Ethics, Conflict of Interest & Consent Policy

Synergy: International Journal of Multidisciplinary Studies upholds the highest standards of research integrity, transparency, and ethical publishing. The journal follows internationally recognized ethical guidelines to ensure credible and reliable scholarly publications.

Our policies are guided by:

1. Responsibilities of Authors

SIJMDS is committed to maintaining the highest standards of research integrity and publication ethics. The journal follows recognised principles of responsible scholarly publishing, including relevant guidance from the Committee on Publication Ethics (COPE), and expects authors, reviewers, editors, and other contributors to uphold these standards throughout the publication process.

  • Originality & Plagiarism: Authors must ensure that their manuscripts are entirely original. All submissions are screened using plagiarism-detection software, such as iThenticate, provided by Crossref. Manuscripts with similarity exceeding acceptable limits (generally above 15–20%, excluding references) may be rejected or returned for revision. Please refer to the complete Policy regarding the journal's Plagiarism Policy: https://sijmds.com/index.php/pub/plagiarismpolicy.
  • Multiple Submission: Authors must not submit or publish the same manuscript, or substantially overlapping work, in more than one journal. Authors must disclose any closely related publications or manuscripts under consideration elsewhere.
    • If duplicate or redundant publication is confirmed, SIJMDS may reject the manuscript, withdraw an accepted manuscript, or retract the published article. Relevant editors or institutions may also be notified where appropriate.
  • Authorship: Authorship should be limited to individuals who have made significant contributions to the conception, design, data collection, analysis, or interpretation of the study. All authors must approve the final manuscript before submission. Refer section 11 of the Author Guidelines: Authorship & Ethical Responsibilities
  • Fabrication of Data: Fabrication means inventing research data, results, participants, experiments, observations, images, references, or other research information that did not actually exist.

    Examples include:

    • inventing participants or experimental subjects;
    • creating data that were never collected;
    • inventing laboratory results;
    • creating fictitious clinical observations;
    • inventing references or sources;
    • presenting fabricated datasets as genuine research.

    Fabrication constitutes serious research misconduct. Manuscripts containing fabricated data will be rejected. If fabrication is discovered after publication, the article will normally be considered for retraction and the relevant institution or authority may be notified.

  • Falsification and Manipulation of Research Data: Falsification includes manipulating, altering, omitting, selecting, or misrepresenting research materials, data, procedures, images, or results in a manner that produces a false or misleading research record.

    This includes:

    • altering research data;
    • selectively removing data without scientific justification;
    • manipulating images or figures;
    • inappropriate enhancement or alteration of images;
    • changing experimental procedures or results without disclosure;
    • misrepresenting statistical analyses;
    • deliberately reporting only favourable results while concealing relevant contradictory findings;
    • manipulating datasets to obtain a desired result.

    Where necessary, SIJMDS may request original or raw data from authors to verify the integrity of reported findings.

  • Citation Manipulation: Authors, reviewers, and editors must not manipulate citations for the purpose of artificially increasing citation counts, journal metrics, author metrics, or the visibility of particular publications.

    Prohibited practices include:

    • adding irrelevant citations;
    • excessive self-citation without legitimate scholarly justification;
    • coercive citation;
    • coordinated citation arrangements intended to artificially increase citations;
    • requiring authors to cite particular publications without legitimate academic justification.

    Citations must be relevant, accurate, and necessary to support the scholarly content of the manuscript.

  • Data Integrity: Authors must present accurate data and avoid fabrication, falsification, or inappropriate manipulation of data. Authors may be requested to provide raw data during the editorial review process.
  • Conflict of Interest: Authors, reviewers, and editors must disclose any financial, personal, professional, institutional, or other interests that could influence or reasonably appear to influence their work or editorial decisions. Failure to disclose a significant conflict of interest may constitute publication misconduct. A conflict of interest does not necessarily prevent publication, but it must be disclosed and appropriately managed.
  • AI Tool Use: Disclose AI use for language or drafting support; AI cannot be listed as an author. Refer to: AI Policy and Guidelines
  • Data Availability: Author(s) are encouraged to provide a data availability statement indicating where the data supporting the findings of the study can be accessed. When possible, datasets should be made publicly available in appropriate repositories to support research transparency and reproducibility.
  • Copyright and Open Access and Licensing: SIJMDS is an open-access journal. Authors retain copyright of their published articles and grant Synergy Publication a non-exclusive, worldwide, perpetual right to publish, distribute, archive, and identify itself as the original publisher of the work. All articles are published under the Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 International License (CC BY 4.0), permitting sharing and reuse with appropriate attribution.

    For further details, please refer to the Copyright Notice in the Author Guidelines.

  • Funding Disclosure: Authors must disclose sources of financial support for their research.

    Where applicable, authors should provide:

    • funder name;
    • grant number;
    • relevant funding information;
    • role of the funder.

    Where no external funding was received, authors may provide an appropriate no-funding statement.

2. Ethical Considerations in Research

  • Human Participants: Research involving human participants must comply with internationally recognized ethical standards, including the principles outlined in the Declaration of Helsinki.

    Authors must provide:

    • Name of the Institutional Review Board (IRB) or Ethics Committee
    • Ethics approval number (if applicable)
    • Confirmation that informed consent was obtained from participants

    For research involving minors, consent from a parent or legal guardian must be obtained.

  • Privacy & Confidentiality: Authors must protect the privacy and confidentiality of research participants. Identifiable information such as names, photographs, or personal details must not be published without explicit written consent from the participant. visit to know the policy: https://sijmds.com/index.php/pub/about/privacy
  • Research with Students/Educational Institutions: Studies involving students, teachers, classrooms, or educational institutions must ensure voluntary participation, protection from harm, and respect for confidentiality of educational records. Researchers must take special care to avoid coercion and ensure that participation does not affect academic evaluation or institutional relationships.
  • Clinical Trials: Although the journal does not primarily publish clinical trial research, clinical trial registration is required only for manuscripts reporting clinical trials, in accordance with recognised registries in a recognised public clinical trial registry (e.g., ClinicalTrials.gov or other WHO-approved registries).

3. Responsibilities of Editors

  • Fair & Impartial Decisions: Editors evaluate manuscripts solely on their scholarly merit, including originality, methodological rigor, clarity, and relevance to the journal’s aims and scope.
  • Confidentiality: Editors must treat all submitted manuscripts as confidential documents and must not disclose information about manuscripts to anyone other than the corresponding author, reviewers, and publisher as appropriate.
  • Conflict of Interest: Recuse if conflicts exist. COPE Guidance
  • Ethical Oversight: Editors take reasonable steps to identify and prevent the publication of papers involving research misconduct such as plagiarism, citation manipulation, and data fabrication.

Refer to: Editorial Guidelines

4. Responsibilities of Reviewers

  • Confidentiality: Do not share or discuss manuscripts without authorization.
  • Objectivity: Provide constructive, evidence-based feedback.
  • Conflict of Interest: Decline review if impartiality may be affected.
  • Timeliness: Complete reviews within the agreed timeframe.

Refer to: Reviewer Guidelines

5. Peer Review Process

SIJMDS follows a double-blind peer review process. Each manuscript is reviewed by at least two independent experts. Final decisions are made by the Editor-in-Chief based on reviewer recommendations and editorial assessment.

For more, see Peer Review Policy.

6. Misconduct & Post-Publication Updates

  • Allegations of Misconduct: The journal follows procedures recommended by the Committee on Publication Ethics (COPE) in handling allegations of misconduct; institutions may be contacted.
  • Corrections/Retractions: All post-publication updates are clearly linked to the original article. Retracted articles remain accessible with clear labeling to maintain the scholarly record. COPE Retraction Guidelines or refer to the journal retraction policy

7. Editorial Independence & Appeals

  • Independence: Editorial decisions are made independently of the publisher, sponsors, or commercial interests. The Editor-in-Chief has full authority over editorial content and publication decisions.
  • Appeals: Authors have the right to appeal editorial decisions by submitting a formal written request to the editorial office, which is reviewed by the Editor-in-Chief and, where necessary, an independent editorial board member. A decision is typically communicated within 2–4 weeks. Complaints related to editorial processes, peer review, or publication ethics will be handled in accordance with guidelines from the Committee on Publication Ethics.
  • Publisher Responsibilities: The publisher supports the journal in maintaining ethical publishing standards and works with editors to address any cases of publication misconduct when they arise.

8. Advertising & Direct Marketing Policy

  • Editorial Independence: SIJMDS maintains complete editorial independence from advertisers, sponsors, publishers, and other commercial interests. Advertising or commercial relationships must not influence manuscript acceptance, rejection, peer review, editorial content, or publication priority.
  • Advertising: SIJMDS currently does not permit advertising that could compromise the independence or integrity of the journal. If advertising is introduced in the future, all advertisements will be clearly distinguished from editorial content and governed by a transparent advertising policy.
  • Commercial Influence: Advertisers, sponsors, or other commercial partners will have no authority over editorial decisions, reviewer selection, peer-review outcomes, publication priority, or the content of published articles.
  • Truthful Communication: SIJMDS will ensure that all promotional and direct marketing communications are accurate, professional, relevant, and not misleading to authors, reviewers, readers, or other members of the scholarly community.
  • Prohibited Claims: The journal will not knowingly make false or misleading claims concerning indexing, accreditation, impact factors, journal metrics, editorial-board membership, peer review, acceptance, publication guarantees, institutional affiliations, partnerships, or endorsements.
  • Calls for Papers: Calls for papers, manuscript invitations, and other scholarly communications will accurately represent the journal's scope, editorial policies, peer-review process, publication practices, and applicable fees.
  • No Guaranteed Publication: SIJMDS will not guarantee manuscript acceptance or publication in exchange for payment, sponsorship, personal relationships, or any other commercial or non-academic consideration.
  • Responsible Marketing: Direct marketing activities will be appropriately targeted, unobtrusive, and conducted solely for legitimate scholarly communication. Deceptive, aggressive, or misleading solicitation practices are not permitted.
  • Policy Compliance: Any violation of this policy will be reviewed by the journal, and appropriate corrective action will be taken to protect the editorial independence, transparency, and integrity of SIJMDS.

9. Diversity, Equity, Inclusion and Accessibility

  • Fair and Inclusive Environment: SIJMDS is committed to maintaining a fair, inclusive, respectful, and non-discriminatory scholarly publishing environment for authors, reviewers, editors, and readers.
  • Editorial Independence: Editorial decisions are based solely on scholarly merit, scientific quality, originality, relevance, and ethical standards. Decisions will not be influenced by nationality, ethnicity, gender, religion, disability, race, political beliefs, institutional affiliation, or other irrelevant personal characteristics.
  • Diversity: SIJMDS encourages appropriate diversity among authors, reviewers, editorial board members, and other contributors to the scholarly publishing process.
  • Accessibility: The journal supports reasonable measures to improve accessibility and ensure that scholarly content can be accessed and understood by a broad and diverse readership.

10. Research Involving Minors and Vulnerable Participants

  • Ethical Safeguards: Research involving minors or vulnerable populations must comply with applicable ethical standards and provide appropriate safeguards for the protection, dignity, privacy, and welfare of participants.
  • Informed Consent: Authors must obtain informed consent from participants or their legally authorised representatives where required by applicable ethical standards.
  • Assent: Where appropriate, researchers must obtain the assent of minors or individuals who are capable of providing assent in accordance with applicable ethical requirements.
  • Protection from Harm: Researchers must take reasonable measures to protect participants from physical, psychological, social, legal, or other foreseeable harm.
  • Confidentiality: Personal and identifiable information must be protected, and identifying information must not be published without appropriate consent or ethical justification.
  • Voluntary Participation: Participation must be voluntary, and participants must be free to withdraw where applicable without inappropriate consequences.
  • Protection from Coercion: Researchers must ensure that participants are not subjected to coercion, undue influence, exploitation, or inappropriate pressure to participate.
  • Ethical Approval: Where required, research must receive approval from an appropriate institutional review board, ethics committee, or other authorised body before the research is conducted.

11. Special Issues

  • Same Ethical Standards: Special issues are subject to the same standards of research integrity, publication ethics, editorial independence, and peer review as regular journal issues unless a clearly stated alternative procedure applies.
  • Guest Editors: Guest editors must comply with all SIJMDS policies relating to conflicts of interest, confidentiality, authorship, peer review, research integrity, and publication ethics.
  • Editorial Responsibility: Guest editors do not have authority to bypass the journal's established ethical or editorial requirements.
  • Peer Review: Manuscripts submitted to special issues must undergo the stated peer-review process, and any deviation from the journal's standard process must be clearly disclosed.
  • Commercial Interests: Commercial sponsorship, financial interests, or other external relationships must not influence editorial decisions, reviewer selection, manuscript acceptance, rejection, or publication priority.

12. Conference Proceedings

  • Separate Procedures: If SIJMDS publishes conference proceedings in the future, such proceedings will have clearly identified and separately stated publication procedures.
  • Peer Review: The journal will clearly disclose whether conference proceedings are peer reviewed and will specify the type of peer-review process used.
  • Editorial Responsibility: The individuals or organisations responsible for the editorial assessment and publication of the proceedings will be clearly identified.
  • Publication Fees: Any fees associated with conference proceedings will be clearly disclosed before submission or publication.
  • Copyright and Licensing: Copyright ownership, licensing conditions, and permissions applicable to conference proceedings will be clearly stated.
  • Publication Ethics: Conference proceedings will be subject to appropriate research-integrity and publication-ethics standards, including policies concerning plagiarism, duplicate publication, fabrication, falsification, conflicts of interest, and authorship.
  • Digital Preservation: The journal will disclose the arrangements used for the long-term preservation and accessibility of published conference proceedings.
  • Clear Identification: Conference proceedings will not be presented or labelled as ordinary journal issues unless they genuinely constitute journal content under the journal's publicly stated publishing model.