Ethical aspects

The Geographical Journal of Central America considers the following ethical elements in the management of articles:

 

  • The Journal only manages works that have not been previously published and have not been simultaneously postulated/submitted for evaluation and/or publication in any other printed or electronic journal and/or written medium, and/or publishing entity.

 

  • Authors must guarantee that the submitted work is of their authorship by providing the Journal with a signed sworn statement. Additionally, in the case of collaborative works, sworn statement must provide a declaration wherein all signees (authors) declare that they have contributed intellectually to the preparation of the submitted work and disclose their level of participation and contribution.

 

  • All sources that are cited in the text must appear as a list at the end of the manuscript, arranged in alphabetical order according to the author’s last name, and comply with APA style as outlined in the 6th edition of the Publication Manual of the American Psychological Association.

 

  • Tables and illustrations (i.e., diagrams, figures, graphs, maps, photographs, etc.) must cite their sources to evidence recognition of copyrights.

 

  • Misconduct such as plagiarism is prohibited, the Journal checks for plagiarism by running the text through Turnitin software and Google search engine to determine the degree of similarity between the submitted manuscript and other published works.

 

  • In cases where the percentage of similarity is greater than 25% , authors will be notified and requested to rectify their references.

 

  • If plagiarism is verified, the author(s) will be notified and the manuscript will be immediately withdrawn from the evaluation/editorial process.

 

  • Submitted manuscripts will undergo review by external peers.

 

  • If required and requested by the Journal, the author(s) agrees to make available the supporting and source data on which the findings of the submitted work are based, to allow the external peer to verify the presented results.

 

  • Authors will be provided with the evaluation results which accounts to feedback derived from the external peer review process; the consideration and incorporation in the revised manuscript of modifications based on such feedback is left to the author’s discretion. All clarifications and/or justifications provided by the authors will be considered and evaluated by the Journal’s Editorial Team.

 

  • The Journal shall contact the authors and provide a copy, in electronic format, of the accepted manuscript for publication, which they are obliged to review one last time, and indicate to the Journal of any pertinent final modifications. The submission of the final manuscript for publication, by the authors to the Journal, implies consent to publish; likewise, if the final manuscript for publication is not remitted, the work will not be published.

 

  • All the while considering the previous statement, if authors discover a serious error in their work, they have the obligation to communicate it to the Journal as soon as possible to modify, withdraw or retract the work, and/or publish a corrigendum or erratum. Such errors must result from the editorial process and/or its omissions.

 

  • Editors and editorial working group members undertake not to disclose the information contained in the submitted works to anyone other than authors, reviewers and editors. Editors and the Editorial Committee commit to maintaining confidentiality regarding information contained in the manuscripts, authorship and identity of reviewers; anonymity preserves the intellectual integrity of the entire process.