Publication Ethics and Malpractice Statement

Matenadaran: Medieval and Early Modern Armenian Studies subscribes to the principles of the Committee on Publication Ethics (COPE) on how to deal with acts of misconduct thereby committing to investigate allegations of misconduct to ensure the integrity of research. If you have ethical concerns about a paper, whether published or in review, contact the editor first. The editor will then follow the COPE guidelines.

To prevent plagiarism, all submissions undergo an initial screening using the Crossref Similarity Check service. When ethical misconduct, such as plagiarism, is discovered in a manuscript under review or a published article, editors investigate the details of the case and take necessary actions using appropriate COPE flowcharts, even if the misconduct is discovered years after publication. In such cases, the manuscript under review may be immediately rejected, the published article may be retracted, and relevant legal bodies may be informed about the details of the case. 

 

Duties of Authors

Authorship and acknowledgements

Authors must have made a significant scientific contribution to the research in the manuscript, approved its claims, and agreed to be an author. Those who have made scientific contributions should be listed as co-authors. If others have contributed to certain aspects of the research project, they should be recognized in the "Acknowledgements" section of the article. Any changes to authorship must be declared to the journal and agreed to by all authors. For more information visit the authorship and contributorship page.

 

Prospective authors should adhere to the following rules:

• Authors must refrain from submitting the manuscript, which was already been published in other editions, as well as from submitting identical material for publication in other journals. 
• Authors must avoid any unethical and improper actions such as plagiarism, simultaneous submission, fabrication, fraud authorship, copyright breaches, hiding competing interests, etc. 
• Authors shall avoid manuscript duplication. If some elements of the manuscript have been previously published, the author shall refer to the earlier work and specify the differences.
• Authors shall submit and prepare their manuscripts in compliance with the journal standards.
• Content changes and clarifications made in the text are agreed upon with the author. In case of disagreement with editorial interventions, the parties have the right to refuse the publication of the material or come to a mutual agreement.
• If the author finds significant errors or inaccuracies in the manuscript under consideration or after its publication, they should immediately inform the Editorial Board.
• Authors assume full accountability for the views, results, discussions, and conclusions provided in the articles and resolve any issues that may arise from the inclusion of copyrighted content without the necessary permission. 

 

Duties of Editors

• The editor should give unbiased consideration to each manuscript submitted for publication. They should judge each on its merits, without regard to race, religion, nationality, sex, seniority, or institutional affiliation of the author(s).
• The editor should reject a submitted manuscript without formal peer review if they consider it to be inappropriate for the journal and outside its scope.
• The editor must not allow the paper to be published if there is sufficient evidence to believe that it is plagiarism.
• The editor should ensure a qualified, objective, confidential and timely process of reviewing.
• The editor must keep the peer-review process confidential. He/ She must not share information about a manuscript with anyone outside of the peer-review process.
• The editor should not disclose the names of reviewers to third parties without their permission.
• The editor should take all measures to ensure that the results presented in the peer-reviewed manuscript cannot be used before publication.
• The editor should refuse to consider the manuscript if there is a clearly expressed conflict of interest between any of the authors or institutions associated with them.
• The editor reserves the right to make a final decision on the publication of the manuscript, informing the author of his motives (opinion of reviewers, relevance for the journal, correspondence to its subject matter, conflict of interest etc.). The Editorial Board of the Journal takes the entire responsibility for a decision on the publication or rejection of the manuscript.
  
  

Duties of Peer-Reviewers

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 editor. 

• Peer-Reviewers should be conducted objectively. Personal criticism of the author is inappropriate. Referees should express their views clearly with supporting arguments.
• Peer-Reviewers should identify relevant published work that has not been cited by the authors. Any statement that an observation, derivation, or argument had been previously reported should be accompanied by the relevant citation. 
• Peer-Reviewers should also call to the editor's attention any substantial similarity or overlap between the manuscript under consideration and any other published paper of which they have personal knowledge.
• Peer-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 or institutions connected to the papers.