The editorial board of Diametros ensures strict ethical overview of the publication process. In adhering to the guidelines proposed by the Committee on Publication Ethics we encourage all our contributors and collaborators to well understand and conscientiously apply the policies designed to uphold the quality and integrity of the work we publish. We are committed to preventing publication malpractice and remain readily available to address any questions or doubts that may arise with regard to the content we manage.

Ethical oversight

Diametros follows COPE guidelines and core practices to safeguard the ethical standards in publishing and to act appropriately whenever their breach is suspected. We emphasize that It is every author’s, contributor’s, reviewer’s, and editor’s responsibility to identify, prevent and deal with any signs of publication misconduct. Our principle areas of concerns for publication integrity include duplicate or redundant submissions and publications, plagiarism and self-plagiarism (text recycling), ghost, guest or gift authorship, inadequate affiliation, citation manipulations, image or data falsification, peer review or editing malpractice including bias and discrimination, breaches of copyrights, breaches of confidentiality, undisclosed competing interests and other forms of misbehavior or fraud that may occur at any stages in the scholarly publishing.

Authorship and contributorship

Researchers submitting their work are required through the submission checklist to confirm their authorship and to signal all potential co-authors. We use a definition of authorship based upon the general standards of the humanistic disciplines and suggested by the International Committee of Medical Journal Editors (see: ICMJE, Defining the Role of Authors and Contributors). Editors and editorial team members of Diametros are excluded from publication decisions when they have contributed to a manuscript or have any conflict of interest. This is to ensure both that proper credit is given as well as due responsibility taken for the content submitted for publication. We expect fair and accurate acknowledgment of all significant contributions to the papers proposed. In case of authorship concerns or disputes, including authorship changes request that require investigation, as well as suspicions or allegations of ghost, guest or gift authorship, appropriate steps are taken in line with the COPE guidelines on the matter.

Complaints and appeals

Decisions concerning publication or rejection of the submitted work are made by the Editor in Chief, following a double-blind peer review process and the editorial board’s appreciation of the journal’s publishing priorities at a given time. The Editor’s in Chief announcement is final and is not subject to revision unless genuine concerns, such as conflicts of interests or biased reviews are raised and supported with strong evidence, in which case additional opinions might be sought to reach a revised and final decision. Prompt review and decision-making process for new submissions will take precedence over potential appeals. In case of other complaints or comments regarding aspects of the journal’s management, the editorial board should be contacted directly and will take necessary steps to address them in a timely manner.

Conflicts of interest

All parties involved in the publication process, from authors and co-authors, through peer reviewers up to managing editors, are held to disclose interests that might prevent or be perceived as preventing their contribution, either in presenting the work, or in assessing it, from being objective and impartial. Competing interests as well any associations which may be considered by others as a competing interest, either financial or non-financial in nature, should be disclosed immediately to allow appropriate publication decisions to be taken and in the case when the submission is accepted, to offer readers the opportunity to form their own judgments regarding a potential bias.

Data sharing and reproducibility

Where applicable due to the nature of the research submitted for publication, authors might be required to provide access to the underlying raw data. The adopted methodologies must be represented in an accurate and thorough manner with sufficient references for other researchers to replicate the work and verify the results. The need for a data availability statement might be raised during the review process and its form will be discussed and agreed upon with the concerned authors.

Intellectual property

By submitting their work to the Editorial Board, authors accept, upon having their text recommended for publication, that Diametros applies the Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial 4.0 International Public License (CC-BY-NC) to the papers we publish. Under this license, authors agree to make articles legally available for reuse, without permission or fees, for any purpose except commercial. Anyone may read, download, copy, print, distribute or reuse these articles without asking prior permission from the publisher or the author, as long as the author and original source are properly cited. The author holds the copyright without any other restrictions. Full information about CC-BY-NC: https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc/4.0/legalcode.

Post-publication discussions and corrections

Critical comments on the subject matter of a published article as well as the author's response might be considered for publication. Such contributions may be subject to peer review, should the editorial board consider a potential discussion fruitful and decide to accept the submitted reactions.

In case of clear evidence invalidating or discrediting published work, such as major errors that may affect the interpretation of data, or either research or publication misconduct, the author’s clarification will be sought and if needed an investigation will be carried out following COPE guidelines. Depending on the severity of the identified issue an article may be followed by a correction (linked to the original paper), subject to retraction (watermarked without removal from the archives) and, in exceptional cases, withdrawal.