Ethical Principles

 

The  Journal of Landscape Architecture and Garden Design is firmly committed to upholding the highest standards of publication ethics and integrity. Our editorial practices are guided by international frameworks including the Committee on Publication Ethics (COPE) Code of Conduct, the ICMJE Recommendations, and best practices in scholarly publishing. We expect all parties involved in the publication process—authors, reviewers, editors, and publishers—to adhere to these ethical principles to ensure the credibility and quality of the scientific record.

1. Duties and Responsibilities of Authors

Authors submitting their manuscripts to this journal are required to:

Ensure originality and avoid plagiarism: Submitted work must be original and not previously published or under consideration elsewhere. Proper citation of all sources is mandatory. All submissions are checked using iThenticate software to detect plagiarism.

Provide accurate and honest data: Any data presented must be gathered using ethically sound methods and must be reported accurately, without fabrication, falsification, or inappropriate data manipulation.

Avoid redundant publication: Authors should not submit the same research to multiple journals simultaneously or publish the same data in more than one outlet unless clear disclosure is made.

Disclose conflicts of interest: All financial, institutional, or personal relationships that may influence the interpretation of the findings must be disclosed at the time of submission.

Follow ethical guidelines in human subjects research: For studies involving humans, authors must confirm that informed consent was obtained and that the research was approved by a recognized ethics review board. Documentation must be available upon request.

Acknowledge contributions appropriately: All contributors who made substantial contributions to the work should be listed as co-authors, while minor contributors should be acknowledged appropriately.

Respond to editorial requests: Authors must comply with revision requests, respond to reviewer feedback respectfully and thoroughly, and cooperate in case of post-publication discussions or corrections.

2. Duties and Responsibilities of Reviewers

Peer reviewers play a vital role in the scholarly publishing process and are expected to observe the following ethical guidelines:

Maintain confidentiality: Manuscripts received for review must be treated as confidential documents. Reviewers must not share, discuss, or use the content for personal gain.

Provide objective and constructive feedback: Reviews should be based on objective criteria and should aim to improve the quality of the manuscript. Personal criticism of authors is inappropriate.

Disclose conflicts of interest: Reviewers must recuse themselves if they have a personal, academic, or financial conflict with the authors or subject matter.

Review in a timely manner: Reviewers should complete their evaluations within the journal's deadline and inform the editor if a delay is unavoidable.

3. Duties and Responsibilities of Editors

The editorial team is responsible for ensuring a fair, rigorous, and transparent peer-review and publication process:

Maintain editorial independence and impartiality: Editorial decisions are based solely on the scientific merit of the manuscript, regardless of the authors’ nationality, institutional affiliation, gender, or personal beliefs.

Ensure confidentiality: Editors must keep all manuscript and reviewer information confidential and must not disclose any details outside the editorial team.

Oversee a fair peer-review process: Editors must ensure that each submission is reviewed by qualified, unbiased experts and that the process is free from manipulation or unethical interference.

Take action on unethical behavior: Editors are obligated to investigate and act upon suspected ethical violations, including plagiarism, data fabrication, image manipulation, and authorship disputes. Retractions, corrections, or expressions of concern will be issued as appropriate.

Disclose conflicts of interest: Editors must recuse themselves from handling manuscripts in which they have a conflict of interest.

4. Ethical Oversight and Allegations of Misconduct

The journal follows the COPE flowcharts for handling all allegations of research and publication misconduct, including but not limited to:

Plagiarism and self-plagiarism

Fabrication and falsification of data

Improper authorship or ghost authorship

Undisclosed conflicts of interest

Unethical experimentation or lack of informed consent

In cases where misconduct is confirmed, the journal may take corrective actions including withdrawal of the manuscript from review, rejection, retraction of published articles, notification of authors’ institutions, and, if necessary, public disclosure.

 


5. Corrections, Retractions, and Expressions of Concern

If errors or misconduct are discovered after publication, the journal will take appropriate corrective measures, guided by COPE recommendations:

Corrections will be issued for honest errors that do not invalidate the findings (e.g., data mislabeling or typographical errors).

Retractions will be published if there is evidence of serious ethical breaches (e.g., fraud, plagiarism, duplicate publication).

Expressions of concern may be posted if a potential issue is under investigation.

All corrections and retractions will be clearly linked to the original article and indexed in repositories.

6. Copyright and Licensing Ethics

All published content in the Journal of Landscape Architecture and Garden Design is made available under the Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial 4.0 International License (CC BY-NC 4.0). Authors retain full copyright and grant the journal a license to publish and distribute the work.

This licensing model ensures that content is freely available for non-commercial use, adaptation, and distribution, with appropriate credit to the authors. Commercial reuse requires separate permission from the authors.

7. Data Sharing and Transparency

We encourage authors to share raw data, code, instruments, and research materials whenever feasible. Authors should include a data availability statement in the manuscript, indicating whether and how supporting data can be accessed.

Transparency in methodology and data enhances reproducibility and promotes trust in published findings.

Transparency Statement on the Use of Artificial Intelligence

In light of the growing use of artificial intelligence (AI) tools in academic writing, translation, data analysis, and editorial processes, our journal is committed to ensuring full transparency and ethical responsibility in the use of such technologies throughout the submission, peer review, and publication processes.

To uphold the highest standards of academic integrity and align with the recommendations of the World Association of Medical Editors (WAME), our journal has adopted the following principles regarding the use of AI:

  1. Transparent and Responsible Use: Authors are required to clearly disclose any use of AI tools—such as ChatGPT, Grammarly, DeepL, or others—at any stage of manuscript preparation (e.g., literature review, results description, discussion writing, language editing, or translation). This disclosure should appear in the acknowledgments section or a footnote on the title page.

  2. AI Tools Cannot Be Authors: According to the WAME guidelines, AI tools cannot be credited as authors of scientific manuscripts. These tools do not meet authorship criteria because they lack legal responsibility and the ability to consent to publication or accountability for the content.

  3. Human Oversight and Validation: All AI-generated content must be critically reviewed, edited, and validated by human authors. The final responsibility for the accuracy, coherence, and integrity of the manuscript lies solely with the human contributors.

  4. Use in Peer Review: Peer reviewers using AI tools to assist with manuscript evaluation must ensure they do not share confidential information with such tools. Any AI use during review must comply with confidentiality and data protection standards.

  5. Misuse and Ethical Violations: The inappropriate use of AI—such as generating fabricated content, falsifying data, or committing plagiarism—will be treated as a serious ethical violation and subject to disciplinary action in accordance with publication ethics.

  6. Policy Review and Updates: This policy will be reviewed regularly in response to evolving AI technologies and ethical considerations. Any updates will be published on the journal’s official website.

Our journal is committed to transparency, integrity, and accountability in scientific publishing. We fully adhere to the WAME statement entitled “Recommendations on Chatbots and Generative Artificial Intelligence in Relation to Scholarly Publications.”

For the complete text of WAME’s recommendations, please visit:
https://wame.org/page3.php?id=106