Research Misconduct Policy

This policy outlines the journal’s commitment to ensuring integrity, transparency, and ethical conduct in all research published. It establishes the procedures for identifying and addressing research malpractices to uphold the highest academic and ethical standards.

1. Definition

Research misconduct includes all intentional and negligent acts that are against accepted ethical and professional standards, which mislead, deceive, or misguide the community and public at large. These acts that compromise and undermine the integrity of research can occur at any stage from conducting, reporting, reviewing, or publishing of the research.

2. Types of Research Misconduct

Research misconduct shall include any and all acts and practices stated herewith:

2.1 Plagiarism

Plagiarism is the act or practice of passing off somebody else’s contributions or work as one’s own. However, plagiarism extends to self-plagiarism and plagiarized authorship too, which can be understood as follows:

1. 1. Self-plagiarism or text recycling: It refers to the author dishonestly reusing his/her/their own work, without sufficient disclosure about the original work. It is not mandatory for the reproduction to be in its entirety. Part reproductions are also considered self-plagiarism and extend to include resubmitted work or simultaneous submissions.
   2. Plagiarized authorship: It refers to the practice of claiming authorship or significant contribution to a work, that is not one’s own. It extends to include authorship misconduct (refer to sec 2.6).

At SLJ we advocate to provide rightful credits, to the source of information, and therefore we stand strongly against plagiarism. All articles must be screened for plagiarism post-submission, and a high percentage of plagiarism empowers the board to outrightly reject the article.

2.2 Fabrication

The act or practice of deliberately generating or producing data or results and reporting them as factual, to support assertions of a manuscript are called fabrication. Fabrication can include the following:

1. 1. Data Fabrication: It is the act or practice of artificially creating data, information or results that are inconsistent with reality.
   2. Image Fabrication: It refers to the act of generating, or manipulating images that mispresent original findings. It includes splicing and combining of different images, selective presentation, duplication/reuse of images without acknowledgement or editing images to convey results different from original findings.

These practices deceive the community and undermine the integrity and trustworthiness of findings, therefore SLJ does not promote fabrication of results.

2.3 Data Manipulation

Ethical research must communicate and analyze all discovered results. Therefore, veiling or hiding a category of results, to back and push forward the claim of author is unwelcomed. Suppression of findings or cherry-picking of results refers to hiding results, and selective analysis of results respectively, and are considered as data manipulation. Manipulated data obstructs transparency in research and is therefore not encouraged by the board.

2.4 Falsification

Ethical research requires the sharing of true information. Therefore, tampering, altering, or modifying findings to get the desired output is blameworthy and undesirable. Falsification if discovered would empower the board to take rightful stringent steps against the author.  

2.5 AI-generated content

At SLJ, our aim is to promote original intellectual contributions to the academic community. To fulfill our purpose, we are unsupportive of works generated entirely or substantively using Artificial Intelligence (AI) tools. These AI tools shall include generative and paraphrasing tools. Detection of AI beyond a reasonable and acceptable percentage, shall refrain the board from reviewing the work any further and empower the board to outrightly reject the article.

2.6 Authorship Misconduct

At SLJ we strive to encourage novel, creative, or intellectual contributions to the academic community, and for the same, we promote authorship based on the following criteria:

1. 1. Substantive intellectual contribution to the work, either during the formation of the article or the conception of idea.
   2. Contribution to drafting of the final work submitted, which includes both original drafts and subsequent revisions to the manuscript.

The journal is against any unethical practice that inappropriately attributes authorship credits to a research output. These unwelcomed practices include the following:

1. 1. Ghost authorship: It refers to the exclusion of a significant contributor from the list of authors.
   2. Gift authorship: It refers to the practice of granting authorship to someone who has not made contributions to the research, to increase the influence or enhance the chances of publication.
   3. Authorship for sale: It is an unethical practice of buying and selling of authorships on a research paper, not considering intellectual contributions.
   4. Substitution Authorship: This malpractice involves the replacement of rightful author(s), with others, often done without the original author’s knowledge or consent.
   5. Coercive Authorship: This practice involves forcing, compelling, or pressurizing the original author or researcher to include name(s) in the author list majorly due to power dynamics within an institution.
   6. Artificial Collaboration: It is an unethical practice of fabricating or overstating collaborations to increase research’s apparent credibility.

It is hereby stated that these malpractices are unaccepted and upon discovery, appropriate steps will be taken by the board.

2.7 Affiliation Misrepresentation

Rightful representation shall mean a disclosure of true association with any Institute where research was conducted, or place of study and academic endeavor. Affiliation misrepresentation is the unethical act of providing false or misleading information concerning one's institutional or organizational affiliation in academic or professional settings. This extends to include practices like declaring an affiliation or association with an institution that carries prestige, even when one is not formally connected to it.

Also, overstating the character of the affiliation and indicating outdated affiliations, with no acknowledgement of present-day position, to improve one's credibility are also unaccepted. Affiliation misrepresentation undermines trust in academic and professional communication, distorts institutional reputations, and has the potential to lead to serious consequences, including retraction of publications, and disciplinary actions. Therefore, SLJ opposes any form of affiliation misrepresentation.

2.8 Undisclosed Competing Interests

Competing interest or conflict of interest happens when one’s associations with institutions or power dynamics has capacity to influence the result of research. Such interest must be disclosed to the board to aid in decisions. Such interests may also be communicated to the public at large, when and if the research gets published, to aid readers in determining the reliability of the information provided. Non-disclosure of competing interests is against ethical standards and shall result in grave consequences.

2.9 Duplicate Submission or Publication

All research works must be original and previously unpublished. It is unethical to submit a research paper simultaneously at multiple journals or send very similar versions of the same paper for consideration to the same or different journals. Also, sending a pre-published work without proper disclosure violates ethical standards and is considered a form of academic misconduct. Author(s) must refrain from such malpractices.

2.10 Peer Review Manipulation

The board is committed to objectively analysing articles irrespective of the author’s background and promotes equity principles of equitable treatment. Any act aimed at manipulating the decision of the board via means of formal or informal communication to any or all members of the board is strictly unwarranted. Such communications act as obstructions to transparency, ethical procedure, and intellectual contributions. Therefore, an endeavor to manipulate the decisions of the board is shunned.  

2.11 Citation Manipulation

Research and non-research articles must appropriately cite the source of information to back claims. Citation manipulation includes the following:

1. 1. Coercive citation: It is an unethical practice where an author or researcher is compelled by the reviewers or publishers to add unnecessary citations to the article, with an aim to enhance the impact factor of the journal.
   2. Citation farming: Also known as citation cartel, this malpractice happens when a group of researchers frequently cite each other’s work, to enhance the impact of their publications. It is largely not expressly coordinated, however, a rapid increase in citation numbers in a short span of time is indicative of the same.
   3. Over Citation: It includes citing a particular source too many times, even when it is unnecessary. For example, citing the same source in every sentence even when the topic or paragraph has not changed. 
   4. Excessive Self Citation: It is an unethical way of increasing the citation counts, where an author unnecessarily cites his/her/their previously published work.
   5. Mis-citation: It refers to the act of attributing an idea to an incorrect source or author.
   6. Plagiarized Citations: This malpractice involves copying citations from another work, without referring or consulting the original source of information.
   7. Ghost Citations: It refers to citing a source that either does not exist or cannot be verified.

2.12 Unethical Experimentation Due to Lack of Consent

Gaining an informed consent of participants with sufficient disclosure of information is mandatory for ethical research. Failure to comply with this standard invades the autonomy, dignity, and rights of participants. Therefore, the rightful consent of participants must be gained.

2.13 Breach of Copyright/Use of third-party material without appropriate permissions

All third-party material needs to be properly and sufficiently acknowledged, cited and permissions must be obtained if the source mandates. Author(s) are required to obtain the necessary permission to reuse third-party materials in articles. These materials may include text, illustrations, photographs, tables, data, audio, video, film stills, screenshots, or musical notation, among others. For review or criticism of short extracts, no formal permission is required, however, proper acknowledgements must be provided to the source. If the author(s) want to include materials for which he/she/ they do not own the copyright and are not covered by this general exception, written permission from the copyright holder must be secured before submission.

2.14 Failure to retain data

Keeping original data intact is necessary to empower the board to verify claims. Failure to retain original data for a reasonable or required duration either due to negligence or deliberate distortion of records interrupts smooth functioning as it makes it impossible for the board to verify the accuracy of outputs. Therefore, apt management of data is required to uphold transparency. 

2.15 Salami Slicing

A research paper must be complete, conveying all arguments of the author. It is unethical for the author(s) to do “slicing” of one meaningful work into several works to increase the number of publications. Salami slicing refers to the act of dividing a comprehensive analysis, argument, or research into multiple smaller, narrowly focused publications or filings with often overlapping content. While segmentation may sometimes be justified to address distinct issues, too many or unnecessary divisions can lead to inefficiency, redundancy, and confusion, rendering the article to be absurd or irrational.

At SLJ, the board works tirelessly to uphold ethical standards and promotes rightful conduct. Therefore, any research misconduct is unwelcome.

3. Board's Ethical Duties

The ethical duties of the board shall include the following:

1. 1. Editor(s) must disclose any and all information related to submitted work only to the concerned author(s), or agreed point of contact upon the request of author. This information shall extend to include the substance of submitted work, ideas, and suggested edits.
   2. Editor(s) must not share or publish personal data of the author unless the author agrees to such publication.
   3. Editor(s) are restricted from using any unpublished work, or part of unpublished work for their personal endeavors without the author’s informed consent.
   4. Editor(s) must review and suggest edits without prejudice and uninfluenced by the author’s background, affiliations, race, ethnic origin, religious belief, sexual orientation, gender, citizenship or political philosophy.
   5. Editor(s) must not indulge in any form or kind of research misconduct.
   6. The board must promptly respond to all queries or concerns of research misconduct reported to them at dnluslj@mpdnlu.ac.in.

4. Author's Duties

The duties of authors shall include the following:

1. 1. Author(s) must not indulge in any form of research misconduct.
   2. Upon request by the editors, the author(s) must willingly share the source of information, or any other deliverable related to the submitted work as required.
   3. Every author agrees that their work does not violate the copyright or any other third-party rights, nor does it contain any illegal, obscene, libellous, slanderous, or defamatory content. Every author acknowledges that they will bear full responsibility for any legal violations.
   4. Authorship disputes are to be dealt with by the author, and the board shall have no responsibility in determining who the actual author is.

5. Dealing with Allegations of Research Misconduct

1. 1. Upon receipt of a query or concern regarding research misconduct, the Board shall promptly respond to such reporting.
   2. A preliminary review to verify the concern shall be carried out using detection tools and manual checks.
   3. The concern shall be communicated to the author, by the Board. It is binding on the author to provide explanations for the conduct.
   4. Upon discovery of research misconduct, at any stage from submission of work to post-publication, the Editor-in-Chief has full authority to reject the article or retract publication, as the case may be.
   5. In cases of repeated breaches, the Editor-in-Chief also reserves the right to inform and notify the author’s institution about the misconduct.

For any queries, please contact the Editorial Board of the DNLU- Student Law Journal at: Email: dnluslj@mpdnlu.ac.in