5 Ethical and Legal Considerations

Covert duplicate publication violates the ethics of scientific publishing and may constitute a violation of copyright law. Editors have a duty to inform prospective authors of their policies on duplicate publication, which should be published in their instructions for authors. Reviewers should notify editors of the existence of duplicate articles discovered during their review. Authors should send copies of all duplicate or overlapping articles and manuscripts with their submitted manuscripts. Authors should also include citations to highly similar articles and any reports from the same study under their authorship in the reference list of the submitted manuscript. When in doubt ...Less

A final editorial procedure that should be a part of every journal’s operation is quality review. After publication, editorial and production staff and advisers should review each issue for content errors (which, if detected, should be considered for publication as corrections), problems in presentation and format, and general appearance. All editorial and publishing staff should have the opportunity to participate in the quality review process, and all errors, problems, and suggestions for improvement should be communicated to the editor as well as those directly involved in editing and producing the publication. ...Less

I believe the editor is the primary source for ethicalresponsibility among professional publications.   George D. Lundberg, MDCoupled with the autonomy and authority that come with editorial freedom are responsibility and accountability (see also , Editorial Freedom and Integrity). Editors are responsible for determining the journal’s content, ensuring the quality of the journal, directing editorial staff and board members, developing and maintaining procedures, and creating and enforcing policies that allow the publication to meet its mission and goals effectively, efficiently, and ethically and in a fiscally responsible manner. This section focuses primarily on decision-making editors (ie, editors in chief and other editors, ...Less

Editors should follow consistent procedures to evaluate papers and make decisions regarding acceptance (see , Editorial Responsibility for Manuscript Assessment). Editors should inform authors of acceptance of their manuscripts in a letter that describes the subsequent process of publication, including substantive editing and any remaining queries; editing of the manuscript, tables, and figures for accuracy, consistency, clarity, style, grammar, and formatting; and what material the author will be expected to review and approve before publication. Editors may also provide an approximate timetable for the publication process. If authors are given an expected date of publication, they should be informed of ...Less

The editor should establish and maintain procedures and policies for appropriate editorial assessment and decisions to accept, request revision of, and reject mansucripts (see also , Editorial Assessment and Processing). The editor also establishes whether such decisions will be made unilaterally or by other editors (eg, deputy, associate, assistant, contributing, section, or guest editor) or in collaboration. Factors used to determine decisions should be made available to authors and reviewers. For example, JAMA editors use the following general criteria to evaluate manuscripts: material is original, writing is clear, study methods are appropriate, data are valid, conclusions are reasonable and supported ...Less

Decisions about manuscripts are made by editors, not peer reviewers. Reviewers offer valuable advice, serve as consultants to the editor, and may make recommendations about a paper’s suitability for publication, but all editorial decisions should be made by the editors. Editors are obliged to be courteous to peer reviewers, provide them with guidance and explicit instructions, assign only those papers that are appropriate to specific reviewers (in terms of reviewer expertise and interest), maintain confidentiality if using blind or anonymous review, provide reviewers with sufficient time to conduct their review, and avoid overworking them., Editors should ask reviewers in advance ...Less

Rejecting manuscripts may be one of the most important responsibilities of an editor. By rejecting papers appropriately, an editor sets standards and defines the editorial content for the journal. Decisions to reject a manuscript may be based on a wide range of factors, such as lack of originality, lack of importance or relevance to the journal’s readers, poor writing, flawed methods, scientific weakness, invalid data, biased interpretations and/or conclusions, timeliness, or the specific publishing priorities of the journal. A rejection letter must be carefully worded to avoid offending the author and should express regret for the outcome, but also must ...Less

The editor’s impartial focus on improving a manuscript faciliates the process of revision. According to Morgan, “in letters requesting revision the editor should use an impersonal tone in criticizing.” All such communication is best if the tone is objective and constructive. Editors should clearly communicate to authors what is expected in a revision; it may be helpful for editors to request that authors submit revised manuscripts with changes, additions, and deletions indicated and a cover letter itemizing the changes made in response to the editor’s and reviewers' comments and suggestions.Editors are obligated to use sound editorial reasoning in requesting a ...Less

A news embargo is an agreement between journals and news reporters and their organizations not to report information contained in a manuscript that has been accepted but not yet published until a specified date and time in exchange for advance access to the information. Among medical journals, the embargo system may have been initiated by Morris Fishbein, MD, editor of JAMA between 1924 and 1949.As an example, the standard embargo date and time for JAMA is 3 pm central time on the day before the journal’s cover date (issue publication date). Qualified journalists are given early access to the journal ...Less

As described by Davies and Rennie, the relationship between editors and publishers/owners is interdependent and must be based on mutual trust. However, there are bound to be uncertainties, concerns, and occasional conflicts that could threaten the trust relationship. To maintain trust, a formal agreement between the editor and owner should specify each party’s expectations and the mission of the journal (for example, see JAMA’s governance plan, and Key and Critical Objectives reproduced in Box ). If these expectations are not formalized in a governance plan or other document, are not mutually understood, or are intentionally disregarded (as happened in the ...Less