Publication Ethics Guidelines

The ethical principles governing the publication of articles in Studia Mazowieckie apply to all individuals involved in the publishing process, who are obliged to familiarise themselves with these guidelines.

• In cases of violations of the principles outlined below, the international standards of publication ethics established by COPE (Committee on Publication Ethics) will be applied. These standards are available at https://publicationethics.org.
• Submitted articles must be original (authored by the submitting author) and not previously published elsewhere.
• Submission of a manuscript to the Editorial Board constitutes a declaration that the author holds full copyright to the submitted text and consents to its publication in Studia Mazowieckie both in print (the journal’s primary version) and online.
• All submissions are subject to plagiarism screening using anti-plagiarism software (iThenticate).
• The Editorial Board does not accept any form of plagiarism, including self-plagiarism, copying of entire works or fragments thereof without proper attribution, claiming sole authorship of a text co-written with others, misappropriation of authorship, or publication of someone else's work with modifications (e.g., editorial or stylistic changes). Manuscripts found to be plagiarised will be immediately rejected, and the authors involved will be banned from submitting future articles.

Authors' Responsibilities:

• Prepare articles in accordance with the Author Guidelines,
• Present real and authentic research results not previously published elsewhere,
• Compile bibliographies reliably and follow the citation rules adopted by the journal—only works cited in the article should appear in the references,
• Draft the manuscript with due diligence and in accordance with the highest scholarly standards,
• Implement suggested revisions and correct errors indicated by reviewers, editors, or proofreaders; in case of disputes, authors should provide written justification for their objections,
• Declare the percentage of individual contributions in multi-author articles,
• Include acknowledgements for institutions or individuals who contributed to the article but do not meet the criteria for authorship, and indicate any financial support received (e.g., grants, subsidies, etc.).

Reviewers' Responsibilities:

• Complete the review using the form provided by the Editorial Board, including a clear conclusion on whether the article should be accepted or rejected,
• Provide objective, thorough, and fair reviews,
• Adhere to confidentiality standards,
• Declare any potential conflicts of interest (a conflict of interest is deemed to exist when there is a personal relationship between the reviewer and the author, such as familial ties, legal connections, personal conflict; a supervisory or professional dependency; or direct scientific collaboration within the two years preceding the review),
• Review only those articles that fall within their area of expertise and research interests,
• Avoid bias and refrain from emotional language in the review,
• Report any cases of plagiarism or other violations of publication ethics.

Editors' Responsibilities:

• Prevent conflicts of interest during the review, rejection, or acceptance of articles,
• Provide justified decisions on the acceptance or rejection of articles,
• Document any violations of publication ethics, including ghostwriting (excluding individuals who significantly contributed to the work) and guest authorship (including individuals as co-authors who made little or no contribution),
• Inform authors of any identified errors and request corrections or clarifications,
• Oversee the integrity of the peer-review process (ensuring anonymity and acting as intermediaries between reviewers and authors),
• Correct stylistic, grammatical, spelling, and punctuation errors and apply standard abbreviations without notifying the authors. Substantive errors will be corrected in consultation with the authors,
• Provide authors with a PDF file of the formatted article for final proofreading and approval prior to publication,
• Return manuscripts to authors for revision if they do not meet publication standards,
• Handle authors’ complaints appropriately,
• Publish corrections, clarifications, or apologies when justified.

Grounds for Rejection of Articles:

• Rejection after preliminary assessment by the Editor-in-Chief or subject editor due to failure to meet academic standards, topic inconsistency with the journal’s profile, serious language deficiencies, poor bibliography, or unethical practices as described in this publication ethics policy,
• Rejection following a negative peer review,
• Rejection due to the author's failure to submit the following: a declaration of copyright transfer, a conflict of interest statement, or a contribution statement (in the case of multi-author publications).

Furthermore, the Editorial Board upholds the integrity of the academic record. If it is found that a published article contains inaccuracies, misleading or falsified data, a notice will be published in a prominent place, and the article will be retracted, including from citation databases, to prevent further referencing.