REVIEW PROCESS

Each article undergoes a double-blind peer review.

Internal review is the process of preliminary evaluation by the Editorial Board. All manuscripts submitted to the Editorial Board are checked by the Chief Editor for compliance with the Journal’s aims, scope, and editorial policy. Manuscripts that do not meet the Journal’s scope, editorial policy, or editorial standards are rejected before review. The Editor’s foreword and the corrections section are not subject to peer review.

Manuscripts that do not comply with the Journal’s requirements regarding structure and formatting are returned to Authors for revision. If the Author does not respond to the Editor’s request within 30 calendar days, the manuscript is considered withdrawn from editorial review.

Manuscripts in which the StrikePlagiarism system detects a significant percentage of text borrowings are returned to Authors for revision. If plagiarism is identified, the article is returned to the Author without the right to resubmit.

The Editorial Board gives preference to articles with qualitative and/or quantitative data, although the Journal also publishes thorough review articles.

After internal checks, the Author’s original manuscript is sent for external review (expert evaluation).

External review is the evaluation of the submitted material by independent experts. Articles submitted for publication undergo double-blind peer review on the Open Journal System (OJS) platform by at least two external Reviewers –experts in the scientific field relevant to the article’s topic.

Members of the Editorial Board recommend Reviewers who are experts in the scientific field of the submitted article and have publications on its subject. Members of the Editorial Board may also serve as Reviewers.

Reviewers must adhere to the best international practices of peer review, in particular the Recommendations for Reviewers from the European Association of Science Editors and the Web of Science Academy (https://clarivate.com/academia-government/web-of-science-academy/), as well as the requirements of this Journal.

Reviewers are obliged to promptly inform the Chief Editor and/or Editorial Board of any potential conflicts of interest. They must adhere to the principle of confidentiality when working with a manuscript, in particular, not to use and/or reproduce it in whole or in part, and not to disclose information regarding the Editorial Board’s request for review.

Reviewer response options: “Yes,” “No, requires minor revision,” or “No, requires major revision” to the following questions (the question is specified in the reviewer’s form on the OJS platform):

• Does the title of the article correspond to its content and purpose?
• Does the abstract reflect the main content of the article?
• Are the key ideas of the article original, scientifically significant, and of interest to the readership?
• Are the main results of the article substantial and scientifically justified?
• Does the article and its key sections comply with the IMRAD structure and the technical requirements of the Journal?
• How well-grounded, appropriate, and compliant with the Journal’s requirements are the illustrations (tables, figures, etc.)?
• Is the research methodology appropriate and sufficiently justified?
• Is the language of the article scientific, grammatically correct, and clear to the readership?
• Does the “Discussion” section demonstrate knowledge of the literature relevant to the article’s subject?
• How clear and well-argued are the conclusions?

If a Reviewer selects the response "No, requires minor revision" or "No, requires major revision" for any item, he/she is obliged to provide well-grounded comments and explain to the Authors how to improve the article.

The Chief Editor has the right not to communicate to the Author any comments that contain a subjective assessment of the article’s content, that are disrespectful, or do not meet the previously established requirements and criteria.

The Chief Editor acts as a mediator in all discussions between Authors and Reviewers during the peer-review process prior to publication. If no agreement is reached, the Chief Editor may invite additional Reviewers. The Chief Editor has the right to return a review for revision if the Reviewer has not followed the requirements set out in the Recommendations for Reviewers or if the review contains ambiguous remarks. In cases of significant concerns about a Reviewer’s conduct, the Chief Editor has the right to exclude the Reviewer from the list of individuals approached by the Editorial Board and/or inform the Reviewer’s institution of such conduct.

Reviewers do not perform structural or language editing of the manuscript but, if necessary, notify the Authors and Journal Editors of such issues in the appropriate section of the review.

Reviewers’ decisions may be as follows:

• Accept;
• Accept after minor revisions (Authors have five days to make minor changes according to the Reviewers’ comments);
• Accept after major revisions (Authors have two weeks to make substantial revisions to the manuscript);
• Reject with a resubmission option (the manuscript is rejected, and the Authors are invited to resubmit the article after substantial revision of its content if, in the Reviewers’ opinion, the article requires additional experiments or other empirical research to confirm its conclusions);
• Reject (the article is rejected without the right to resubmit if it contains serious flaws and/or does not present original scientific results).

If an article is accepted with revision, it is returned to the Author(s) along with the Reviewers’ comments and suggestions for improvement, as well as any recommendations from the Editors. The Author must then resubmit the revised version of the article together with clear responses to the Reviewers’ comments. All changes must be highlighted in the article text.

The Chief Editor directly evaluates the quality of the revisions or forwards the article to the Reviewers for reassessment. In the second round of review, the Reviewer may be asked to evaluate the revised manuscript in light of their original recommendations. Reviewers must clearly and convincingly express their opinions, and remain courteous and constructive in their recommendations.

Authors are required to respond to all Reviewer comments in accordance with the review points. The total review period must not exceed three months from the date the article is sent to the Reviewer.

The Journal allows no more than two rounds of manuscript review.

The Editorial Board considers the Reviewers’ comments, but the final decision on publication is made by the Chief Editor of the Journal.

Author appeals. Authors may appeal a rejection decision. The procedure for such an appeal is described in the Complaints and Appeals section of the Journal’s Editorial Policy.