Ethical code

Any detected cases of improper behavior on the part of authors, reviewers or editors form the basis for taking appropriate actions on the part of the editorial staff and will be subject to appropriate restrictions.

ETHICAL EXPECTATIONS

Editorial duties:

• Editors should perform duties objectively, sustainably and fairly without discrimination against either of the parties.
• Editors should strive to meet the needs of authors and readers.
• Editors should constantly work to improve the quality of the magazine.
• Editors should control, analyze and accept articles for publication based on their scientific value, without commercial impact.
• Editors should reply to authors’ all complaints, which should be investigated no matter when the original publication was approved.
• Editors should make all documentation related to the publication procedure accessible to authors.
• Editors should make sound decisions about the acceptance or rejection of an article.
• Editors should provide a transparent review process.
• Editors should publish guidelines for reviewers.
• Editors take all steps to ensure an appropriate double-blind peer review process while maintaining the anonymity of the reviewers.
• Editors should monitor the manifestations of any violation of ethical issues.

Reviewers’ responsibilities:

• Reviewers should maintain the confidentiality of any information supplied by the editor or authors.
• Reviews should valuate objectively, without any conflict of interest (financial, institutional, collaborative or other relations between the reviewer and the author) with the researcher and/or the entities financing the research. The editor must be informed about such relations and the reviewer should withdraw his participation in the reviewing procedure for the given article.
• Reviewers should alert the editor to any published or submitted content that is substantially similar to that under review.

Authors’ responsibilities:

• All authors are required to participate in the review process.
• It is not allowed to publish the same research in more than one journal, using false data or plagiarism. All data contained in the article should be reliable and true.
• Authors should keep accurate records of data related to their submitted article, and supply or provide access to this data on a reasonable request of the journal's editorial office.
• Authors should confirm that all the work in the submitted manuscript is original. They should obtain permission to reproduce any content from other sources.
• All authors should make a significant contribution to the research described in the article submitted to the journal.
• Authors should confirm that the manuscript as submitted to the editorial office is not taken into account or accepted for publication elsewhere. In addition, they should provide the editor with a copy of each submitted article that may contain overlapping or closely related content.
• Authors should declare any potential conflicts of interest that could be considered as exerting undue influence, or recognized or viewed as having an excessive impact on their duties at any stage of the publication process.
• Authors should immediately notify the editor of the journal or publisher if a significant error in their publication is identified.
• Authors are obliged to exercise self-discipline in the field of unethical behavior.

PROCEDURES FOR DEALING WITH UNETHICAL BEHAVIOR:

• Misconduct and unethical behavior may be identified and brought to the attention of to the editor and publisher at any time, by anyone.
• Whoever informs the editor or publisher of such unethical conduct should provide sufficient information and evidence to initiate an investigation.
• Minor offenses can be resolved without the need to consult more widely. In any case, the author should have the opportunity to respond to all allegations.
• Serious offenses might require that the employers of the accused be notified. The editor, in consultation with the publisher, decides on whether or not to involve the author's employers.

SECURITY PROCEDURE AGAINST PHYSICAL "GHOSTWRITING" AND "GHOST AUTHORSHIP"

With the phenomenon of "Ghostwriting" we are dealing when one of the authors of the concept, idea, calculations, etc., the person who contributed to the publication was omitted in the group of authors, as well as in any acknowledgments included in the text. The phenomenon of "Ghost Authorship" refers to the situation when the author's participation in the creation of the publication is negligible or none, and yet it is mentioned among the authors. Considering the standards set for scientific journals by the Ministry of Science and Higher Education in Poland, editorial staff introduces the following principles counteract the phenomena of “Ghostwriting" and "Guest Authorship":

1. The author/authors of the publication are required to disclose the contribution of individual persons in the creation of publications in percentages (with their affiliation and contribution, i.e. who is the author of the concepts, assumptions, methods, protocol, etc. used in the preparation of the publication), the main one the author is responsible for submitting the text for printing.
2. The author/authors of the publication are obliged to inform about the sources of financing publications, contributions from other institutions, associations, business entities, both in financial and substantive support as well sharing data, documents, information.
   The editors reserve the right to collect and store all information on detected instances of “Ghostwriting" and "Ghost Authorship" and transmissions information about them to individuals (entities employing authors, societies scientific, editors of scientific publications).