Publication Ethics

Introduction

Ethical standards for publication exist to ensure high-quality scientific publications, public trust in scientific findings, and that people receive credit for their work and ideas. An important issue to sort out at the planning stage – as well as ensuring that the study will be conducted in an ethical manner – is to agree on a publication plan among all the investigators. The path to successful research and a high quality paper should be relatively smooth if each investigator agrees at the start to keep an open mind, minimize bias, aim to publish even negative results, and agrees on everybody’s roles. It is far better to decide before the study starts on who will be principal investigator, coauthors, and acknowledged contributors rather than leaving these things till the writing stage.

Among the cases seen each year by the Committee on Publication Ethics (COPE) the worst are about fraud, plagiarism, redundant publication, and undeclared conflicts of interest, but by far the most numerous are about disputes between authors.

  • Statement of Ethics Approval
  • Article Assessment
  • Plagiarism
  • Duplicate Submission and Redundant Publication
  • Citation Manipulation
  • Fabrication and Falsification
  • Authorship and Acknowledgements
  • Conflicts of Interest
  • Sanctions
  • Investigations
  • Corrections and Retractions

Statement of Ethics Approval

All material published in BVMJ journal which reports experiments performed using animals must adhere to high ethical standards concerning animal welfare.

We require every research article submitted to BVMJ journal to include a statement that the study obtained ethics approval (or a statement that it was not required and why), including the name of the ethics committee (s) or institutional review board (s), the number/ID of the approval (s), and a statement that participants gave informed consent before taking part.

If such detail does not easily fit into the manuscript please provide it in the covering letter or upload it as a supplemental file when submitting the article. Even if we do not include such detailed information in a final published version, we may make it available to peer reviewers and editorial committees.

Editors retain the right to reject manuscripts on the basis of ethical or animal welfare concerns. Papers may be rejected on ethical grounds if the study involves unnecessary pain, distress, suffering or lasting harm to animals, or if the severity of the experimental procedure does not appear to be justified by the value of the work presented.

 

Article Assessment

All manuscripts are subject to peer review and are expected to meet standards of academic excellence. If approved by the editor, submissions will be considered by peer reviewers, whose identities will remain anonymous to the authors.

Our Research Integrity team will occasionally seek advice outside standard peer review, for example, on submissions with serious ethical, security, biosecurity, or societal implications. We may consult experts and the academic editor before deciding on appropriate actions, including but not limited to recruiting reviewers with specific expertise, assessment by additional editors, and declining to further consider a submission.

 

Plagiarism

Plagiarism is the use of others' published and unpublished ideas or words (or other intellectual property) without attribution or permission, and presenting them as new and original rather than derived from an existing source. The intent and effect of plagiarism is to mislead the reader as to the contributions of the plagiarizer.

Self-plagiarism refers to the practice of an author using portions of their previous writings on the same topic in another of their publications, without specifically citing it formally in quotes. This practice is widespread and sometimes unintentional, as there are only so many ways to say the same thing on many occasions, particularly when writing the Methods section of an article. Although this usually violates the copyright that has been assigned to the publisher, there is no consensus as to whether this is a form of scientific misconduct, or how many of one's own words one can use before it is truly "plagiarism." Probably for this reason self-plagiarism is not regarded in the same light as plagiarism of the ideas and words of other individuals.

Authors must not use the words, figures, or ideas of others without attribution. All sources must be cited at the point they are used, and reuse of wording must be limited and be attributed or quoted in the text.

BVMJ uses the iThenticate checking program and our own software to detect submissions that overlap with published and submitted manuscripts.

Manuscripts that are found to have been plagiarized from a manuscript by other authors, whether published or unpublished, will be rejected and the authors may incur sanctions. Any published articles may need to be corrected or retracted.

 

Duplicate Submission and Redundant Publication

BVMJ journal considers only original content, i.e. articles that have not been previously published, including in a language other than English. Articles based on content previously made public only on a preprint server, institutional repository, or in a thesis will be considered.

Manuscripts submitted to the BVMJ journal must not be submitted elsewhere while under consideration and must be withdrawn before being submitted elsewhere. Authors whose articles are found to have been simultaneously submitted elsewhere may incur sanctions.

If authors have used their own previously published work, or work that is currently under review, as the basis for a submitted manuscript, they must cite the previous articles and indicate how their submitted manuscript differs from their previous work. Reuse of the authors’ own words outside the Methods should be attributed or quoted in the text. Reuse of the authors’ own figures or substantial amounts of wording may require permission from the copyright holder and the authors are responsible for obtaining this.

BVMJ journal will consider extended versions of articles published at conferences provided this is declared in the cover letter, the previous version is clearly cited and discussed, there is significant new content, and any necessary permissions are obtained.

Redundant publication, the inappropriate division of study outcomes into more than one article (also known as salami slicing), may result in rejection or a request to merge submitted manuscripts, and the correction of published articles. Duplicate publication of the same, or a very similar, article may result in the retraction of the later article and the authors may incur sanctions. 

Citation Manipulation

Authors whose submitted manuscripts are found to include citations whose primary purpose is to increase the number of citations to a given author’s work, or to articles published in a particular journal, may incur sanctions.

Editors and reviewers must not ask authors to include references merely to increase citations to their own or an associate’s work, to the journal, or to another journal they are associated with. 

Fabrication and Falsification

The authors of submitted manuscripts or published articles that are found to have fabricated or falsified the results, including the manipulation of images, may incur sanctions, and published articles may be retracted. 

Authorship and Acknowledgements

All listed authors must have made a significant scientific contribution to the research in the manuscript, approved its claims, and agreed to be an author. It is important to list everyone who made a significant scientific contribution. Author contributions may be described at the end of the submission. Changes in authorship must be declared to the journal and agreed to by all authors.

Anyone who contributed to the research or manuscript preparation, but is not an author, should be acknowledged with their permission.

Submissions by anyone other than one of the authors will not be considered. 

Conflicts of Interest

Conflicts of interest occur when issues outside research could be reasonably perceived to affect the neutrality or objectivity of the work or its assessment. Potential conflicts of interest must be declared-whether or not they actually had an influence-to allow informed decisions. In most cases, this declaration will not stop work from being published nor will it always prevent someone from being involved in a review process.

If unsure, declare a potential interest or discuss with the editorial office. Undeclared interests may incur sanctions. Submissions with undeclared conflicts that are later revealed may be rejected. Published articles may need to be re-assessed, have a corrigendum published, or in serious cases be retracted.

Conflicts include the following:

  • Financial—funding and other payments, goods and services received or expected by the authors relating to the subject of the work or from an organization with an interest in the outcome of the work
  • Affiliations—being employed by, on the advisory board for, or a member of an organization with an interest in the outcome of the work
  • Intellectual property—patents or trademarks owned by someone or their organization
  • Personal—friends, family, relationships, and other close personal connections
  • Ideology—beliefs or activism, for example, political or religious, relevant to the work
  • Academic—competitors or someone whose work is critiqued 

Duties of the authors

Authors must declare all potential interests in a ‘Conflicts of interest’ section, which should explain why the interest may be a conflict. If there are none, the authors should state “The author (s) declare (s) that there are no conflicts of interest regarding the publication of this paper.” Submitting authors are responsible for coauthors declaring their interests.

Authors must declare current or recent funding (including article processing charges) and other payments, goods or services that might influence the work. All funding, whether a conflict or not, must be declared in the ‘Acknowledgments’.

The involvement of anyone other than the authors who 1) has an interest in the outcome of the work; 2) is affiliated to an organization with such an interest; or 3) was employed or paid by a funder, in the commissioning, conception, planning, design, conduct, or analysis of the work, the preparation or editing of the manuscript, or the decision to publish must be declared.

Declared conflicts of interest will be considered by the editor and reviewers and included in the published article. 

Duties of Editors and Reviewers

Editors and reviewers should decline to be involved with a submission when they

  • Have a recent publication or current submission with any author
  • Share or recently shared an affiliation with any author
  • Collaborate or recently collaborated with any author
  • Have a close personal connection to any author
  • Have a financial interest in the subject of the work
  • Feel unable to be objective

Reviewers must declare any remaining interests in the ‘Confidential’ section of the review form, which will be considered by the editor.

Editors and reviewers must declare if they have previously discussed the manuscript with the authors. 

Sanctions

If BVMJ becomes aware of breaks of our publication ethics policies, the following sanctions may be applied across the BVMJ journal:

  • Rejection of the manuscript and any other manuscripts submitted by the author(s).
  • Not allowing submission for 1–3 years.
  • Prohibition from acting as an editor or reviewer.

BVMJ may apply additional sanctions for severe ethical violations. 

Investigations

Suspected breaches of our publication ethics policies, either before and after publication, as well as concerns about research ethics, should be reported to our Research Integrity team, overseen by the Head of Research Integrity.

BVMJ may ask the authors to provide the underlying data and images, consult editors, and contact institutions or employers to ask for an investigation or to raise concerns. 

Corrections and Retractions

When errors are identified in published articles, the publisher will consider what action is required and may consult the editors and the authors’ institution (s).

Errors by the authors may be corrected by a corrigendum and errors by the publisher by an erratum.

If there are errors that significantly affect the conclusions or there is evidence of misconduct, this may require retraction or an expression of concern.

All authors will be asked to agree to the content of the notice. 

Responding to Allegations of Possible Misconduct

BVMJ Journal have a clear policy on handling concerns or allegations about misconduct, which can arise regarding authors, reviewers, editors, and others. BVMJ journal have a responsibility to help protect the integrity of the public scientific record by sharing reasonable concerns with authorities who can conduct such an investigation.

 Deception may be deliberate, by reckless disregard of possible consequences, or by ignorance. Since the underlying goal of misconduct is to deliberately deceive others as to the truth, the journal's preliminary investigation of potential misconduct must take into account not only the particular act or omission, but also the apparent intention (as best it can be determined) of the person involved. Misconduct does not include unintentional error.

  • Falsification of data: ranges from fabrication to deceptive selective reporting of findings and omission of conflicting data, or willful suppression and/or distortion of data.
  • Plagiarism: The appropriation of the language, ideas, or thoughts of another without crediting their true source, and representation of them as one's own original work.
  • Improprieties of authorship: Improper assignment of credit, such as excluding others, misrepresentation of the same material as original in more than one publication, inclusion of individuals as authors who have not made a definite contribution to the work published; or submission of multi-authored publications without the concurrence of all authors.
  • Misappropriation of the ideas of others: an important aspect of scholarly activity is the exchange of ideas among colleagues. Scholars can acquire novel ideas from others during the process of reviewing grant applications and manuscripts. However, improper use of such information can constitute fraud. Wholesale appropriation of such material constitutes misconduct.
  • Violation of generally accepted research practices: Serious deviation from accepted practices in proposing or carrying out research, improper manipulation of experiments to obtain biased results, deceptive statistical or analytical manipulations, or improper reporting of results.
  • Material failure to comply with legislative and regulatory requirements affecting research: Including but not limited to serious or substantial, repeated, willful violations of applicable local regulations and law involving the use of funds, care of animals, human subjects, investigational drugs, recombinant products, new devices, or radioactive, biologic, or chemical materials.
  • Inappropriate behavior in relation to misconduct: this includes unfounded or knowingly false accusations of misconduct, failure to report known or suspected misconduct, withholding or destruction of information relevant to a claim of misconduct and retaliation against persons involved in the allegation or investigation.

Deliberate misrepresentation of qualifications, experience, or research accomplishments to advance the research program, to obtain external funding, or for other professional advancement.

BVMJ Journal has an obligation to readers to ensure that their published research is both accurate and adheres to the highest ethical standard. Therefore, if the inquiry concludes there is a reasonable possibility of misconduct, responses should be undertaken, chosen in accordance with the apparent magnitude of the misconduct.

Responses may be applied separately or combined, and their implementation depends on the circumstances of the case as well as the responses of the participating parties and institutions. The following options are ranked in approximate order of severity:

  • A letter of explanation (and education) sent only to the person against whom the complaint is made, where there appears to be a genuine and innocent misunderstanding of principles or procedure.
  • A letter of reprimand to the same party, warning of the consequences of future such instances, where the misunderstanding appears to be not entirely innocent.
  • A formal letter as above, including a written request to the supervising institution that a investigation be carried out and the findings of that inquiry reported in writing to the journal.
  • Publication of a notice of redundant or duplicate publication or plagiarism, if appropriate (and unequivocally documented). Such publication will not require approval of authors and should be reported to their institution.
  • Formal withdrawal or retraction of the paper from the scientific literature, published in the journal, informing readers and the indexing authorities if there is a formal finding of misconduct by an institution. Such publication will not require the approval of authors, should be reported to their institution, and should be readily visible and identifiable in the journal. It should also meet other requirements established by the International Committee of Journal Editors. It is recommended that editors inform readers and authors of their reservations of the right to publish a retraction if it meets these conditions, thereby helping decrease arguments among authors.

Editors or reviewers who are found to have engaged in scientific misconduct will be removed from further association with the journal, and this fact reported to their institution.