Responsibilities of the Editorial Board

Responsibilities of the Editorial Board
The responsibilities of editors in scientific journals entail ensuring integrity and quality by managing the research review process, selecting appropriate reviewers, and making publication decisions based on reviewers' reports, all while maintaining the confidentiality of the process. They are also responsible for defining journal policies, developing content, and upholding research ethics.

Responsibilities of the Editor-in-Chief
Administrative and Ethical Leadership: Ensuring the integrity and ethical standards of scientific research, and establishing the journal's editorial policies.
Initial Review and Decision-Making: Receiving manuscripts, conducting initial reviews, and making final decisions regarding acceptance or rejection.
Oversight and Supervision: Supervising all administrative and editorial operations of the journal, and liaising with the editorial board and the publishing management.

Responsibilities of Other Editors
Managing the Peer Review Process: Selecting appropriate reviewers to evaluate manuscripts, ensuring the confidentiality of the review process, and addressing reviewers who provide inappropriate reviews.
Communicating with Authors: Ensuring manuscripts meet the journal's standards and informing authors of the final status of their submissions.
Maintaining Quality: Ensuring manuscripts are of high quality and align with the journal's scope and objectives.
Resolving Issues: Handling any publication-related issues, including those concerning errors or plagiarism.

Guidelines for Editors

Editors are responsible for managing the manuscript review process, making recommendations regarding acceptance or rejection, and encouraging the submission of high-quality articles.

The following guidelines for editors are derived from the COPE Code of Conduct and Best Practice Guidelines for Journal Editors.

Review Process

1- Editors must ensure that all assigned manuscripts are processed in a timely manner and that an initial decision is reached within three months.

2- Editors must make every effort to handle all assigned research papers, regardless of the subject area. Only in exceptional cases should a paper be returned to the section editor for reassignment. Section editors aim to distribute papers appropriately while ensuring a fair division of work among editorial board members. Occasionally, assigning an editor outside their specific field of expertise is unavoidable.

3- Even when the decision aligns fully with the reviewers' comments, editors must provide written feedback to the authors. In such instances, a brief summary of the reviewers' comments—consisting of one or two sentences—suffices.

4- Editors must be prepared to provide a convincing explanation for any significant deviation from established peer-review procedures.

5- Before accepting a review, editors must require reviewers to disclose any potential conflicts of interest. Editors should carefully evaluate reviewer performance and take appropriate measures to ensure a high standard of quality.

6- Editors should encourage reviewers to raise concerns regarding ethical issues and potential research or publication misconduct in submitted papers (such as unethical research methodology, data manipulation, or inappropriate presentation).

7- Reviewers should assess the originality of submitted papers and be alert to redundant publications and plagiarism.

Decision-Making

1- Editors' recommendations to accept or reject a paper for publication should be based on peer reviews and their own assessment of the paper's significance, originality, and clarity, as well as the validity of the study and its suitability for the journal's scope.

2- If a submitted paper does not meet the journal's standards, editors are encouraged to recommend its immediate rejection.

3- Editors should exercise caution when considering reversing a decision to accept a submitted paper—regarding decisions made by previous editors—and should do so only if substantial issues are identified.

4- New editors should refrain from reversing publication decisions unless they discover serious issues with the submitted paper.

5- In cases of suspected misconduct or disputes regarding authorship, it is the editors' responsibility to inform the Editor-in-Chief or the publisher and to handle the matter accordingly.