Ethics and Publication Policies

Submission Declaration

Submission of a manuscript to INNOVARES implies that:

• the work has not been published previously, except in the form of a preprint, thesis, abstract, or lecture;
• the manuscript is not under consideration by another journal;
• all authors have approved the submission; and
• if accepted, the work will not be published elsewhere in the same form without prior written permission.

These principles closely follow the standard policies listed in the reference guide. 

Authorship

All listed authors must have made substantial contributions to the study, including:

1. the conception and design of the study, data collection, or analysis and interpretation of data;
2. drafting the manuscript or critically revising it; and
3. final approval of the version to be submitted.

A corresponding author must be designated to communicate with the journal during the editorial process. This follows the authorship criteria described in the reference guide.

Changes to Authorship

Authors are strongly encouraged to finalize the list and order of authors before submission. Requests to add, remove, or rearrange authors after submission will only be considered in exceptional cases and must be supported by written consent from all authors.

Declaration of Competing Interests

All authors must disclose any financial or personal relationships that could influence or bias their work. If there are no competing interests, authors should explicitly state:

“The authors declare that they have no competing interests.”

The reference guide similarly requires a competing-interests declaration and provides examples such as employment, consultancies, stock ownership, honoraria, patents, grants, or journal affiliations.

Funding Sources

Authors must identify all sources of funding for the research and/or manuscript preparation, and clearly state the role of the funder in study design, data collection, analysis, interpretation, writing, and submission.

If there is no specific funding, authors may state:

“This research received no specific grant from any funding agency in the public, commercial, or not-for-profit sectors.”

This wording is adapted from the reference guide’s standard funding disclosure format. 

Plagiarism Policy

Authors must acknowledge the issue of plagiarism, and therefore, submitted papers must be free of plagiarism. Authors must check for indications of plagiarism using a similarity checker. Before publication in the journal, articles will be reviewed by the editor using iThenticate to check for similarity, with a minimum similarity of 25%.

Declaration of Generative AI Use

If authors use generative AI tools in the preparation of the manuscript, they must disclose this use at the time of submission. The reference guide explicitly requires declaration of generative AI use in manuscript preparation.

Inclusive Language

Authors should use respectful, professional, and inclusive language throughout the manuscript.