Editors evaluate manuscripts objectively and make decisions based exclusively on academic merit, relevance to the journal’s scope, originality, methodological quality, ethical compliance, and reviewers’ recommendations.

Editors must protect the confidentiality of submitted manuscripts and must not disclose information about a submission to anyone other than the corresponding author, reviewers, prospective reviewers, authorized editorial staff, and the publisher when necessary.

Editorial decisions must remain independent from commercial, financial, institutional, political, or personal influence. The publisher does not interfere with individual editorial decisions.

Editors must disclose any actual, potential, or perceived conflict of interest. An editor must not handle a manuscript involving close collaborators, institutional colleagues, family members, personal relationships, competitors, or circumstances that may compromise impartiality.

Editors must take reasonable action when ethical concerns are raised regarding a submitted or published article. Allegations will be examined fairly, confidentially, and without prejudging the outcome.

Authors must present an accurate, original, complete, and verifiable account of their community service activities, methods, participants, findings, evaluation results, limitations, and impacts.

Manuscripts must not have been previously published and must not be under consideration by another journal at the same time. Submission of substantially similar manuscripts to more than one journal constitutes unethical publishing behavior.

Authors must appropriately cite all ideas, data, figures, methods, instruments, quotations, publications, and other materials obtained from external sources.

Authors must not fabricate, falsify, manipulate, omit, or misrepresent data, documentation, participant responses, program outcomes, photographs, tables, figures, or other evidence.

Authorship must be limited to individuals who have made substantial contributions to the conception, implementation, analysis, interpretation, drafting, or critical revision of the manuscript and who accept responsibility for the final published work.

Authors must disclose all financial support, institutional support, sponsorship, professional relationships, personal interests, and other circumstances that could influence or reasonably be perceived to influence the work.

Authors must promptly notify the editor when they discover a significant error or inaccuracy in a submitted or published manuscript and must cooperate in issuing a correction, withdrawal, expression of concern, or retraction when necessary.

Using another person’s words, ideas, data, images, or work without proper attribution.

Inventing data, activities, participants, documentation, results, citations, or evidence.

Manipulating methods, materials, images, data, or results so that the work is inaccurately represented.

Publishing or submitting substantially the same work to more than one journal.

Gift authorship, ghost authorship, guest authorship, omission of contributors, or unauthorized authorship changes.

Providing false reviewer identities, manipulating reviewer nominations, or interfering with the integrity of peer review.

Ethical concerns may be submitted to the Editor-in-Chief with relevant evidence and a clear explanation of the alleged misconduct.

The editorial team evaluates whether the allegation is credible, specific, supported by evidence, and within the journal’s responsibility.

The corresponding author and, when appropriate, all co-authors are informed of the concern and given a reasonable opportunity to provide an explanation and supporting documentation.

The journal may consult reviewers, editorial board members, independent experts, the author’s institution, research ethics committee, funding body, or other relevant authority while maintaining appropriate confidentiality.

Depending on the evidence and seriousness of the issue, the journal may request clarification or revision, reject the manuscript, withdraw the manuscript, publish a correction, issue an expression of concern, retract the article, notify relevant institutions, or impose restrictions on future submissions.

A correction may be published when an error affects part of an article but does not invalidate the overall findings, reliability, or integrity of the work.

An expression of concern may be issued when credible concerns exist but the available evidence is inconclusive, an investigation is incomplete, or an institutional decision is delayed.

An article may be retracted when its findings are unreliable because of major error or misconduct, when it contains plagiarism, unethical material, unauthorized data, duplicate publication, fabricated information, manipulated peer review, or other serious violations.