Peer Review Policy

1. Purpose and Scope

This policy defines the scientific evaluation process for all submissions to Aintelia Science Notes (ASNJ), the responsibilities of the parties involved, and the decision-making mechanisms. It has been prepared in alignment with the principles of COPE (Committee on Publication Ethics), the ICMJE recommendations, and the ULAKBİM TR Index journal evaluation criteria.

The policy applies to research articles, review articles, short communications, technical notes, and case/application reports. Editorials, book reviews, corrections (erratum/corrigendum), and letters to the editor are not subject to external peer review; such content is assessed by the Editorial Board and, when published, is labelled as not peer reviewed.

2. Review Model

ASNJ operates double-anonymous peer review. Author identities are withheld from reviewers and reviewer identities are withheld from authors. Reviewer identities are never disclosed to authors unless the reviewer has given written consent to be identified.

Authors are responsible for uploading a main text file suitable for anonymous review:

• Author names, affiliations, e-mail addresses, and ORCID identifiers must be removed from the main text.
• Acknowledgements, funding information, project numbers, and ethics approval details must appear only on the separate title page.
• Self-citations must be phrased in the third person; expressions such as "in our previous work" must be avoided.
• Document properties (e.g., the Word "Author" field) must be cleared.
• Links to data or code repositories must be provided in anonymized form (e.g., OSF anonymized view-only, Zenodo restricted link).

3. The Review Process

3.1. Initial screening (technical and ethical check)

Within 7 working days of submission, the editorial office verifies:

• Fit with the aims and scope of the journal
• Compliance with author guidelines, template, and reference style
• Fulfilment of anonymization requirements
• Presence of ethics committee approval, informed consent, and permission documents where applicable
• Presence of author contribution, conflict of interest, funding, and artificial intelligence use statements
• Similarity (plagiarism) screening via iThenticate/Turnitin. Excluding the reference list and quotations, total similarity should remain below 20% and similarity to any single source below 5%. Where thresholds are exceeded, the report is examined qualitatively by the editor; the index alone is not grounds for rejection, but text overlap that constitutes plagiarism in nature results in rejection.

Submissions with deficiencies are returned to the authors for correction. Manuscripts outside the scope of the journal, lacking sufficient scientific contribution, or repeatedly failing to meet formal requirements may be concluded by desk rejection without external review.

3.2. Editorial assessment

Submissions that pass screening are assigned by the Editor-in-Chief to a Section Editor, who evaluates originality, methodological soundness, and contribution to the field, and recommends either external review or desk rejection. The final decision rests with the Editor-in-Chief.

3.3. Reviewer assignment

• At least two independent external reviewers are appointed for each submission.
• Reviewers are selected from researchers holding a doctoral degree or equivalent expertise, with a publication record in the subject area.
• Reviewers must be affiliated with different institutions, and none may share an affiliation with the authors.
• Reviewers are given 7 days to respond to an invitation. Non-responding invitations are cancelled and replacement reviewers appointed.
• Authors may suggest up to two reviewers and may request the exclusion of up to two named individuals with justification. Such requests are not binding; reviewer selection is an exclusively editorial prerogative.

3.4. Conflict of interest

Reviewers must decline an invitation in the presence of any of the following:

• Co-authorship, joint project, or advisory relationship with the authors within the past three years
• Shared institutional affiliation
• Family relationship, close personal association, or personal dispute
• Financial or competing interest

Editors are excluded from the handling of their own submissions at every stage. Manuscripts authored by editors or editorial board members are handled by an independent guest editor, and the independence of the process is declared in the published article.

3.5. Review timelines

• Reviewers are allowed 21 days to complete a review; one extension of 14 days may be granted upon justified request.
• Reminders are sent for overdue reviews; if no response is received within a further 14 days, the reviewer is replaced.
• The target time to first decision is 8 weeks from submission.

3.6. Review criteria

Using the review form in OJS, reviewers assess the manuscript across the following dimensions:

1. Consistency of title and abstract with the content
2. Definition of the problem, originality, and contribution to the literature
3. Appropriateness, reproducibility, and reporting adequacy of the methods
4. Data quality, correctness of statistical analysis, and reporting of uncertainty
5. Presentation of results (quality of tables and figures, redundancy)
6. Consistency of the discussion with the findings and absence of overclaiming
7. Support for the conclusions and explicit statement of limitations
8. Currency, sufficiency, and accuracy of the references
9. Language, expression, and formal adequacy
10. Compliance with research and publication ethics

Reviewers provide comments in two fields: (i) constructive, reasoned comments to be shared with the authors, and (ii) confidential comments and recommendations for the editor only.

3.7. Decision categories

Where reviewer recommendations conflict, a third reviewer is appointed. The final decision is taken by the Editor-in-Chief on the scientific merit of the arguments rather than by tallying recommendations. At least two positive assessments are required for publication.

3.8. Revision

• Authors are allowed 15 days for minor revisions and 30 days for major revisions. Extensions may be granted upon justified request.
• Authors must submit a point-by-point response letter addressing each reviewer comment together with a tracked-changes version of the manuscript.
• Authors may decline a recommendation provided they give reasons.
• Manuscripts for which no revision is received within the deadline are considered withdrawn; later submission is processed as a new submission.

3.9. After acceptance

Accepted manuscripts proceed through copyediting, typesetting, and proofreading. A DOI is assigned, permanent archiving is ensured, and the article is published online. At the proofreading stage, author changes are limited to the correction of typesetting errors; substantive changes require the approval of the Editor-in-Chief.

4. Reviewer Responsibilities

• Confidentiality: A manuscript under review is a confidential document. Reviewers may not share it or its content with third parties, use it in their own work, or retain copies. All copies must be deleted after the review.
• Generative artificial intelligence: Reviewers may not upload any part of a manuscript under review to generative AI tools that do not guarantee confidentiality. The scientific substance of the review must derive from the reviewer's own expertise; AI tools may be used for language editing only, and such use must be disclosed to the editor.
• Impartiality: Reviews must address scientific content alone, independent of the authors' identity, institution, nationality, gender, seniority, or theoretical position.
• Constructiveness: Comments must be reasoned, actionable, and respectful. Dismissive language and personal criticism are not acceptable.
• Reporting ethical concerns: Suspected plagiarism, data fabrication or falsification, duplicate publication, salami slicing, or unauthorized use of data must be reported directly to the editor; reviewers must not contact authors on such matters.
• Citation suggestions: Reviewers must not request citation of their own work in order to increase citation counts. Suggested references must be justified by the needs of the manuscript.

5. Author Responsibilities

• Submissions must be original, not under review elsewhere, and not previously published. Conference abstracts and preprint server postings are exceptions provided they are declared.
• All authors must have approved the content and must meet authorship criteria. After the review process has begun, any addition, removal, or reordering of authors requires the written consent of all authors, a justification, and the decision of the Editor-in-Chief.
• Where ethics committee approval is required, the date and number of the approval must be stated in the methods section.
• A data and materials availability statement must be provided; sharing of data and code supporting reproducibility is encouraged.
• Artificial intelligence statement: Generative AI tools cannot be listed as authors. Where used, the purpose and extent of use must be declared under a separate heading; use limited to language and proofreading is also subject to declaration.

6. Appeals and Complaints

Authors may appeal a decision within 30 days of notification by submitting a letter setting out their reasons and scientific counter-arguments to the reviewer comments. Appeals are examined by an editor who was not involved in the original decision; new reviewers may be appointed where necessary. The outcome is communicated within 30 days and is final.

Complaints regarding process management, editorial conduct, or publication ethics may be submitted to [journal contact address]. Complaints are handled in accordance with the COPE flowcharts. Where a complaint concerns members of the editorial team, the examination is conducted by the BAUDER Publication Ethics Committee.

7. Post-Publication Review and Corrections

Notifications concerning published articles are examined by the editor. Depending on the outcome, a corrigendum/erratum, an expression of concern, or a retraction is published. Retraction decisions follow the COPE Retraction Guidelines; the original article remains accessible for the integrity of the scholarly record and is clearly marked as retracted.

8. Recognition of Reviewer Contribution

ASNJ regards reviewing as a scholarly service. Certificates of review are issued upon request, and reviewers are encouraged to record their contributions via the Web of Science Reviewer Recognition Service (formerly Publons) or ORCID. At the end of each volume, the names of consenting reviewers are published as a reviewer list (without linkage to individual manuscripts).

9. Transparency

ASNJ publishes peer review statistics annually on the journal website, including the number of submissions, rejection rate, and mean time to first decision and to acceptance. This policy is reviewed at least every two years; revisions are recorded with a version number and date.