Ethics

PUBLICATION ETHICS

The rules of publication ethics, which aim to prevent the unfair publishing practices, are adopted and applied by the University of Warsaw Press (Wydawnictwa Uniwersytetu Warszawskiego – WUW), according to the guidelines of the Committee on Publication Ethics COPE and the Council of Science Editors (CSE).

Before they are accepted for publishing, monographs and journals submitted to WUW are verified for compliance with the rules of the publication ethics, reliability, and scientific value. We pay special attention to the review of the works and the proper course of the whole publishing process.


All monograph texts send to WUW and initially accepted for publishing are checked in the plagiarism detection software iThenticate.

To facilitate cooperation of authors, scientific editors, and reviewers with the publishing house, we publish the most significant ethical rules, which we follow in our activity.

The acceptance of the text for publication is ruled out if the author/s breached the rules of ethics while conducting research used in the publication, including, in particular, when:

• there is no written consent of the people (research participants, researchers, associates) to participate in the research;
• the rules of confidentiality considering the participants of the research have been breached;
• the participants had not been informed of the risks and dangers (physical, emotional, intellectual or affecting their reputation) resulting from the conducted research;
• there was an omission in terms of protection from the risks resulting from the conducted research;
• legal and ethical requirements were not followed in relation to people and animals participating in the research, human organs and tissues used in the research, and referring to the environmental protection;
• the proper respect was not shown in presenting the human remains and religious objects.

Rector’s Committee for the Ethics of Research Involving Human Participants University of Warsaw >>>

Rule of following the legal and professional norms

All people engaged in the research and the creation of the publication are obligated to follow the legal and professional ethic norms imposed by the professional organisations and the entities funding the research, for example, the European Commission (Research and innovation).

Rule of equal treatment

Race, gender identity, sexual orientation, religion, origin, nationality, age, civil and parental status, disability, and political views of the authors do not influence in any way the evaluation of the texts which are evaluated only in terms of substance.

Criteria for accepting the texts for publishing

In case of scientific monographs the publisher/ scientific editor, and in case of journals their executive editors decide which texts will be published. When accepting texts and publications, the opinions of the reviewers are taken into consideration regarding the scientific value of the work, originality, perspective on the problem, and clarity of the argument.

Prevention of conflicts of interests

Unpublished texts, confidential information, original ideas must be kept confidential and without a written consent they cannot be used by the employees of the publishing house or any other person involved in the publishing process. The authors, reviewers, and editors are obligated to disclose a potential conflict of interests, which could exclude them from partaking in the publishing process.

Rule of research reliability

The scientific editors of monographs written by several authors and the editorial boards of journals oversee the research reliability of the published works. In order to maintain it, they can introduce relevant changes and adjustments. In case of suspicions of malpractice (especially intentional plagiarism and falsification of the research findings), they are obligated to make a decision regarding the withdrawal of the publication and to inform the appropriate entities, such as institutions hiring the author, scientific societies, scientific editor societies, etc.

Withdrawal of the text

The publisher, the scientific editor of a monograph by several authors, and the executive editor of a journal have the right to withdraw the text from publishing if:

• there is evidence testifying to the lack of credibility of the findings of the research and/or the falsification of data, as well as in case of committing unintentional errors (for example, errors in calculations, methodological errors);
• the work shows signs of plagiarism or breaches the rules of publication ethics.

Authorship of a publication

The author is obliged to reliably describe the conducted research and to objectively interpret the findings. The works should contain information enabling the identification of the sources of data, as well as a repetition of the research. Presenting and interpreting data and findings of the research against the rules of publication ethics is unacceptable and may result in a withdrawal of the text. An author asked to present raw findings of the research used in the text is obligated to provide access to such data, also after the work has been published. Generally accepted rules of the authorship of the work were described by the Council of Science Editors (CSE).

The authors can submit for publishing only their own, original texts. The research and/or information originating from other scholars used in the publication should be marked in a way which makes the authorship unambiguous. Plagiarism, self-plagiarism, or data fabrication are unacceptable.

The authors submitting for publishing texts by several authors are obliged to disclose the contribution of each author to the creation of the text (including the affiliations of the authors and information about who is the author of the concepts, assumptions, methods, protocol, etc. used while creating the text).

Ghostwriting and guest authorship are indications of research unreliability and any case detected should be disclosed, and the appropriate entities, such as institutions hiring the author, scientific societies, scientific editor societies, etc. should be informed.

It is forbidden to:

• buy or sell the authorship of the academic works;
• include as co-authors of academic works people who did not have any substantive contribution, and only made it possible to secure funding of the research and to create the publication or can provide such funding in the future;
• mutual adding co-workers/colleagues as co-authors of the publication in order to increase the number of publications of the employees of a certain unit, without their actual substantive contribution to the publication;
• adding as a co-author an esteemed scholar on account of his surname increasing the chance for publishing of the work or ensuring a larger influence of the publication;
• using a higher academic or professional position by the elder scholars in order to coerce their younger colleagues, who are often their subordinates, into including them as co-authors in their works.

The author is obliged to list in the bibliography only those publications which have been used by the author when creating the text.

If the author discovers significant errors or inaccuracies in the text, he/she is obliged to inform the publisher about it in order to correct the occurred errors in the next edition or in the reprint.

Information regarding the use of AI in the author’s work is located in the AI Ethics tab (point II).

Reviewing of the publication

The reviewer carrying out the review should:

• have competences in the field in which the work is being published, the publisher (WUW) chooses two independent reviewers – individual scholars, affiliated outside the academy of the author, who have adequate specialised knowledge enabling the substantive evaluation of the reviewed work;
• inform the publisher about the potential conflict of interests; the reviewer cannot stay in close relations with the author, neither personal nor professional (scientific cooperation, subordination, financial benefits), if there is a conflict of interest between the reviewer and the author, the reviewer should refuse to carry out the review;
• maintain data confidentiality; the reviewer should not appropriate or use the reviewed work for their own needs and benefits, the reviewer also cannot share data included in the reviewed work with anyone not associated with the publishing process; the content of the works and the decisions made during the publishing process are confidential;
• remain objective while evaluating the work; the review should not be influenced by personal or professional views of the reviewer; the evaluation of the work should only refer to the substantive contents, it cannot take into account author’s race, origin, gender, sexual orientation, religion, or nationality;
• constructively criticise using substantive arguments; reviewer’s comments should indicate the positive and negative aspects of the work; pointing out errors should be substantive, clear, and comprehensible, including the ways to amend them in order to improve the quality of the work;
• conduct the review on time; the reviewer is obliged to conduct the review in a punctual way and in accordance with the publisher’s instructions; if the reviewer cannot hand in the work on time, the reviewer should inform the publisher about it.

In case of the suspicion of plagiarism, self-plagiarism, or data fabrication the reviewer should report the above-mentioned practices of the publisher, send the evidential documentation showing the similarities between the text and other works or the unreliability of the research process. Depending on the nature and the extent of plagiarism:

• in case of a monograph by a single author the publisher contacts the author, and then makes the final decision regarding the rejection of the text / the introduction of necessary adjustments;
• in case of a monograph by several authors the publisher contacts the executive editor, who after a conversation with the author makes the decision regarding the withdrawal of the text/ the introduction of adjustments.

The reviewer can suggest to add bibliographic entries in order to improve the substantive quality of the work. However, the practices of manipulating citations are unacceptable, including:

• allowing to excessively cite the author’s own works;
• suggesting to add an excessive number of bibliographic entries, especially publications of the reviewer and of the authors with connections to the reviewer, for example in order to falsely raise the number of citations.

Information regarding the use of AI in the reviewer’s work is located in the AI Ethics tab (point III).

Compare also:

AI Ethics

Review process