Responsibilities of Editors

Editors bear full responsibility for maintaining the academic quality and integrity of all published content.

• Editors shall evaluate manuscripts purely based on academic merit, originality, scientific rigor, and suitability for the journal’s scope, without discrimination based on the nationality, institutional affiliation, academic rank, gender, or other personal characteristics of authors.
• Editors must preserve the confidentiality of all submitted manuscripts. Unpublished manuscripts cannot be shared with any third party without explicit written consent from authors.
• Editors shall select qualified, appropriate peer reviewers with relevant expertise, avoiding conflicts of interest. Editors should recuse themselves from processing manuscripts where personal, institutional, or financial conflicts of interest exist.
• Editors implement fair, unbiased double-blind peer review. Editors shall treat all complaints regarding suspected academic misconduct seriously and launch formal investigations.
• Editors reserve the right to reject manuscripts at any stage prior to formal publication if severe ethical violations are confirmed.

Responsibilities of Peer Reviewers

• Reviewers who accept review invitations must complete evaluations within the agreed timeframe. Reviewers who cannot finish the task promptly should decline the invitation immediately.
• All review materials and manuscript content are strictly confidential. Reviewers are prohibited from copying, distributing, or using unpublished manuscript content for personal research purposes.
• Review comments must be objective, constructive, and supported by clear academic reasoning. Reviewers shall avoid hostile, offensive, or vague criticism.
• Reviewers must disclose any conflicts of interest, including prior collaboration, institutional connections, competitive research projects, or personal disputes with the manuscript authors.

Responsibilities of Authors

• Authors guarantee all submitted work is original research. Direct plagiarism, self-plagiarism, data fabrication, data falsification, image manipulation, and unauthorized reuse of published results are strictly prohibited.
• All individuals who satisfy standard authorship criteria must be listed as authors. Honorary authorship, ghost authorship, and exclusion of qualified contributors are forbidden.
• All sources of data, published literature, and collaborative work must be properly cited. Authors must accurately acknowledge prior relevant research findings.
• If errors or defects are found in a manuscript either before or after publication, authors are obligated to notify the editorial office promptly and cooperate with corrections, corrigenda, or retraction procedures.
• Authors must disclose conflicts of interest, including commercial funding, corporate sponsorship, patents, or financial relationships that may influence research conclusions.
• Multiple simultaneous submissions to different journals are prohibited. A manuscript cannot be submitted to other journals while under review by AIJSTR.

Handling of Academic Misconduct

• Suspected misconduct includes plagiarism, data forgery, manipulated experimental figures, duplicate publication, improper authorship, undisclosed conflicts of interest, and violation of research ethics.
• Once credible evidence of misconduct is received, the editorial office initiates a formal investigation. Authors will receive written notification and an opportunity to provide a formal response.
• Consequences of confirmed misconduct may include: immediate rejection of the manuscript, permanent rejection of all future submissions from involved authors, publication of an expression of concern, formal corrigendum, or full retraction of published articles.
• In serious circumstances, the journal reserves the right to notify the authors’ affiliated academic institutions.

Complaints and Appeals

Authors or reviewers who disagree with editorial decisions may submit a formal written appeal via official editorial email. All appeals will be reviewed objectively by the editorial board. Appeals must include clear supporting evidence; appeals without valid grounds will not be reconsidered.