Publication Ethics and Publication Malpractice Statement
(based on Elsevier recommendations and COPE's Best Practice Guidelines for Journal Editors)
Asian-European Music Research Journal (AEMR) follows the standard for ‘Ethics and Publication Malpractice’ set by the Committee on Publication Ethics (COPE) (We refer to: COPE’s Ethics toolkit for a successful editorial office). This also includes the application of authorship rules and the way how citations and references are handled. The journal is, therefore, committed to ensuring ethics in publication and mainly in the quality of articles that are pre-reviewed and later on twice reviewed by anonymous reviewers.
Duties of the publisher and the Editorial Board-members
Logos Verlag Berlin as publisher of the AEMR takes its duties of guardianship over all stages of publishing extremely seriously and recognizes its ethical and other responsibilities. We are committed to ensuring that reprint or any other commercial revenue has no impact or influence on editorial decisions. In addition, the editorial board members of the journal will assist in communications with other journals and/or publishers where this is useful to editors in terms of their publication policies. Conformance to standards of ethical behaviour is, therefore, expected of all participants involved: Authors, editors, reviewers, and, finally, the publisher.
The editorial board members are committed to take actively part in distributing submissions under consideration to reviewers. The authors will not be disclosed to the reviewers as well as the reviewers are not disclosed to the authors. All communication with the authors is crossing the chief editor and/or the co-editor.
Duties of authors
Publication standards
Authors of articles and review essays have to provide original research. They should give an accurate elucidation of the work performed as well as an expected discussion of its significance to international readers. Underlying data have to be represented accurately in the respective writing. An article should contain sufficient details and references to permit others to later replicate the work and to trace the given information. Fraudulent or knowingly inaccurate statements constitute unethical behaviour and are unacceptable. Review essays and professional publication articles should always be accurate and as far as possible objective. Editorial 'opinion' works are also invited when clearly identified as such.
Originality
The authors should ensure that they have written entirely original works, and fulfil the criteria of authorship as applied in a number of other journal writings, such as the
ICMJE, if the authors have used the work and/or words of others, that this has been appropriately cited or quoted. Plagiarism takes many forms, from 'passing off' another's article or review essay as the author's own article or review essay, to copying or paraphrasing substantial parts of another's article or review essay (without attribution), to claiming results from research conducted by others. Plagiarism in all its forms constitutes unethical publishing behaviour and is unacceptable.
Multiple or concurrent publication
An author should not in general publish manuscripts describing essentially the same research in more than one journal or primary publication. Submitting the same manuscript to more than one journal concurrently constitutes unethical publishing behaviour and is unacceptable. In general, an author should not submit for consideration in another journal a previously published article or review essay.
Sources/References
Proper acknowledgment of the work of others must always be given. Authors should cite publications that have been impactful in determining the nature of the reported article or review essay. Information obtained privately, as in conversation, correspondence, or discussion with third parties, must not be used or reported without explicit, written permission from the source. This mainly applies to the practice to use fieldwork reports with informants, who have to be fully mentioned as a source in case that their knowledge is crucial Information obtained in the course of confidential services, such as refereeing manuscripts or grant applications, must not be used without the explicit written permission (executed on an approval sheet) of the author of the work involved in these services.
Authorship of the article or review essay
Authorship should be limited to those who have made a significant contribution to the conception AND the design, AND the execution, AND the interpretation of the reported study. All those who have made these significant contributions should be listed as co-authors in a way that it complies to true authorship. All authors are of the same importance. As a journal in social sciences and the humanities it adheres to not making a distinction in the order of authors. Where there are others who have participated in certain substantive aspects of the research project, they should be properly acknowledged. The corresponding author should ensure that all co-authors have seen and approved the final version of the article or essay and have agreed to its submission for publication.
Dangerous processes involving human or animal subjects
If the work involves chemicals, procedures or equipment that have any unknown dangers inherent in their use, the author must clearly identify these in the manuscript. If the work involves the use of animal or human subjects, the author should ensure that the manuscript contains a statement that all procedures were performed in compliance with relevant laws and institutional guidelines and that the appropriate institutional committee(s) has approved them. Authors should include a statement in the manuscript that informed consent was obtained for experimentation with human subjects. The privacy rights of human subjects must always be observed.
Disclosure
All authors should disclose in their manuscript any financial or other substantive conflict of interest that might be construed to influence the results or interpretation of their manuscript. All sources of financial support for the project should be disclosed. Examples of potential conflicts of interest which should be disclosed include employment, consultancies, stock ownership, honoraria, paid expert testimony, patent applications/registrations, and grants or other funding. Potential conflicts of interest should be disclosed at the earliest stage possible.
Fundamental errors
When an author discovers a significant error or inaccuracy in his/her own published work, it is the author's obligation to promptly notify the journal editor or publisher and cooperate with the editor to retract or correct the article or review essay. If the editor or the publisher learns from a third party that a published work contains a significant error, it is the obligation of the author to promptly retract or correct the article or review essay or provide evidence to the editor of the correctness of the original article or review essay. If any fundamental error becomes evident to the editor or publisher after publishing, the article or review essay might by removed and an explanation will be written by any editorial board member.
Duties of editors
Publication decisions
The chief editor is responsible for deciding which of the articles submitted to the journal should be published. The validation of the article or review essay in question and its importance to researchers and readers must always drive such decisions. The editor may be guided by the policies of the journal's editorial board and constrained by such legal requirements as shall then be in force regarding libel, copyright infringement and plagiarism as shown in the guidelines of COPE. The editor may confer with other editors or reviewers, and society officers in making this decision as described in the above section on duties of the publisher and the editorial board-members.
Fairness
An editor should evaluate manuscripts for their intellectual content without regard to race, gender, sexual orientation, religious belief, ethnic origin, citizenship, or political philosophy of the authors. Taking solely the scope of the journal as a measurement. An instant answer and requested receipt of submission must be given.
Confidentiality
The editor and any editorial staff must not disclose any information about a submitted manuscript to anyone other than the corresponding author, reviewers, potential reviewers, other editorial advisers, and the publisher.
Conflicts of interest
Unpublished materials and privileged information or ideas obtained through peer review must be kept confidential and not used for personal advantage. Editors may recuse themselves from considering manuscripts in which they have conflicts of interest resulting from competitive, collaborative, or other professional relationships or connections with any of the authors, companies, or institutions connected to the article or review essay. Editors should require all contributors and authors to disclose relevant competing interests and publish corrections if competing interests are revealed after publication. If needed, other appropriate action should be taken, such as the publication of a retraction or expression of concern.
Involvement and cooperation
An editor should take reasonably responsive measures when ethical complaints have been presented concerning a submitted manuscript or published article or review essay, in conjunction with the publisher or society. Such measures will generally include contacting the author of the manuscript or article or review essay and giving due consideration of the respective complaint or claims made, but may also include further communications to the relevant institutions and research bodies, and if the complaint is upheld, the publication of a correction, retraction, expression of concern, or other note, as may be relevant. Every reported act of unethical publishing behaviour must be looked into, even if it is discovered years after publication.
Duties of reviewers
Contribution to decisions
Peer review assists the editor in making editorial decisions and through the editorial communications with the author may also assist the author in improving the article or review essay. Peer review is an essential component of formal scholarly communication, and lies at the heart of the scientific method. The Publisher shares the view of many that all scholars who wish to contribute to publications have an obligation to do a fair share of reviewing. The review process is always initiated by the chief editor and the co-editor and strictly monitored by the publisher.
Timeliness
Any selected referee who feels unqualified to review the research reported in a manuscript or knows that its review will be impossible should notify the editor and excuse himself from the review process. In case that a review has to be done and is fair and does not cause any conflict of interest the review has to be delivered within 6 weeks from considering the review.
Discretion
Any manuscripts received for review must be treated as confidential documents. They must not be shown to or discussed with others except as authorized by the editors.
Other standards
Reviews should be conducted in a constructive way. Personal criticism of the author is inappropriate. Referees should express their views clearly with supporting arguments and negotiate agreements.
Acknowledgement of sources
Reviewers should identify relevant published work that has not been cited by the authors. Especially, the age of sources should not be older than 12 years in average unless those are historical sources and marked as such within the specific text. Any statement that an observation, derivation, or argument had been previously reported should be accompanied by the relevant citation. A reviewer should also call to the editor's attention any substantial similarity or overlap between the manuscript under consideration and any other published article or review essay of which they have personal knowledge.
Disclosure and conflict of interest
Unpublished materials disclosed in a submitted manuscript must not be used in a reviewer's own research without the express written consent of the author. Privileged information or ideas obtained through peer review must be kept confidential and not used for personal advantage. Reviewers should not consider manuscripts in which they have conflicts of interest resulting from competitive, collaborative, or other relationships or connections with any of the authors, companies, or institutions connected to the article or review essays.