Authorship and Contributorship

An author is an individual who has made a substantial intellectual contribution to a manuscript. NJLLCS recommends that authorship be granted only to those who meet all four of the following criteria:

1. Made substantial contributions to the conception or design of the work, or to the acquisition, analysis, or interpretation of data; AND
2. Participated in drafting the work or revising it critically for important intellectual content; AND
3. Approved the final version to be published; AND
4. Agreed to be accountable for all aspects of the work and to address questions relating to its accuracy or integrity.

Contributors who do not meet all four criteria should be acknowledged, with their specific contributions described. Organizations that provided funding or other support should also be acknowledged.

Handling of Complaints and Appeals

Complaints
Complaints may relate to review delays, breaches of confidentiality, undisclosed conflicts of interest, or alleged author/reviewer misconduct. Editors will investigate complaints confidentially and in collaboration with relevant stakeholders. Complaints will be acknowledged within 30 days. Wherever possible, investigations and resolutions will be completed within three months; more complex cases may require additional time.

Appeals
Appeals must be based on substantive new evidence, demonstrable factual errors, reviewer bias, or significant procedural irregularities. Disagreement with an editorial judgement alone is not grounds for appeal. Authors wishing to appeal a rejection must submit a detailed, point-by-point rebuttal to the Editor-in-Chief within 30 days of the decision. The Editor-in-Chief will review the peer-review process and, if necessary, seek independent reassessment. The Editor-in-Chief’s final decision on the appeal is binding; if an appeal is upheld, the manuscript may be reconsidered or sent for further peer review.

Allegations of Research Misconduct

Where an author is suspected of research misconduct, NJLLCS will undertake a confidential, fair, and timely investigation in accordance with institutional and international standards. Penalties, determined by the Faculty of Human Sciences and Research (with advice from the Internal Board), will be proportional to the severity of the misconduct and may include temporary or permanent bans on submissions to NJLLCS. All current NJLLCS editors will be informed of penalties. Where multiple authors are implicated, the Board may apply tailored sanctions to individual authors. In serious cases, the author’s institution may be notified.

Conflicts of Interest

All parties must disclose potential conflicts of interest. Reviewers should decline manuscripts where a competing interest could bias their assessment. Editors should recuse themselves from handling manuscripts in which they have a conflict. Authors must disclose all financial and other relevant interests that could have influenced their work.

Data Sharing and Reproducibility

Authors are encouraged to make data supporting their findings openly available in trusted open-access repositories and to follow the FAIR principles (Findable, Accessible, Interoperable, Reusable), ideally using persistent identifiers (e.g., DOI). Data sharing must respect ethical, privacy, and legal constraints; authors must describe any restrictions in the Data Availability statement. Data archived only on personal websites or as unindexed supplementary files is discouraged.

Ethical Oversight

NJLLCS requires evidence of appropriate ethical oversight and adherence to accepted research standards:

• Subject protection: Safeguard privacy, dignity, and safety of human participants, obtain documented informed consent where required, and anonymize personal identifiers.
• Research integrity: Ensure proper care of animal subjects and compliance with relevant laws and regulations.
• Authorship and disclosure: List only qualifying contributors as authors and disclose all competing and financial interests.
• Reviewer conduct: Preserve confidentiality in peer review and prevent misuse of unpublished material.
• AI tool usage: Authors may use artificial intelligence as a writing aid only. Authors retain full responsibility for the accuracy, originality, and integrity of the content.

Intellectual Property

Reviewers and editors must protect authors’ intellectual property. Reviewers will not use or disclose ideas from manuscripts under review without explicit permission obtained via the journal. Reviewers may consult colleagues for specific expertise only if confidentiality and the author’s intellectual property are preserved.

Post-publication Discussions

Readers may raise concerns or request clarification about published material through “Letters to the Editor.” Letters should focus on factual critique presented professionally; personal attacks or discriminatory language are not acceptable. Authors of the original article will be given an opportunity to respond. Post-publication handling will follow COPE guidance:

https://publicationethics.org/guidance/flowchart/handling-post-publication-critiques

Corrections and Retractions

Corrections
Minor corrections will be applied directly to the online article. For substantive corrections that affect interpretation or conclusions, a corrected version will be published and linked to the original article. A clear statement explaining the nature of the correction will accompany the revised version. Corrigenda (author errors) and errata (publisher errors) will be published at no charge.

Retractions and Removal

An article will be retracted when the integrity of the work is substantially compromised by errors, misconduct, or ethical breaches. Retracted articles will remain available with a clear retraction notice that is bi-directionally linked to the original. Retraction statements will normally indicate whether authors agree with the retraction. In exceptional circumstances—such as unlawful or potentially dangerous content, or by court or government order—the editorial office may remove content temporarily or permanently. In such cases, bibliographic metadata will be retained and accompanied by an explanatory statement.

Integrity of Scholarly Literature

Plagiarism
Plagiarism is prohibited and includes unattributed copying, presenting others’ ideas or words as one’s own, and self-plagiarism (recycling previously published work without appropriate citation). Submissions that have been published elsewhere in any language are not acceptable. Authors must inform the Editor-in-Chief on submission of any circumstances that could raise concerns about originality.

Citation Manipulation

Citation manipulation is forbidden. Examples include coercing authors to add irrelevant citations, citation stacking, excessive self-citation, and ghost citations. Violations may result in manuscript rejection, retraction, notification of affiliated institutions, and removal of individuals from editorial or reviewer roles.

Data Falsification and Manipulation

Authors must present data honestly and adhere to accepted reporting standards. Suspected falsification or manipulation will prompt a confidential investigation by the Editorial Board; findings may lead to corrections, retraction, sanctions, and institutional notification.