Peer Review Statement

All research articles in this journal have undergone a rigorous double-blind peer review, based on the initial editor's screening and double-blind refereeing by at least two expert referees. The purpose of a peer review is to assist the editor in making editorial decisions and through the editorial communications with the author, this may also assist the author in improving the paper. Double-blind peer review means that reviewers are unaware of the identity of the authors, and authors are also unaware of the identity of the reviewers. The typical period of time allowed for reviews is 8 weeks. 

The Peer Review Process

Authors submit manuscripts to the Editorial Office via our online submission platform. The  Editor-in-chief first reviews the manuscript if the manuscript was relevant to the aims and scope of the journal, Editor-in-chief will assign a Section Editor to see the manuscript through the complete review process and return it to Editor-in-chief with a recommendation or decision.  Based on the reviewers’ comments and Section Editor's final opinion, the Editor-in-chief decides to:

• Accept the manuscript without further revision
• Accept after revision
• Ask the authors to re-submit
• Reject

An acceptance letter is sent to the author and the final manuscript is forwarded to production. Sometimes, the authors are requested to revise their manuscript in accordance with the reviewers’  comments and submit the updated version to the Editor-in-chief. The time for review can be set from  6 to 8 weeks, depending on the discipline and the type of additional data, information or argument required. The authors are requested to make substantial revisions to their manuscripts and re-submit for a new evaluation.   In the case of rejection, a rejection letter will be sent to the authors and the manuscript will be archived. Reviewers might be informed about the decision.

After review, the manuscript goes to the ‘Copy Editor’ who will correct the manuscript in respect of the correct referencing system in accordance with the journal style and layout. When the ‘Copy Editor’ finishes his/her work, the manuscript will be sent to the ‘Layout editor'.

The ‘Layout Editor’ is responsible for structuring the original manuscript, including figures and tables, into an article, activating the necessary links and preparing the manuscript in various formats, in our case PDF and HTML format. When the Layout Editor finishes his/her job, the manuscript will be sent to ‘Proof Editor’.

The Proof Editor confirms that the manuscript has gone through all the requisite stages and is suitable for publishing.

All the reviewers of a paper act independently and they are not aware of each other’s identities. If the decisions of the two reviewers are not the same (accept/reject), the Editor may assign additional reviewers.

The Editorial team shall ensure reasonable quality control of the reviews.  In respect of reviewers whose reviews are convincingly questioned by authors, special attention will be paid to ensure that the reviews are objective and of a high academic standard. When there is any doubt as to the objectivity of the reviews or the quality of the reviews, additional reviewers will be assigned.

The manuscript submission and the peer review process are broken down into the following steps:

 

For more information please see:  Journal Policies