The rules this journal works to

Single-blind by default; double-blind review is available on request.

All submissions undergo initial editorial screening. Manuscripts that meet the journal’s scope and minimum requirements proceed to independent peer review.

Manuscripts that proceed to external peer review are normally evaluated by at least two independent subject-matter experts.

Reviewers are selected for subject expertise and assessed for conflicts before they are invited.

Editorial decisions are based on scope, scientific quality, methodological rigor, ethical compliance, reporting quality, and relevance to the journal.

Editorial decisions remain independent of fees, services, memberships, and roles.

Editors recuse themselves from decisions on their own submissions; those manuscripts are handled independently.

Every listed author must have contributed substantially to the work and must be able to take responsibility for the part they contributed. Anyone who does not meet that standard is acknowledged rather than listed.

Changes to authorship after submission require the written agreement of all authors, including any author being added or removed.

Authors disclose funding sources and any financial or institutional relationships that could bear on the work. Editors and reviewers disclose the same and withdraw where a conflict would affect their judgment.

Studies involving people report ethics-committee or institutional review board approval, together with the consent procedures followed. Research involving animals reports the approval and welfare standards under which it was carried out.

Interventional clinical trials must be registered in an accepted public trial registry at or before the first participant provides consent for enrollment. The registry name, registration number, and registration date must be reported in the manuscript.

Every empirical research manuscript must include a data-availability statement.

Manuscripts report enough methodological detail for another team to evaluate and repeat the work, and follow the reporting guideline appropriate to the study design.

The published record is corrected rather than quietly amended. Where a correction, expression of concern or retraction is issued, it is published as its own citable record, linked to the original, and the original article remains available so the record stays complete.

The journal’s archive lists every such notice alongside the research it concerns.

Submitted manuscripts are screened for originality. Where a concern about integrity is raised, before or after publication, it is investigated with the authors and their institution as appropriate, and the outcome is reflected in the published record.

Authors who need to withdraw a manuscript follow the terms set out on the Article Processing Charges page.

Read the withdrawal policy