POLICIES
Background
Journalgurus: Peer-reviewed, scholarly open access journals
Journalguru is a global scholarly Open-Access publishing services provider, partnering with esteemed institutions, international societies and associations to publish their journals with best-in-class platforms. Journalgurus provides end to end publishing Open Access services to peer-reviewed online and print, plus online journals as well as texts on behalf of institutions, learned societies/associations and individual, across various disciplines, specialties or fields.
Journalgurus collaborates with institutions, hospitals, and universities, offering them expertise in publishing and disseminating knowledge. Our primary focus is to help professionals, researchers, and academics in their pursuit of knowledge, innovation, and improved patient care. Additionally, we extend our services to empower and support in the training and coaching in the art of academic manuscript writing and conduct of research.
Vision
Journalgurus is the premier scientific publishing services provider in Nigeria with a reputation of excellence and integrity, providing cutting-edge infrastructure for scientific and academic publications, including journals and texts.
Mission Statement
To serve as a medium for providing educational and qualitative scientific publications that will enhance exchange of evidenced-based knowledge and information that will ultimately improve knowledge-based best practice.
Scope
Journalgurus is dedicated to providing cutting-edge infrastructure for scientific and academic publications, including journals and texts.
Aims and Objectives
- To publish high quality journals that will impact knowledge and practice globally.
- To enhance exchange of ideas/information relating to improved knowledge and interaction among stakeholders.
- To encourage networking and partnership between individuals, government and non-governmental organizations for the provision of qualitative scientific research finding sharings.
- To advocate for training on scientific manuscript writing through workshops, seminars, conferences that will advance the publishing culture.
Journal Ethics
Journalgurus is committed to meeting and upholding standards of ethical behavior at all stages of the publication process. We follow closely the industry associations, such as the Committee on Publication Ethics (COPE), International Committee of Medical Journal Editors (ICMJE) and World Association of Medical Editors (WAME), that set standards and provide guidelines for best practices in order to meet these requirements. For a summary of our specific policies regarding duplicate publication, conflicts of interest, patient consent, etc., please visit https://journalgurus.com/publishingethics/
Digital Archiving
Journalgurus provides for long-term digital preservation through two primary partnerships, Portico and CLOCKSS.
Portico is a leading digital preservation service worldwide. The content is preserved as an archival version and is not publically accessible via Portico, but is provided when required under specific conditions, such as discontinuation of the collection or catastrophic failure of the website.
CLOCKSS will enable any library to maintain their own archive of content from Journalgurus and other publishers, with minimal technical effort and using cheaply available hardware.
Journalgurus URL is at http://www.journalgurus.com
- JOURNALGURUS RESEARCH ETHICS POLICY
Introduction
Journalgurus (publishing firm) seeks to protect the dignity, rights and welfare of all those involved in research (whether they are participants, or third parties) and to promote high ethical standards of research. Journalgurus achieves this by:
- fostering a culture that embraces the principles set down in this policy to protect the rights, dignity and welfare of those involved in research;
- providing ethics guidance that communicates regulatory requirements and best practice, and offering ongoing support and training to staff and students to maintain high ethical standards; and
- maintaining a review process that subjects research to a level of scrutiny in proportion to the risk of harm or adverse effect.
The aim of this policy is to set out the responsibilities and requirements for ethics review of Journalgurus journals’research-reporting principles.
Journalgurus’ Commitments
Rigour: Journalgurus is committed to ensuring that research reported in Journalgurus journals comply with high ethical standards.
Respect: Journalgurus is committed to ensuring that all research contributes to the public good, and that the dignity, rights and welfare of staff and students conducting research, research participants and third parties are respected.
Responsibility: Journalgurus is committed to providing leadership in the area of ethical conduct of research and to participating openly in discussions on the direction of research, and improvements to practice, in this area.
Education and training: Journalgurus is committed to cultivating and sustaining ethical research conduct through the provision of training to equip stakeholders (editors) with the skills to recognise potential risks and by informing of the Journalgurus’ relevant policies and procedures, and the responsibilities of researchers in helping ensure Journalgurus meet its obligations under the relevant legislation.
Ethics review process: Journalgurus is committed to providing a competent, rigorous and externally-moderated process of ethics review that is proportionate to the potential risk and, where a high risk is identified, assesses that risk against the benefits to the public good. This policy applies to all journals hosted by Journalgurus.
Research is defined in the Concordat to support research integrity as ‘a process of investigation leading to new insights, effectively shared…’. It includes work of direct relevance to the needs of commerce, industry, and to the public and voluntary sectors; scholarship; the invention and generation of ideas, images, performances, artefacts including design, where these lead to new or substantially improved insights; and the use of existing knowledge in experimental development to produce new or substantially improved materials, devices, products and processes, including design and construction’. 1
Operational Responsibilities
Journalgurus’ CEO
The CEO is the Journalgurus’ chief administrative officer and, as such, has overall responsibility for ethical conduct in the Journalgurus and for the Journalgurus’ compliance with government policy and legislation.
Research and Innovation Committee
The Research and Innovation Committee is responsible for Journalgurus’ policies that promote responsible conduct of research and for meeting relevant regulatory requirements.
Research Ethics Committees
The Central University Research Ethics Committee (CUREC) has overall responsibility for the University’s ethics review process. CUREC reports to Research and Innovation Committee and recommends changes to this policy, its remit as set out in the University’s regulations, and the composition of its membership and that of its subcommittees.
Implementation
Journalgurus requires all journal editors to observe the highest standards of ethics and integrity in the conduct of the researches in their journals as set out in Journalgurus’ Publishing Ethics for Journals, including engaging in research ethics review, as appropriate.
The following research must be reviewed through the appropriate research ethics committee and formally approved before it is conducted:
- research involving living human participants;
- esearch involving the personal data of living human participants;
- research involving human samples;
- research requiring approval or authority from other bodies.
Information about the Journalgurus’ research ethics is available on the Research Support website. It is the responsibility of the journal editors to ensure that authors/researchers wishing to publish their works in their journals comply with sound ethical principles.
Journalgurus regards as a very serious matter any breach of this policy or any breach of the approved terms of a project. These may result in disciplinary action, which may include expulsion of journals from our management.
General
Journalgurus is committed to ensuring that its research activities involving human participants, personal data, and /or regulated material and procedures are conducted in a way which:
- respects the dignity, rights, and welfare of all participants in research;
- minimises risk to participants, researchers, and third parties;
- appropriately manages personal data; and
- aims to maximise the public benefit of research.
Journalgurus requires that all those reporting such research engage with the relevant author to conduct research to high ethical standards and seek ethics review and approval of such research from relevant ethical approval authorities, and fulfil their moral and legal responsibilities in respect of the rights and welfare of participants.
Rigour
Journalgurus ensures that research reported by journals is carried out to high ethical standards by:
- requiring that research is designed and undertaken in a manner that demonstrates accountability and quality;
- setting appropriate standards for the conduct of research that are in line with current legislation and best practice;
- identifying and reviewing, proportionately to the level of risk, all research involving human participants, personal data, and / or regulated material and procedures, except where the ethical standards of that research are more appropriately secured by another recognised approval procedure;
- ensuring that research complies with current legislative requirements; and
- promoting research transparency through: encouraging registration of research, expecting researchers to seek to publish their results in accordance with current best practice and funders’ terms and conditions and by expecting researchers to be as transparent as possible when sharing research findings with others, e.g. making it clear whether the findings have been peer reviewed.
Respect
Journalgurus is committed to ensuring that researches contribute to the public good, and that the dignity, rights and welfare of staff and students conducting research, research participants and third parties (which may include family members, carers or the wider community) are respected, by:
- ensuring that any risk of adverse effect on people, either directly or indirectly as a result of participation in the research project, is outweighed by the expected benefits;
- avoiding or minimising harm to people involved in or affected by the research through sound research methodology and the early identification and considered assessment of risk;
- requiring that people are fully informed about the purpose and intended possible uses of the research, what their participation involves and details of any risks and burdens (unless the relevant ethics committee explicitly approves otherwise because, for example, the research involves the deception of participants in the research project);
- ensuring that participants formally and voluntarily register their consent to participate in such research and can choose to withdraw their participation at any time without adverse consequences; and
- safeguarding the confidentiality of information provided by participants and, where appropriate, their anonymity.
Responsibility
Journalgurus is committed to providing oversight in the area of ethical conduct of research and to participating openly in discussions on the direction of research, and improvements to practice, in this area, by:
- facilitating and participating in examination of issues that research may raise for society;
- working closely with relevant peer groups and government agencies to remain abreast of developments and contribute to UK policy and standards of good practice; and
- maintaining open and transparent procedures relating to the conduct and review of research.
Education and training
Journalgurus is committed to cultivating and sustaining ethical research conduct among journal editors through the provision of training to equip them with the skills to recognise potential risks and by informing of the firm’s relevant policies and procedures, and the responsibilities of researchers in helping ensure Journalgurus meet its obligations under the relevant legislation, by:
- communicating the firm’s standards and policies effectively to editors reporting research;
- promoting awareness of best practice through education and training;
- providing appropriate training for those undertaking research involving human participants, personal data, and / or regulated material, and for those responsible for ethics review of such research, so that knowledge and skills are current; and
- fostering an environment of openness and integrity that encourages collaboration and early communication of potential risks or issues.
Ethics review process
The University is committed to providing a competent, rigorous and externally-moderated process of ethics review that is proportionate to the potential risk and, where a high risk is identified, assesses that risk against the benefits to the public good, by
- distinguishing research that requires external review, such as by the Health Research Authority and separating out low-risk research for ‘light-touch’ expedited review from those research projects requiring further scrutiny by committee, and providing researchers guidance and support through the relevant review process;
- keeping under regular review the effectiveness of the ethics review process, including the composition of its review committees.
2. JOURNALGURUS INFORMED CONSENT POLICY
Informed consent implies that enough relevant information is provided to enable a reasoned decision to be made, and that the information is understood. Without understanding what is involved no one can make a reasoned decision. The consent must be voluntary.
Journalgurus’ policy on informed consent requires that all individuals have individual rights that are not to be infringed. Individual participants in studies have, for example, the right to decide what happens to the (identifiable) personal data gathered, to what they have said during a study or an interview, as well as to any photograph that was taken. This is especially true concerning images of vulnerable people (e.g. minors, patients, refugees, etc) or the use of images in sensitive contexts. In many instances authors will need to secure written consent before including images.
Identifying details (names, dates of birth, identity numbers, biometrical characteristics (such as facial features, fingerprint, writing style, voice pattern, DNA or other distinguishing characteristic) and other information) of the participants that were studied should not be published in written descriptions, photographs, and genetic profiles unless the information is essential for scholarly purposes and the participant (or parent/guardian if the participant is a minor or incapable or legal representative) gave written informed consent for publication. Complete anonymity is difficult to achieve in some cases. Detailed descriptions of individual participants, whether of their whole bodies or of body sections, may lead to disclosure of their identity. Under certain circumstances consent is not required as long as information is anonymized and the submission does not include images that may identify the person.
Informed consent for publication should be obtained if there is any doubt. For example, masking the eye region in photographs of participants is inadequate protection of anonymity. If identifying characteristics are altered to protect anonymity, such as in genetic profiles, authors should provide assurance that alterations do not distort meaning.
Exceptions where it is not necessary to obtain consent:
• Images such as x rays, laparoscopic images, ultrasound images, brain scans, pathology slides unless there is a concern about identifying information in which case, authors should ensure that consent is obtained.
• Reuse of images: If images are being reused from prior publications, the Publisher will assume that the prior publication obtained the relevant information regarding consent. Authors should provide the appropriate attribution for republished images.
Consent to Participate
For all research involving human subjects, freely-given, informed consent to participate in the study must be obtained from participants (or their parent or legal guardian in the case of children under 16) and a statement to this effect should appear in the manuscript.
In the case of articles describing human transplantation studies, authors must include a statement declaring that no organs/tissues were obtained from prisoners and must also name the institution(s)/clinic(s)/department(s) via which organs/tissues were obtained.
For manuscripts reporting studies involving vulnerable groups where there is the potential for coercion or where consent may not have been fully informed, extra care will be taken by the editor and may be referred to the Springer Nature Research Integrity Group.
Consent to Publish
Individuals may consent to participate in a study, but object to having their data published in a journal article. Authors should make sure to also seek consent from individuals to publish their data prior to submitting their paper to a journal. This is in particular applicable to case studies.
3. JOURNALGURUS PEER REVIEW POLICY
Journalgurus’ Journal operate double-blinded peer review system with rapid and thorough process through electronic submissions and communications. In this process the authors’ names and affiliations are concealed from the reviewers, while authors are kept blinded from reviewer details. The benefit of the double-blind peer review is that it is the traditional model of peer review that many reviewers are comfortable with, and it facilitates a credible, dispassionate critique of a manuscript with integrity.
Initial decisions are held by Editors-in-Chief and submitted manuscripts will undergo unbiased preliminary assessment for the suitability to the scope of the journals. As an extension to the process, the assessed manuscripts are forwarded to at-least two expert reviewers in the field. This is intended to advance the correctness, clarity, and wholeness of manuscripts and help editors to decide whether the manuscript has to be published or not. Reports from at least two reviewers will be taken in to consideration for the decision to accept or reject a manuscript. Editors can give the updated guidance to the reviewers when required. Reviewers are given 3 weeks to send their fair and constructive reviews to Editor, and Editors-in-Chief are aimed to take the final decision within 4 weeks from the manuscript submission.
In case of a negative decision from the editor, authors can challenge the decision with reasonable arguments. At the concerned editor’s discretion, manuscripts will be forwarded to additional reviewers and final decisions will be made in support with their implications.
4. JOURNALGURUS ADVERTISING POLICY
Since Journalgurus journals are the official publications of a number of institutions, leading societies and associations, we deliver their contents to the stakeholder members using our open-access policy that increases the visibility of the journals’ content, reaching far more readers. Advertising the Journalgurus journals will deliver message to target audience via both print and digital media, with a number of digital options including banners on journal websites and email alerts, advertisements in journal apps, and dedicated email campaigns. While advertisements are crucial to this journal, to be able to keep all content free for everyone, ethical considerations are in place to ensure the integrity of the journal and its content:
- “Pop-up” and “banner” ads appear on a random, rotating basis. The advertiser has no control or input over the pages where their ads appear.
- The Editorial Board has full and final approval over the content of all advertisements.
- Advertisers will never be shown any manuscripts or other content prior to publication.