Ethics and Malpractice Statement

1. Ethical Principles

The International Journal of Didactical Studies (IJODS) is committed to maintaining high standards of publication ethics, research integrity, transparency, editorial independence, and accountability throughout the scholarly publishing process.

IJODS follows internationally recognized principles of publication ethics and takes guidance from the Committee on Publication Ethics (COPE) Core Practices and relevant COPE guidance.

These principles apply to authors, reviewers, editors, Editorial Board members, Guest Editors, and the publisher. Ethical concerns are evaluated on a case-by-case basis with the primary aim of protecting research participants, ensuring fair editorial processes, and preserving the integrity of the scholarly record.

2. Responsibilities of Authors

Authors submitting manuscripts to IJODS are responsible for ensuring the originality, accuracy, integrity, and ethical conduct of their work.

Submitted manuscripts must be original, must not have been formally published elsewhere, and must not be simultaneously under consideration by another journal.

All sources must be appropriately acknowledged and cited. Authors must ensure that the manuscript does not contain plagiarism, inappropriate text reuse, fabricated references, falsified or fabricated data, manipulated results, or other practices that could compromise the reliability of the scholarly record.

Authorship must accurately reflect substantial scholarly contributions to the work. All listed authors must approve the submitted and final versions of the manuscript and accept responsibility for their contributions. Guest, gift, honorary, and ghost authorship are not permitted. Individuals who contributed to the work but do not meet the criteria for authorship should be acknowledged where appropriate.

Authors must disclose all financial, institutional, professional, personal, or other competing interests that could reasonably be perceived as influencing the research or its interpretation. All sources of funding must also be disclosed, including the role of the funder where relevant.

Ethical Approval, Informed Consent, and Participant Protection

Where required, research involving human participants must have received approval from an appropriately constituted ethics committee, institutional review board, or equivalent body before the research was conducted. The name of the approving body and, where applicable, the approval or reference number must be reported in the manuscript.

Where ethical approval was waived, exempted, or not required under applicable institutional, national, or disciplinary requirements, authors must clearly state this and provide an appropriate explanation.

Informed consent must be obtained where required. Where informed consent was waived, exempted, or not applicable, the basis for this must be explained.

Research involving minors, individuals with impaired decision-making capacity, or other vulnerable participants must follow appropriate additional ethical and legal safeguards. Where required, consent must be obtained from a parent, legal guardian, legally authorized representative, or other appropriate proxy. Assent from the participant should also be obtained where appropriate.

Authors must protect the privacy, dignity, confidentiality, and rights of research participants and must ensure that identifiable personal information is not published without appropriate authorization.

3. Responsibilities of Editors

Editors are responsible for safeguarding the integrity, fairness, confidentiality, and independence of the editorial and peer-review processes.

Editorial decisions must be based on the scholarly quality, originality, methodological rigor, relevance, and contribution of the manuscript and must not be influenced by authors’ nationality, institutional affiliation, personal characteristics, commercial considerations, Article Processing Charge payments, sponsorship, or other inappropriate factors.

Editors must maintain the confidentiality of submitted manuscripts, peer-review reports, author information, and other unpublished material obtained during the editorial process.

Editors must disclose relevant competing interests and must not participate in the handling of manuscripts where such interests could reasonably compromise, or appear to compromise, their impartiality.

Submissions by Editors and Editorial Board Members

Manuscripts submitted by the Editor-in-Chief, editors, Editorial Board members, or individuals closely connected with them are not given preferential treatment.

Such manuscripts must be assigned to an appropriately qualified independent editor who has no relevant conflict of interest. The author-editor or Editorial Board member must have no involvement in reviewer selection, access to confidential peer-review information beyond that available to ordinary authors, or participation in the editorial decision concerning the manuscript.

The same peer-review and editorial standards applied to other manuscripts apply to these submissions.

IJODS seeks to minimize editorial endogeny. In accordance with the journal’s publication standards, research papers in which at least one author is an editor, Editorial Board member, or reviewer of the journal must not exceed 25% of the research papers published in either of the journal’s latest two issues.

Editorial Misconduct and Ethical Concerns

Editors must take appropriate action when credible concerns relating to plagiarism, authorship, data integrity, peer-review manipulation, undisclosed competing interests, unethical research practices, citation manipulation, or other forms of misconduct are identified.

Where appropriate, authors must be given a reasonable opportunity to respond to allegations before a final editorial action is taken.

Editorial action must be evidence-based and proportionate to the nature and seriousness of the concern.

Confidentiality and Artificial Intelligence

Editors must not upload submitted manuscripts, peer-review reports, unpublished data, or other confidential editorial materials to publicly accessible generative artificial intelligence services or other systems where confidentiality, data protection, or intellectual property cannot be assured.

Artificial intelligence or automated tools must not replace independent editorial judgment. Where automated tools are used by the journal for routine purposes such as similarity screening, integrity checks, reviewer suggestions, or workflow support, their outputs must remain subject to appropriate human review and verification.

4. Responsibilities of Reviewers

Reviewers must evaluate manuscripts objectively, constructively, confidentially, and within the limits of their expertise.

Reviewers should assess the scholarly quality, methodological rigor, originality, clarity, relevance, and contribution of the manuscript and should provide comments that assist editors in reaching an informed decision and authors in improving their work.

Reviewers must disclose any financial, institutional, professional, personal, or other competing interest that could reasonably affect their impartiality and should decline the review where an appropriate independent assessment cannot be provided.

Unpublished material obtained through peer review must not be used for personal, professional, academic, or commercial advantage.

Citation Ethics

Reviewers may recommend additional references only where they are genuinely relevant and necessary to improve the scholarly accuracy or contextualization of the manuscript.

Reviewers must not request citations primarily to increase citations to their own work, the work of associates, or articles published by IJODS or any other journal.

Citation suggestions must be based solely on scholarly relevance. Editors may disregard or remove citation requests that appear unnecessary, excessive, coercive, or motivated by citation metrics.

Confidentiality and Artificial Intelligence in Peer Review

Reviewers must treat manuscripts and all associated review materials as confidential.

Submitted manuscripts, unpublished data, figures, tables, reviewer reports, or other confidential materials must not be uploaded to publicly accessible generative AI tools or other external systems where confidentiality cannot be assured.

Generative AI must not replace the reviewer’s independent scholarly judgment or be used to generate substantive peer-review assessments. Any permitted use of automated tools must comply with the journal’s Artificial Intelligence (AI) Usage Policy.

Reviewers are not responsible for determining definitively whether a manuscript contains AI-generated material. Where a reviewer has a reasonable concern regarding inappropriate or undisclosed AI use, the concern should be reported confidentially to the editor for further assessment.

5. Peer Review Integrity

All submissions to IJODS undergo a double-blind peer-review process, ensuring that the identities of authors and reviewers remain confidential. Editorial decisions are based on reviewers’ evaluations and the journal’s academic standards.

In cases of conflicting reviewer recommendations, additional reviewers may be consulted. The final decision regarding publication rests with the editorial team.

Reviewers are selected on the basis of appropriate scholarly expertise and independence. Authors, reviewers, editors, and Editorial Board members must not attempt to manipulate reviewer selection, peer-review reports, editorial decisions, or the outcome of the review process. Suspected peer-review manipulation, fabricated reviewer identities, inappropriate reviewer recommendations, or interference with independent editorial assessment will be investigated as publication-ethics concerns.

6. Conflicts of Interest / Competing Interests

IJODS requires all participants in the publication process—including authors, reviewers, and editors—to disclose any financial, institutional, professional, or personal relationships that could be perceived as influencing the research, its interpretation, or the editorial evaluation of a manuscript.

Individuals with identified conflicts may be excluded from the review or decision-making process to ensure impartiality.

All disclosed conflicts of interest are evaluated and managed by the editorial team under the direction of the Editor-in-Chief, with the aim of preserving the integrity, transparency, and fairness of the peer-review and publication process.

Failure to disclose relevant conflicts of interest may be considered an ethical concern and may result in editorial action in accordance with the journal’s Publication Ethics.

7. Ethical Misconduct

IJODS considers ethical misconduct to be any action that undermines the integrity of the scholarly record. The following practices are regarded as serious violations of publication ethics.

Plagiarism and Inappropriate Text Reuse

Plagiarism, including the unattributed use of another person’s words, ideas, data, images, or other intellectual contributions, is unacceptable.

IJODS may use similarity-detection software as part of its editorial screening process. A similarity report is a screening indicator and does not, by itself, establish plagiarism or research misconduct. Editors assess the nature, extent, and context of identified similarities before determining whether editorial action is required.

Confirmed plagiarism or inappropriate text reuse is handled on a case-by-case basis according to its nature and severity and may result in revision, rejection, correction, retraction, or other appropriate editorial action.

Data Fabrication and Falsification

The fabrication, falsification, or selective manipulation of research data is considered a severe ethical breach. Manuscripts found to contain manipulated or unreliable data may be rejected or retracted.

Duplicate and Redundant Publication

Submitting the same manuscript to more than one journal or publishing substantially similar content without proper disclosure is unethical and unacceptable.

Fabricated or Unverifiable References

Authors are ethically responsible for ensuring that all references cited in their manuscripts are accurate, authentic, and based on sources that genuinely exist and have been consulted. The inclusion of fabricated, incorrect, or non-existent references constitutes a serious breach of publication ethics.

Undisclosed or Unethical Use of Artificial Intelligence

The use of artificial intelligence (AI)–assisted tools does not exempt authors from responsibility for the originality, accuracy, and integrity of their work. Undisclosed or unethical use of AI tools—including the generation of content, data, or references without verification—is considered ethical misconduct and is handled in accordance with the journal’s Artificial Intelligence (AI) Usage Policy.

8. Data Avaibability and Reproducibility

IJODS supports transparency, reproducibility, and responsible research-data practices.

All research articles must include a Data Availability Statement indicating whether and how the data supporting the findings of the study can be accessed.

Where data are publicly available, authors should provide the repository name and a persistent identifier or URL, where available.

Where data cannot be shared publicly because of participant confidentiality, privacy, ethical approval conditions, legal restrictions, intellectual property considerations, or other legitimate reasons, the Data Availability Statement must clearly explain the applicable restriction.

Where data sharing is not applicable because no new data were created or analyzed, this should be explicitly stated.

Editors may request access to underlying data or relevant supporting materials where reasonably necessary to evaluate research integrity. Authors must not share data in a manner that violates participant consent, privacy, confidentiality, ethical requirements, or applicable law.

9. Corrections, Retractions, Expressions of Concern, and Article Removal

IJODS is committed to maintaining the accuracy and integrity of the scholarly record. Concerns raised after publication are evaluated fairly and in accordance with the journal’s ethical procedures and relevant COPE guidance.

Corrections

Where an error affects the accuracy or interpretation of a published article but does not invalidate its principal findings, IJODS may publish a correction linked to the original article.

Retractions

An article may be retracted where there is reliable evidence that its findings are substantially unreliable as a result of major error or misconduct, where plagiarism or redundant publication materially affects the integrity of the work, or where other serious ethical or legal concerns justify retraction.

Retracted articles normally remain accessible as part of the scholarly record and are clearly identified as retracted, with a notice explaining the reason for the action.

Expressions of Concern

An Expression of Concern may be published when significant questions have been raised regarding the integrity or reliability of an article but an investigation has not yet reached a conclusion or sufficient evidence is not yet available to determine whether correction or retraction is appropriate.

Article Removal

Removal of a published article is considered only in exceptional circumstances, such as where continued publication would create a serious legal risk, violate privacy or confidentiality rights, present a serious risk of harm, or where removal is otherwise legally required.

Where removal is necessary, the bibliographic record should normally remain available with an appropriate notice explaining why the content has been removed, to the extent legally and ethically permissible.

10. Appeals and Complaints

IJODS provides authors, reviewers, readers, and other stakeholders with a fair and transparent mechanism for submitting complaints and appeals.

Authors may submit a reasoned appeal against an editorial decision where they believe that a significant error has occurred in the editorial or peer-review process. Appeals should identify the specific grounds for reconsideration and should address the scientific or procedural basis of the original decision.

An appeal does not guarantee reversal of an editorial decision. Where appropriate, the appeal may be reviewed by an editor or independent academic who was not materially involved in the original decision.

Complaints concerning editorial conduct, peer review, confidentiality, competing interests, publication ethics, journal procedures, or other matters are handled confidentially and fairly.

Complaints or appeals concerning the conduct or decision of the Editor-in-Chief must not be adjudicated solely by the Editor-in-Chief. Such matters will be referred to an appropriately qualified Editorial Board member, independent editor, publisher representative, or other independent person who was not involved in the matter under review.

Individuals whose conduct is the subject of a complaint must not control the investigation or final resolution of that complaint.

Where appropriate, IJODS may seek information or advice from authors’ institutions, research-integrity offices, other journals, relevant experts, or other appropriate bodies.

Complaints and appeals may be submitted to the journal through the contact information provided on the journal website.

11. Withdrawal of Manuscripts

Authors who wish to withdraw their manuscript during the review process must formally notify the editorial office. Withdrawals after acceptance are subject to editorial consideration.

12. Intellectual Property, Copyright, and Licensing

Copyright ownership, licensing, and reuse of published content are governed by the journal’s Open Access Policy and applicable copyright and licensing provisions.

IJODS publishes its open-access scholarly content under the Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 International License (CC BY 4.0). Authors retain copyright in accordance with the journal’s copyright policy.

Copyright and licensing arrangements must remain consistent with the journal’s open-access model and must not restrict reuse otherwise permitted under the applicable Creative Commons license.

13. Publisher Responsibilities

The publisher supports the editorial independence, integrity, accessibility, and long-term sustainability of IJODS.

The publisher does not interfere with individual editorial decisions and does not permit financial, commercial, institutional, advertising, sponsorship, or other external considerations to determine whether a manuscript is accepted or rejected.

The publisher supports the maintenance of the journal’s editorial infrastructure, website, scholarly record, publication policies, metadata, and digital preservation arrangements.

IJODS preserves its published scholarly content through the Internet Archive as part of its independent external digital preservation arrangements. Newly published content is incorporated into the journal’s regular preservation workflow. Further information is available in the journal’s Archiving and Digital Preservation Policy.

The publisher works with the editorial team to ensure that corrections, retractions, Expressions of Concern, and other post-publication actions can be issued where necessary to preserve the integrity of the scholarly record.

Article Processing Charges, waivers, discounts, advertising, sponsorship, or other sources of journal revenue must remain administratively separate from editorial assessment and peer-review decisions.

14. Ethical Oversight

IJODS is committed to continuing ethical oversight before, during, and after publication.

Concerns involving research ethics, authorship, conflicts of interest, data integrity, plagiarism, peer-review manipulation, citation manipulation, AI use, participant protection, or other aspects of publication integrity are assessed according to the circumstances of each case.

Where appropriate, the journal may request explanations or supporting documentation from authors, reviewers, or editors and may seek advice or information from institutions, ethics committees, research-integrity offices, other journals, or relevant experts.

Editorial actions are determined on the basis of available evidence and should be proportionate to the seriousness and impact of the concern.

Journal policies are reviewed periodically to maintain alignment with developments in scholarly publishing and recognized publication-ethics guidance.

15. Compliance Statement

By submitting a manuscript to IJODS, authors acknowledge that they have read, understood, and agreed to comply with the journal’s ethical policies and publication standards.

All participants in the publication process, including authors, reviewers, editors, Editorial Board members, Guest Editors, and the publisher, are expected to act in accordance with the principles described in this statement and other applicable IJODS policies.