Publication Ethics

WUJUD: Journal of Engineering and Technology

WUJUD: Journal of Engineering and Technology is committed to maintaining high standards of integrity, transparency, accountability, and ethical conduct in scholarly publishing. The journal follows internationally recognized principles of publication ethics and good editorial practice, particularly the guidance provided by the Committee on Publication Ethics (COPE). All parties involved in the publication process, including authors, editors, reviewers, and the publisher, are expected to uphold ethical principles throughout submission, editorial evaluation, peer review, publication, and post-publication activities.

Core Principles of Publication Ethics

WUJUD: Journal of Engineering and Technology applies the principles of transparency, integrity, accountability, editorial independence, and best practice in scholarly publishing. The journal's publication ethics framework covers the following core principles:

No.	Ethical Principle	Description
1	Allegations of Research Misconduct	The journal maintains clear procedures for receiving, examining, and responding to allegations of research or publication misconduct before and after publication.
2	Authorship and Contributorship	Authorship must accurately reflect substantial intellectual contributions, while legitimate contributions that do not meet authorship criteria should be appropriately acknowledged.
3	Complaints and Appeals	The journal provides fair and transparent procedures for handling complaints and appeals concerning editorial decisions, peer review, editorial conduct, or published content.
4	Conflict of Interest and Competing Interests	Authors, reviewers, and editors must disclose financial, institutional, professional, personal, academic, or other interests that may influence the publication process.
5	Data and Reproducibility	Authors should maintain accurate research records and provide sufficient methodological and data information to support verification and reproducibility where appropriate.
6	Ethical Oversight	Research involving humans, animals, confidential information, sensitive data, or other ethically regulated subjects must comply with relevant ethical requirements.
7	Intellectual Property	Copyright, licensing, attribution, permissions, citation practices, and other intellectual property rights must be respected throughout the publication process.
8	Journal Management	The journal maintains transparent editorial policies, responsible governance, editorial independence, secure journal management, and accountable publishing procedures.
9	Peer-Review Process	Submitted manuscripts are evaluated through an objective, confidential, independent, and academically responsible peer-review process.
10	Post-Publication Discussions, Corrections, and Retractions	The journal provides mechanisms for scholarly post-publication discussion and for issuing corrections, errata, corrigenda, expressions of concern, or retractions when necessary.

Duties and Responsibilities of Editors

Editors are responsible for maintaining the integrity, quality, impartiality, and confidentiality of the editorial process. Editorial decisions must be based on the academic merit, originality, relevance, methodological soundness, and contribution of the manuscript to engineering and technology.

Evaluate manuscripts fairly and objectively without inappropriate discrimination.
Ensure that manuscripts undergo appropriate editorial screening and peer review.
Maintain the confidentiality of submitted manuscripts and editorial communications.
Avoid conflicts of interest and transfer manuscript handling when a conflict exists.
Identify and appropriately respond to suspected plagiarism, fabrication, falsification, duplicate publication, inappropriate authorship, or other misconduct.
Make publication decisions independently and based on scholarly considerations.
Take appropriate corrective action when credible concerns arise regarding published articles.

Duties and Responsibilities of Reviewers

Peer reviewers play an essential role in safeguarding the scientific quality of articles published by the journal. Reviews must be objective, constructive, confidential, timely, and independent.

Accept review assignments only when the manuscript falls within their area of expertise.
Decline assignments when unable to provide an objective or timely review.
Declare actual or potential conflicts of interest before accepting a review assignment.
Treat manuscripts and all related documents as confidential materials.
Provide clear, scholarly, respectful, substantive, and constructive comments.
Identify relevant published work that has not been appropriately acknowledged when applicable.
Never use unpublished information obtained through peer review for personal or professional advantage.
Maintain independent scholarly judgment throughout the peer-review process.

Duties and Responsibilities of Authors

Submit original, accurate, and academically responsible work.
Ensure that the manuscript has not been published previously and is not simultaneously submitted to another journal.
Properly acknowledge all sources, ideas, methods, data, figures, and previous works used.
Ensure that all listed authors satisfy legitimate authorship criteria.
Disclose research funding and any financial or non-financial competing interests.
Maintain research data and provide supporting information when reasonably required for editorial evaluation or verification.
Obtain relevant ethical approval or clearance when the research requires ethical oversight.
Promptly notify the journal when a significant error or inaccuracy is identified after publication.

Authorship and Contributorship

Authorship must accurately represent substantial intellectual contributions to the research and manuscript. Individuals who have contributed substantially to the conception, design, execution, analysis, interpretation, or preparation of the manuscript should be appropriately recognized. Individuals who have not made a legitimate contribution must not be included as authors. Contributors who do not meet authorship criteria may be acknowledged with appropriate permission.

Research and Publication Misconduct

WUJUD: Journal of Engineering and Technology does not tolerate research or publication misconduct. Forms of misconduct include, but are not limited to:

Fabrication: creating false or nonexistent research data or information.
Falsification: improperly manipulating research materials, processes, instruments, data, or results.
Plagiarism: using another person's ideas, expressions, data, theories, images, or other intellectual work without appropriate acknowledgement.
Unethical Authorship: adding individuals who did not contribute, removing legitimate contributors, or assigning authorship without an appropriate intellectual contribution.
Conflict of Interest: allowing personal, institutional, financial, professional, or other interests to improperly influence research or publication decisions.
Duplicate or Multiple Submission: submitting substantially the same manuscript to more than one journal simultaneously or republishing substantially identical work without appropriate disclosure.

Plagiarism and Similarity Screening

Submitted manuscripts may be examined using appropriate similarity-detection software. Similarity reports are used as an editorial assessment tool and do not automatically determine whether plagiarism has occurred. Editors evaluate the source, extent, pattern, and context of similarities. Manuscripts containing plagiarism, inappropriate duplication, unattributed copying, or other serious ethical concerns may be rejected, returned for clarification or correction, or subjected to further investigation.

Conflict of Interest and Competing Interests

Authors, editors, and reviewers must disclose any financial, institutional, professional, academic, personal, or other relationship that could reasonably be perceived to influence research, interpretation of findings, peer review, editorial evaluation, or publication decisions. When an editor has a conflict of interest with a submission, responsibility for handling the manuscript must be transferred to another qualified editor.

Research Data and Reproducibility

Authors are expected to maintain accurate records of research data and provide sufficient methodological information to permit appropriate scientific evaluation and, where applicable, reproducibility. Research data should be made available when appropriate and ethically permissible, while respecting participant confidentiality, intellectual property rights, institutional requirements, and applicable regulations.

Ethical Oversight

Research involving human participants, animals, confidential information, potentially sensitive technologies, personal data, or other subjects requiring ethical supervision must comply with applicable ethical principles and institutional requirements. Where relevant, authors must provide information regarding ethical approval, informed consent, institutional review, or other appropriate ethical clearance.

Intellectual Property and Copyright

Authors must respect intellectual property rights and properly acknowledge copyrighted materials, software, datasets, figures, tables, photographs, designs, technical drawings, patents, and other protected works used in their manuscripts. Authors are responsible for obtaining necessary permissions when required.

Peer-Review Integrity

The journal applies a peer-review process intended to provide independent and academically responsible assessment of submitted manuscripts. Reviewer selection is based on relevant expertise and consideration of potential conflicts of interest. Reviewer comments should provide meaningful substantive evaluation rather than merely addressing formatting or language. The final decision regarding acceptance, revision, or rejection remains the responsibility of the editor.

Use of Artificial Intelligence

Authors remain fully responsible for the originality, accuracy, integrity, citations, interpretations, and conclusions of their manuscripts regardless of whether Artificial Intelligence tools have been used during manuscript preparation.

Artificial Intelligence must not replace intellectual responsibility, scientific judgment, authorship responsibility, or independent peer review. Where Artificial Intelligence materially contributes to manuscript preparation, its use should be disclosed transparently in accordance with the journal's policy. Artificial Intelligence tools cannot be listed as authors.

Corrections, Errata, Corrigenda, and Retractions

WUJUD: Journal of Engineering and Technology is committed to preserving the accuracy and integrity of the scholarly record. When significant errors, inaccuracies, or ethical concerns are identified after publication, the journal may take appropriate corrective action.

Erratum: may be issued when a significant error originates from the journal or production process.
Corrigendum: may be issued when an error originates from the author but does not invalidate the principal findings of the article.
Expression of Concern: may be issued when serious concerns exist but available evidence is not yet sufficient to justify a correction or retraction.
Retraction: may be applied when findings are unreliable because of serious error or misconduct, including plagiarism, fabrication, falsification, redundant publication, unethical research, or another major violation of publication integrity.

Retracted articles will not simply be removed from the scholarly record. The journal will maintain appropriate metadata and clearly indicate the retracted status of the article together with relevant information explaining the reason for the action.

Complaints and Appeals

Authors, reviewers, readers, and other parties may raise legitimate concerns regarding editorial decisions, peer-review procedures, published content, editorial conduct, or possible violations of publication ethics. Complaints and appeals will be handled objectively, confidentially, fairly, and without retaliation. Where appropriate, a matter may be reviewed by an editor who was not directly involved in the original decision.

Post-Publication Discussion

The journal supports responsible scholarly discussion after publication. Substantive concerns regarding published articles may be submitted to the editorial office. When appropriate, authors may be invited to respond, and the journal may publish corrections, clarifications, expressions of concern, or retractions to preserve the accuracy and integrity of the scientific record.

Confidentiality and Privacy

Personal information, unpublished manuscripts, reviewer identities where applicable, editorial correspondence, and confidential research information obtained through the submission and peer-review process must be protected and used only for legitimate editorial and publication purposes.

Editorial Independence

Editorial decisions are made independently based on scholarly merit, journal scope, methodological quality, ethical compliance, and editorial policy. Commercial considerations, sponsorship, institutional relationships, publication fees, advertising, or other external interests must not improperly influence editorial decisions.

Responsibilities of the Publisher

The publisher supports editorial independence, ethical publishing practices, preservation of the scholarly record, accessibility of journal content, and transparent journal management. The publisher must not interfere with editorial decisions based on commercial, personal, institutional, or other inappropriate interests and should support editors in responding appropriately to allegations of publication misconduct.

Commitment to Publication Integrity

WUJUD: Journal of Engineering and Technology is committed to protecting the credibility of scholarly communication by promoting responsible research, transparent editorial procedures, rigorous peer review, ethical authorship, responsible use of technology, and accountable post-publication practices. Suspected violations of publication ethics will be handled carefully, fairly, transparently, and in accordance with recognized standards of scholarly publishing.

Publication Ethics Reference: Committee on Publication Ethics (COPE)