures in the event of complaints of an ethical or conflict nature, in accordance with the policies and procedures of this Publication Ethics and Malpractice Statement and the policies of the University of Presov. Editors are obliged to give authors a reasonable opportunity to respond to any complaints, retaining documentation associated with any such complaints.

Editors are expected to maintain confidentiality regarding the author’s identity as well as the content of their manuscripts when handling the submitted manuscripts. 

 

Expected practices/responsibilities of the reviewers

Reviewers are expected to contribute to the decision-making process, and to assist in improving the quality of the published paper by reviewing the manuscript objectively, in a timely manner. They are expected to alert the editor to any published or submitted content that is substantially similar to that under review.

Reviewers are further expected to maintain the confidentiality of any information supplied by the editor or author in the decision-making process. They must not retain or copy the manuscript, let alone use it for any other purposes outside of their assessment role.

Reviewers are also expected to notify the Editor-in-Chief should they become aware of any potential conflicts of interest between the reviewer and author. It is the responsibility of the Editor-in-Chief to act upon such knowledge and replace the reviewer. 

 

Identification and investigation of unethical behaviour

Misconduct and unethical behaviour may be identified and brought to the attention of the Editor and Publisher at any time, by anyone. Whoever informs the editor or publisher of such conduct should provide sufficient information and evidence in order for an investigation to be initiated. All allegations will be taken seriously and treated in the same way, until a successful decision or conclusion is reached. An initial decision should be taken by the Editor, who should consult with or seek advice from the publisher, if appropriate. Evidence should be gathered, while avoiding spreading any allegations beyond those who need to know. If sufficient evidence is at the editor’s disposal, the editor will communicate with the author, requesting his/her explanation and/or correction. In cases of a serious breach of ethical conduct, the submitted manuscript will be returned to the author and his/her employer may be notified.  

 

Peer-review process

All of a journal’s content (scientific studies, review papers, and book reviews) are subjected to double blind peer-review whereby the editor obtains advice on individual manuscripts from reviewers’ expert in the field of publication. The editor must insure anonymity of both, the author(s) and reviewers. 

The Editor has the right to refuse to submit the manuscript for review if the manuscript does not meet set formal criteria of the Journal; if its content does not fit within the Journal’s scope; if the editor identifies a breach in publication ethics. The author(s) are notified of this without undue delay. 

Following its first level of assessment by the editor, the manuscript is sent to two reviewers. The Editor-in-Chief chooses reviewers with the advice of other editors or delegates this responsibility to one of his editors who are experts in the given field. In case of significantly diverging opinions on the side of the reviewers, a third reviewer is asked to write a review of the manuscript. Reviewers are asked to address the following questions: 

• Does the manuscript meet the corresponding scientific criteria? Are novel scientific ideas, findings or developments clearly stated and substantiated in a logical, coherent way? 
• Is the paper written clearly using adequate methodology, and are the data and concepts logically presented? 
• Do the bibliographic references adequately cover key publications and research results relevant to the topic of the manuscript? 

When submitting a revised version of the manuscript we advise him to list the changes made in response to the referee’s remarks. The author should go through the reviewer comments and for each comment to mention whether he followed the suggestion or whether he disagrees and wish to respond to the comment. 

Manuscripts are sent to the managing editor’s email address: theologos.article@unipo.sk

Authors are responsible for accuracy of the listed references and for the overall content of their manuscript. 

Proofs will be sent to the corresponding author (by e-mail) and should be returned within 72 hours of receipt to the Editor. Corrections and changes, following the reviewers’ comments, must be made visible by using red color font and should be limited to dealing with the reviewers’ comments. Substantial changes to the submitted article (above what is required by the reviewers) may result in a new review process. 

 

Processing fee

There is no article processing fee linked to reviewing and/or publishing the manuscripts. Following successful peer-review, the approved manuscripts are published free of charge.

 

Publishing schedule 

Theologos Journal is published twice a year (April and October) in electronic (online) and printed forms. The submission deadline for April issue is November 30 and for October issue May 31.

 

Access/Reprints

Theologos Journal is an open-access journal. Authors are provided with the PDF file of their article free of charge. Both, authors and the general public, can also download the whole issue of the Journal from its official website in PDF format. Printed issues of the Journal may be purchased or ordered on a reprint order form, which will be sent to the author from the Editor’s office.

 

Archiving

Should the Journal no longer be published by the Publisher, the Publisher will preserve the whole archive of its published issues on Publisher’s official website. 

 

Author’s Warranty and Assignment of Copyright

Following a successful double-blind peer-review process, each author is requested to read and sign the following Author’s Warranty and Assignment of CopyrightStatement. 

The author warrants that the above-specified paper is original on their part and has neither been submitted for publication nor published elsewhere (except in the form of an abstract or as a part of a published lecture, review or academic thesis) and will not be published elsewhere in the same or another language without the written consent of the Editor or Publisher.

The author also warrants that if a paper owned by others contains copyright material written permission has been obtained from the copyright owner to republish such material and an appropriate note of this is made in the paper.

Whilst every effort is made by the publishers and Editorial Board to see that no inaccurate or misleading data, opinion, statement or plagiarism appears in this journal, they wish to make it clear that the data and opinions appearing in the articles and advertisements herein are the sole responsibility of the contributor or advertiser concerned and do not necessarily reflect the opinions of the Editorial Board or the policy of the publishers. Accordingly, the publishers, the Editorial Board, editors and their respective employees, officers and agents accept no responsibility or liability whatsoever for the consequences of any such inaccurate or misleading data, opinion or statement.

The author assigns all their copyrights in the published paper (following a successful review process of the submitted manuscript) exclusively to the Publisher, i.e. the Greek Catholic Theological Faculty of the University of Presov in Presov. This transfer enables the Editor to reproduce, store in a retrieval system (including Internet), or transmit, in any form or by any means, electronic, mechanical, photocopying, recording, scanning or otherwise, the paper, without any other written permission of the author(s).

(Author’s signature and date)