Publication Ethics

Regulations on the ethics of scientific publications in scientific “Ukrainian society”

The Editorial Board of the scientific journal “Ukrainian Society” in its work is guided by ethics of international scientific publications, including the concepts of integrity, confidentiality, oversight of publications and prevention of possible conflicts of interest etc.

The editorial policy of the journal “Ukrainian Society” is based on the principles of objectivity and impartiality on the articles selection for their publications, high standards for quality research, mandatory articles’ review, support for new knowledge, observation of collective decision-making to publish the material, no abuse of power by members of the editorial board, accessibility and efficiency in communication with authors, strict compliance with copyright and condemnation of plagiarism, a declaration on the terms of use of artificial intelligence, conflict resolution mechanisms and error correction. Journal’s editors are prepared to publish corrections, clarifications and rebuttal if necessary. The editorial board of the journal “Ukrainian society” is guided in its work by international ethical standards for scientific publications and adheres to open access policy – supports the Budapest Open Access Initiative aimed at free and gratis dissemination of scientific knowledge, which facilitates the rapid development of science.

Editors, in turn, is follows the recommendations of the Committee on Publication Ethics, and, in particular, the Publishing Ethics Resource Kit by publisher Elsevie, and based on the experience of reputable international publishers.

Compliance with the rules of publications ethics of the all parties of the publishing process helps to ensure the intellectual property rights of creators, improvement of publication quality and prevention of possible misuse of copyrighted material for the benefit of individuals.

This Regulation meets the policy of the journal and is one of the main components of article review and journal publishing.

Principles of professional ethics in editorial group

All materials (except for reviews and communications of an informational nature) are subject to a two-way “blind” external review (neither the reviewer nor the author is aware of each other) performed by specialists in the relevant field (at least 3 reviewers).
In the case of a negative review, a discrepancy between the material of the profile and the policy of the magazine, the requirements for the design or the existence of substantial remarks, the article may be rejected (as the author is informed in a letter) or returned to the author for revision. The article, revised by the author, is reviewed again.
After proper revision and positive reviews, the article is considered at the meeting of the editorial board, where final approval is made by open voting.
The editorial staff reserves the right to edit, reduce the materials accepted for publication (without distorting the position of the author).
Editors, authors, and reviewers should report on their interests that may affect their objectivity in editing and reviewing article materials (case of conflict of interest). Such may be the interests of the intellectual matter or financial, personal, political and religious.
After approval of the article for publication, each author signs License Agreement. Copyrights are kept by the author.
The contents of the journal with the author, the title of the article, the abstract, the keywords, the references and full text of the work to it are posted on the website of the Ukrainian Society magazine immediately after the publication of the printed version of the magazine.
The editor-in-chief and editorial staff do not provide other persons with information related to the contents of the article under consideration, except for persons involved in the professional evaluation of this manuscript (reviewers).
The editor-in-chief, together with the publisher, should not make unanswered claims regarding the articles or published articles in question. In the event of a conflict situation, they must take all necessary measures to restore the infringed rights, and in the event of errors, to promote the publication of corrections or refutations.
Editor and editorial staff should ensure the confidentiality of names and other information pertaining to reviewers. If necessary, when deciding on the involvement of a new reviewer, the latter may be informed about the names of previous reviewers.
Editors have no right to involve ChatGPT Artificial Intelligence when editing article manuscripts. Chatbots store the prompts given to them, including the manuscript’s content, so providing the material to a chatbot violates the confidentiality of the submitted manuscript.
If a plagiarism is detected, the article is rejected (or sent for a follow-up revision if the source or quotation is not formatted according to the requirements). The amount of borrowed text in the article should not exceed 25%. If plagiarism is detected in an already published article, it will be retracted by the Editorial Board of the journal following the procedure for retraction of already published articles. The electronic version of the notice of retraction is published on the page of the corresponding article and in the next printed issue of the journal after the fact of violation of academic integrity is discovered. The notice must contain the reason for the retraction and the name of the person who initiated it. The article on the web resource is preserved unchanged, except for a “retracted” watermark on each page in the pdf file. Manuscripts of authors whose articles contain signs of plagiarism will not be accepted for consideration by the journal for at least two years.

Principles of professional ethics in the work of the editorial board

The editorial board (including editor-in-chief) is responsible for the scientific level of the publication.
When making a decision on publication, the editorial board (including the editor-in-chief) of the scientific journal is guided by the reliability of the submitted data and the scientific significance of the article.
The editorial board reserves the right to reject the article (if it does not meet the profile and policy of the magazine or requirements for registration) or return it for revision.
The editorial board shall, without prejudice, consider all manuscripts submitted for publication, evaluating each article properly, regardless of racу, religion, nationality, citizenship, gender, as well as the place of work, position, academic degree, academic title of the author(s).
The editorial board adopts fair and impartial decisions that are independent of commercial or other interests and ensures an honest review process.
The editorial board of the magazine opposes falsification, plagiarism, sending of one work in several journals, copying the contents of the article in different works repeatedly, misleading the public about the real Contribution of authors to publication.
The editorial board is responsible for the retraction (official withdrawal or at the author’s initiative) of a published scientific article, initiated in the event of violations of publication ethics and/or other significant shortcomings (errors, plagiarism, or incorrect borrowing of text, ideas, data, or research results, lack of proper references to the original sources of data, republication of the same article in another publication without proper justification, inclusion of authors who did not make a significant scientific contribution to the research, or exclusion of authors who did make such a contribution, detection of unethical review process, the existence of conflict of interest that could have influenced or did influence the results of the research), that make it impossible to reliably use the results of such an article. Following the retraction of the article, it is stored in the archive of the scientific journal, accompanied by a clear indication of the retraction (watermark). The editorial board informs the author who provided the article about this fact.
Members of the editorial board should provide true personal data (last name, name in Ukrainian and English, place of work, position, ORCID, Scopus Author ID, Web of Science ResearcherIDcontact information, etc.), and if they change, inform the editorial board about it.

Ethical principles of the reviewer

The reviewer provides scientific expertise of copyrighted material in order to objectively evaluate the quality of the submitted article and determine the level of its compliance with scientific, literary and ethical standards. In assessing the article the reviewer should be impartial.
Expert evaluation should help the author improve the quality of the text and the editor-in-chief and editorial board to decide on publication.
In the review, the reviewer covers the following questions: Does the content of the article correspond to the topic stated in the title; whether the article contains sufficient material for publication; Does it require shortening, refinement (text, figures, tables), whether there is satisfactory compliance with the requirements for presentation, and the processing of graphic material.
The reasons for a negative review may be lack of novelty, insufficient evidence base, inability to draw conclusions (or their unfoundedness) and outline the prospect, incorrect use of the terminology and methodological apparatus, etc.
The reviewer who does not consider themselves an expert in the subject of the article or know that they cannot submit a timely review of the article should notify the editor-in-chief and decline to review.
The reviewer cannot be the author or co-author of the work presented for review.
Any manuscripts received by an expert from the editors for review shall be a confidential document.
The reviewer must be objective. It is unacceptable to make personal remarks towards the author and respect the intellectual independence of the authors.
The reviewer must identify published articles related to the reviewed articles, not cited by the author. Any statement in the review that some observations, conclusions or arguments in the reviewed article have previously appeared in literature should be accompanied by an accurate bibliographic reference to the source. The reviewer should also draw the attention of the chief editor to significant overlap or similarity of a reviewed article with any other previously published.
In the event of a reviewer suspecting plagiarism, authorship or falsification of data, they must contact the editorial board with a proposal for collective consideration of the author’s article (it can use software, in particular).
The reviewer should not use the information and ideas presented for review in the article for personal gain, following the principle of confidentiality.
The reviewer shall not accept for review manuscripts in cases of a conflict of interest caused by competition, cooperation, or other relationship with any authors or institutions associated with the article.
In the case of interdisciplinary subjects, the reviewer may offer an additional reviewer.
Reviewers have no right to involve ChatGPT Artificial Intelligence in conducting scientific examination of manuscripts of the articles submitted for review. Chatbots store the prompts given to them, including the manuscript’s content, so providing the material to a chatbot violates the confidentiality of the submitted manuscript.

Ethical principles of the author

The authors are personally responsible for submitted to the journal manuscript.
Authors should provide reliable results of the conducted research. False or fraudulent.
Ensure that research results contained in the manuscript, are an independent and original work. When using fragments of others’ work and/or borrowing statements of other authors, the article should have appropriate references with the obligatory indication of the author and the source. Excessive borrowing and plagiarism in any form, including incomplete references, paraphrasing or appropriation of rights to the results of others’ research is unethical and unacceptable.
Authors should not allow self-citation, except when the given material is a continuation of the cycle of articles.
Authors should recognize the contribution of all persons who influenced in any way the course of the study or determined the nature of the presented scientific research. In particular, the article should have references to publications that had some significance for the study.
Authors should present in the journal only the original manuscript. Do not submit to the journal articles that have been sent to another journal and are now pending review, as well as articles published previously in another journal. Failure to observe this principle is regarded as gross misconduct of publication ethics and gives reason for removing the article from the review. If elements of the manuscript were previously published in another article, the authors are obliged to refer to their earlier work and specify how the new work is significantly different from the previous one. Verbatim copying of own work and its paraphrasing is unacceptable, it can only be used as a basis for new conclusions.
Authors should ensure the correct composition of the list of co-authors. The co-authors of the article should include all the persons who have made a significant intellectual contribution to its concept, structure and in the conduct or interpretation of results of the presented work. Other persons (or organizations) who participated in some aspect of the work must be expressed gratitude. The author must also ensure that all co-authors are familiar with the final version of the article, approve it and agree to its submission for publication. All of the authors of the article have to bear public responsibility for the content of the article. If the article is a multidisciplinary work, co-authors are responsible each for their own contribution, leaving a collective responsibility for the overall result. It is unacceptable to include persons in co-authors who were not involved in the research. Each author (co-author) signs a License Agreement for the use of the work.
The authors should clearly indicate the sources of all quoted or submitted information and duly draw reference to the literary sources used in the work, according to the requirements of DSTU 8302: 2015 and for references – APA-2010. Authors are required to cite sources that have significantly influenced their research and manuscript properly. Information received in private conversation or correspondence with third parties during the examination of project applications, manuscripts, and similar materials is not to be used without the written consent of the source of the information.
In case of revealing of material errors or inaccuracies in the article at the stage of its consideration or after publication, the author must immediately inform the editorial staff of the magazine and make a joint decision on recognition and/or correction of the error as soon as possible. If the editorial staff of the magazine becomes aware that the published work contains material errors, the author is obliged to immediately prepare for the publication in the journal of the relevant corrections or provide proof of correctness of the information provided.
Authors should specify in their manuscripts all sources of financial support for the project, information about the employer, patent applications/registrations, grants and other types of funding.
Disclose in their works about any information about significant conflicts of interest that could affect the results of the study or their interpretation. All potential conflicts of interest should be disclosed at the earliest stage possible.
Authors should provide updated and true personal data (last name, name in Ukrainian, Russian and English, place of work, position, if available – reference to the scientific profile, in particular ORCID, Scopus Author ID, Web of Science ResearcherID, contact information, etc.), and in case of their change (from the moment of submission articles before its publication) to inform the editorial office.
If artificial intelligence, in particular ChatGPT, was used at any stage of the research (e.g., for text editing, etc.), the authors must indicate how they used AI when submitting the article for review. A manuscript in which AI-generated content is detected without an appropriate indication of this in the author’s manuscript will be rejected.
Self-archiving policy. Authors themselves can deposit the publishing version (final pdf) of their article in the institutional repository, thematic repository, or general-purpose repository, on a personal web page (in particular, on social networks such as Research Gate, Academia.edu, etc.), and/or the web resource of the institution, where the author works, at any time after publication.In this case, one needs to provide full bibliographic information about the original publication (authors, article title, journal title, volume, issue, pages) and a link to the article’s DOI and its license.

Principles of professional ethics in publisher activity

The publisher is responsible for the publication of works.
Facilitate implementation of ethical responsibilities of editors, editorial and publishing group, editorial board, reviewers and authors in accordance with these requirement.
Support the journal in reviewing claims to the ethical aspects of published materials and help interact with other journals and/or publishers if it facilitates the duties of editors.
Observe the position that the activity of the journal is not commercial and does not intend to obtain profit.
Facilitate the process of publishing corrections, explanations, refutations and apologies when needed, as well as article retractions.

Retraction policy

The editorial board is responsible for the retraction (official withdrawal or at the author’s initiative) of a published scientific article, initiated in the event of violations of publication ethics and/or other significant shortcomings (errors, plagiarism, or incorrect borrowing of text, ideas, data, or research results, lack of proper references to the original sources of data, republication of the same article in another publication without proper justification, inclusion of authors who did not make a significant scientific contribution to the research, or exclusion of authors who did make such a contribution, detection of unethical review process, the existence of conflict of interest that could have influenced or did influence the results of the research), that make it impossible to reliably use the results of such an article.

Occasionally, a retraction procedure may be used to correct errors in a manuscript or publication. The primary purpose of a retraction is to correct an error while preserving the integrity of the scientific research, not to punish the author.

The reason for the retraction and the person initiating it is stated clearly in the retraction notice for any retracted article.In the electronic version, the retraction note has a link to the original article. There is a link to a retraction note in the electronic version of the original article that clearly states that the article has been retracted.The original article remains unchanged except for a watermark in the pdf file on each page stating that it is “retracted”.

Procedure for Handling Complaints on Academic Integrity and Publication Ethics Violations

Review procedure for complaints by the editorial board:

1. Filing a complaint: a complaint may be filed by an author, reviewer, reader, or any other member of the scientific community; complaint must be submitted in writing (by email to the journal’s editorial office) and contain: a clear description of the nature of the violation, evidence (references to sources, copies of documents, excerpts from texts, etc.), and the complainant’s contact details.

2. Initial review: the complaint is registered by the deputy chief editor. The chief editor conducts a preliminary analysis of the complaint to determine whether it concerns issues of academic integrity and publication ethics. If the data is insufficient, the applicant may be asked to provide additional materials.

3. Review of the complaint by the editorial board: the complaint is forwarded to the editorial board for review. The editorial board considers the nature of the violation (e.g. plagiarism, data falsification, duplicate publication, improper authorship, violation of the review procedure, etc.); the scale and consequences of the violation, and the available evidence. If necessary, independent experts are involved.

4. Decision-making: the editorial board may take one of the following decisions: reject the complaint (if it is unfounded or not supported by evidence); make comments to the authors and oblige them to correct the errors; reject the article (if the violation is detected at the review stage); retract an already published article (with a corresponding official publication of the retraction); notify the author’s scientific institution or employer of the violations; refuse the author further publications in the journal for a specified period of time.

5. Notification of the parties: the author(s) and the applicant receive written notification of the results of the review. In the event of an article being retracted, a notice stating the reasons is published on the journal’s website.

6. Appeal: the author or complainant has the right to appeal within 30 days of receiving the decision. The appeal is considered by the chief editor and (if necessary) members of the editorial board or external experts.

7. Principles of the process: transparency – the procedure is clearly regulated and available for review on the journal’s website; confidentiality – complainants and reviewers remain anonymous (at their request); impartiality – decisions are made collectively, taking into account all evidence; compliance with international standards – the procedure is based on the principles of COPE (Committee on Publication Ethics).

Compliance with the principles and recommendations of COPE, WAME, DORA, etc.

The editorial board of the journal adheres to the following principles and recommendations of international organisations:

1. COPE (Committee on Publication Ethics)

The journal must adhere to the ethical standards defined by COPE: transparency in the submission, review and publication of articles; impartiality and independence of editors and reviewers; academic integrity – avoidance of plagiarism, falsification, duplicate publication; correct authorship – clear definition of the contribution of each author; handling complaints – open and clear procedures for considering appeals and complaints regarding ethics; retraction and correction of articles – clear procedures for retraction, corrections and error notifications.

2. WAME (World Association of Medical Editors, principles for editors of all sciences)

WAME recommendations can be applied in a broader context: editorial independence – editorial decisions are made without pressure from sponsors, institutions or commercial interests; conflicts of interest – all authors, reviewers and editors are required to declare any conflict of interest; peer review – ensuring objective, fair and timely expert evaluation; transparency of funding – disclosure of information about grants, sponsors and sources of research funding; support for young scientists – promoting publications by researchers at the early stages of their careers.

3. DORA (San Francisco Declaration on Research Assessment)

The journal should uphold the principles of fair assessment of scientific activity: not limited to bibliometric indicators (impact factor, h-index), but evaluating research for its quality, novelty and contribution to science; value different types of research results – software, data, algorithms, technical solutions, not just articles; recognise interdisciplinary research as equivalent to classical publications; encourage open science – publication of preprints, open access to data and codes.

4. ICMJE (International Committee of Medical Journal Editors – general principles for all sciences)

Authorship criteria – only individulas who have made a significant contribution to the work are considered authors.

Research ethics – compliance with standards for working with data, human participants and experiments.

Data openness – encouraging authors to preserve and provide access to research data.

5. Other contemporary principles (Open Science, Plan S, FAIR Data)

Open Access – promoting open access to scientific results.

FAIR principles for data (Findable, Accessible, Interoperable, Reusable) – ensuring that data can be found, accessed, interoperable and reused.

Plan S – supporting a policy of publishing in open journals and archives.

Ethical use of AI – adherence to transparency and accountability when using artificial intelligence in research.

Ethical Oversight Policy

The Journal adheres to strict ethical standards for research involving human subjects, animals, or sensitive data

Human and Animal Subjects: for all research involving humans, animals, or biological materials, authors must obtain mandatory approval from an Institutional Review Board (IRB) or a local Ethics Committee.

Personal and Confidential Data: research involving personal data must strictly comply with the Law of Ukraine “On Protection of Personal Data” and relevant international standards (e.g., GDPR). Authors must confirm that informed consent was obtained from all participants.

Documentation: the Editorial Board reserves the right to request copies of ethical approvals and consent forms. The manuscript must specify the name of the approving ethical body and the protocol reference number.