PUBLISHING  ETHICS  POLICY

Last updated: 11 August 2026

Publishing Ethics Policy of Seminare

The Publishing Ethics Policy of Seminare, hereinafter referred to as the Publishing Ethics Policy, establishes the ethical principles and good publishing practices applicable to the journal.

Seminare is published by the Francis de Sales Scientific Society (Towarzystwo Naukowe Franciszka Salezego – TNFS). The journal is hosted on the UKSW Journals platform operated by Cardinal Stefan Wyszynski University in Warsaw; however, responsibility for the journal’s editorial policy, publishing ethics and editorial decisions rests with the Publisher and the Editorial Board of Seminare.

1. Purpose and nature of the Policy

The Publishing Ethics Policy establishes uniform ethical principles and good practices governing the publication, peer-review and editorial processes of Seminare, including procedures to be followed in disputed, problematic or ethically questionable cases.

The journal takes as its principal points of reference the standards and good practices developed by the Committee on Publication Ethics (COPE), in particular the COPE Core Practices and COPE Guidance, including recommended procedures concerning suspected misconduct, corrections and retractions.

The Policy is also applied in accordance with applicable law, internationally recognised standards of academic integrity and the policies adopted by the Francis de Sales Scientific Society and Seminare.

2. Scope and definitions

2.1. Personal scope

The Publishing Ethics Policy applies to authors, co-authors, editors, including the Editor-in-Chief, members of the Scientific Council, reviewers and all other persons participating in the editorial and publishing process of Seminare.

2.2. Selected definitions

1. Ethical violations / misconduct – including, but not limited to, plagiarism, undisclosed self-plagiarism, fabrication or falsification of data, peer-review manipulation, concealment of conflicts of interest, copyright infringement, inappropriate authorship practices (ghost, guest or gift authorship) and citation manipulation.
2. Conflict of interest – a situation in which financial, institutional, personal or competitive relationships may influence, or may reasonably be perceived as influencing, the impartiality of decisions made during the editorial or publishing process.
3. Double-blind peer review – a peer-review model in which reviewers do not know the identity of the authors and authors do not know the identity of the reviewers, insofar as this can reasonably be maintained given the specific characteristics of the discipline and manuscript.
4. Expression of concern – an editorial notice published when serious concerns arise regarding a published article while an investigation is ongoing and there is not yet sufficient evidence to justify a correction or retraction.

3. Roles and responsibilities

3.1. The Editorial Board is responsible for:

1. conducting the editorial and peer-review process in accordance with this Publishing Ethics Policy;
2. selecting reviewers independently and impartially;
3. ensuring the confidentiality of the peer-review process;
4. responding to suspected ethical violations and maintaining appropriate documentation concerning such cases;
5. making decisions concerning corrections, retractions and expressions of concern after publication in accordance with Section 10.

3.2. Authors are responsible for:

1. the originality of their work and the reliability and accuracy of its scholarly apparatus;
2. correct citation practices and respect for copyright;
3. disclosure of funding and potential conflicts of interest;
4. accurate attribution of authorship and transparent reporting of each co-author’s contribution, with no ghost, guest or gift authorship;
5. cooperation during peer review, corrections and any subsequent investigations;
6. compliance with applicable research ethics requirements, including obtaining approval from an appropriate ethics committee where required.

3.3. Reviewers are responsible for:

1. maintaining confidentiality and providing reliable and timely reviews;
2. declaring conflicts of interest and withdrawing from the review process where such conflicts exist;
3. refraining from using unpublished material contained in manuscripts under review for their own purposes.

All editorial decisions are made solely on the basis of scholarly merit, quality, relevance to the journal’s aims and scope and compliance with the Publishing Ethics Policy, without discrimination on the basis of gender, age, nationality, ethnic origin, beliefs, institutional affiliation or any other characteristic unrelated to the scholarly content of the manuscript.

4. Peer-review process

1. Seminare. Learned Investigations uses double-blind peer review as its standard peer-review model.
2. At least two independent external reviews are required for every scholarly article considered for publication.
3. Reviewers are selected on the basis of their subject expertise and after consideration of potential conflicts of interest.
4. The Editorial Board takes measures to prevent misconduct in the peer-review process, including verification of reviewer identity where appropriate and responding to indications of peer-review manipulation.
5. Any departure from the journal’s standard peer-review procedure requires a documented editorial decision.
6. The journal publishes the assessment criteria used in its peer-review process on its website. As part of its quality-assurance procedures, the Editorial Board monitors the integrity and reliability of peer review.
7. Seminare publishes an annual list of reviewers who have cooperated with the journal, without identifying which reviewer evaluated a particular manuscript.

4.1. Exceptions and special rules

1. Only materials of an informational or strictly editorial nature, such as editorials, reports or editorial announcements, may be exempted from external peer review.
2. Research articles, review articles and all other scholarly texts requiring substantive academic evaluation are subject to the standard procedure of at least two independent external reviews conducted under the double-blind model.

5. Conflicts of interest

1. Authors are required to disclose sources of funding and any potential conflicts of interest when submitting a manuscript.
2. Reviewers and editors are required to disclose any conflict of interest before participating in the editorial or peer-review process and to withdraw where such a conflict could affect their impartiality or reasonably create an appearance of bias.
3. Where a conflict of interest is identified, the Editorial Board takes appropriate remedial action, including excluding the person concerned from the process, appointing another reviewer or assigning the manuscript to another editor.
4. Information concerning funding and significant conflicts of interest is published with the article whenever applicable.
5. Failure to disclose a significant conflict of interest may result in suspension of the editorial process, rejection of the manuscript or, after publication, a correction or retraction.

6. Originality, plagiarism and similarity assessment

1. The Editorial Board assesses the originality of submitted manuscripts, including through similarity checking using appropriate tools where necessary.
2. Depending on the nature of the manuscript and the requirements of the discipline, different similarity-detection tools may be used, including iThenticate or other systems capable of providing reliable comparison with relevant scholarly databases.
3. A similarity score does not in itself constitute grounds for an editorial decision. Results are interpreted substantively, taking into account correct quotations, references, bibliographies, legitimate methodological similarities and the nature of the manuscript.
4. Where there is justified suspicion of plagiarism or other misconduct, the Editorial Board initiates an appropriate investigation and, where necessary, applies measures proportionate to its findings, including suspension of the editorial process, rejection, correction, retraction or an expression of concern.
5. Authors are responsible for retaining source materials and/or data supporting the findings presented in their articles and, upon a justified request from the Editorial Board, for making such materials available to the extent necessary to verify the integrity of the work.

Manipulation of research materials, particularly illustrations, graphs, photographs or other images, in a manner that could mislead readers or distort the interpretation of the findings is prohibited.

7. Authorship and prohibited practices

1. Authorship must accurately reflect the actual contribution of each author to the work.
2. Ghostwriting, guest authorship and gift authorship are prohibited.
3. Where authorship irregularities are identified, the Editorial Board requests an explanation and may reject the manuscript or, in the case of an already published article, issue a correction or retraction.
4. Authors are required to provide an Author Contributions Statement describing the contribution of individual co-authors in order to ensure transparency of authorship.

8. Ethics of research involving humans or animals

1. Where research involves human participants or animals, authors are required to obtain all approvals, opinions or decisions required from appropriate ethics committees and to comply with applicable legal and ethical standards.
2. For research involving human participants, authors must also obtain informed consent where required by law, relevant disciplinary ethical standards or the nature of the research.
3. Authors are responsible for compliance with ethical and legal requirements and, upon request by the Editorial Board, must provide documentation confirming that such requirements have been fulfilled.
4. The Editorial Board may suspend consideration of a manuscript or reject it where required ethical approval or consent is missing or where justified concerns arise regarding the ethical conduct of the research.

9. Complaints and appeals

Seminare provides procedures for submitting complaints and appeals concerning the editorial process, peer review and decisions taken in matters of publishing ethics, including conflicts of interest, plagiarism, peer-review manipulation, corrections and retractions.

Complaints and appeals are considered impartially and confidentially, and the findings and decisions are appropriately documented.

Where a complaint concerns the conduct, impartiality, or potential conflict of interest of the Editor-in-Chief or another person who would normally be responsible for handling the matter, the case is assigned to another independent editor or, where appropriate, to a representative of the Publisher. Appeals against ordinary editorial decisions on manuscripts are handled in accordance with the procedure described in the Peer Review Process section of the journal website.

10. Corrections, retractions and editorial notices after publication

1. Where an article has already been published, the following actions may be taken:

1. a) correction (erratum/corrigendum);
   b) retraction;
   c) expression of concern.

1. An author may request a correction or retraction, but the final decision is taken by the Editorial Board and/or the Publisher in accordance with principles of academic integrity and COPE good practices.
2. Corrections and retractions are published in a visible and unambiguous manner, with a reference to the original publication and a persistent link between the notice and the article. Where technically possible, the status of the publication is also indicated in the metadata and the PDF file.
3. Retraction is applied in particular in cases of serious ethical misconduct, fabrication or falsification of data, plagiarism, significant errors undermining the reliability of the findings or other circumstances making it impossible to maintain the publication as part of the scholarly record.

Retraction does not normally involve removing the publication from the archive. The article remains part of the scholarly record but is clearly identified as retracted.

1. An expression of concern may be published where serious doubts arise and an investigation is ongoing but there is not yet sufficient evidence to justify a correction or retraction. Following completion of the investigation, the Editorial Board decides whether to issue a correction, retract the article or remove the expression of concern.
2. At its discretion and in accordance with the journal’s academic profile, the Editorial Board may permit the publication of scholarly comments, responses, explanations or corrections relating to previously published material. Such contributions may be subject to editorial assessment and, where considered appropriate, peer review.

11. Artificial Intelligence tools

Seminare has adopted a policy governing the use of Artificial Intelligence (AI) and Generative AI tools in the preparation, review and editing of scholarly publications.

Authors, reviewers and editors are required to comply with the journal’s AI Policy, including the principles governing responsible use of AI, transparency and disclosure, confidentiality, human oversight, and responsibility for scholarly and editorial work.

AI tools cannot be listed as authors or co-authors and cannot assume responsibility for the content of a scholarly work.

Detailed provisions are available in the journal’s AI Policy published on the Seminare website.

12. Copyright, licence and self-archiving

Copyright in materials published in Seminare remains with the authors.

Articles and other scholarly content published in the journal are made available under the Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 International licence (CC BY 4.0).

Under this licence, published materials may be shared and adapted, including for commercial purposes, provided that appropriate credit is given, a link to the licence is provided and any changes made are indicated.

Authors may deposit, without any embargo period, the following versions of their manuscripts:

1. the submitted version;
2. the accepted version;
3. the published version.

These versions may be deposited in institutional repositories or other repositories selected by the authors.

Detailed information concerning Open Access, copyright, the CC BY 4.0 licence and long-term preservation is provided in the journal’s Open Access Policy.

13. Confidentiality and data protection

Ethical investigations, peer-review procedures, complaints and appeals are conducted confidentially.

Personal data are processed only to the extent necessary for the editorial and publishing process and for the consideration of complaints, appeals and ethical cases, in accordance with applicable data-protection legislation, including the General Data Protection Regulation (GDPR), and the relevant privacy policies applicable to the journal and the technical platform on which it is hosted.

14. Review and updating of the Publishing Ethics Policy

1. The Publishing Ethics Policy is periodically reviewed to ensure compliance with applicable law, academic standards and internationally recognised good practices in publishing ethics.
2. The Policy is reviewed at least once every two years from the date of its adoption or most recent update.
3. Irrespective of this interval, the Policy is reviewed and updated whenever significant changes occur in international publishing-ethics standards, particularly in COPE guidance, where such changes affect the content or scope of this Policy.
4. Responsibility for monitoring relevant developments and initiating the review and updating of the Publishing Ethics Policy rests with the Editorial Board of Seminare in cooperation with the Publisher, the Francis de Sales Scientific Society.