Generative AI Policy

General Principle

From the perspective of publication ethics, generative artificial intelligence and AI-assisted technologies may be used only where their use is compatible with accuracy, originality, confidentiality, transparency, research integrity, and ethical accountability.

All authors, reviewers, editors, members of editorial bodies, editorial staff, and the publisher remain fully responsible and accountable for their own contributions, assessments, decisions, and statements.

Undisclosed, misleading, excessive, inappropriate, or unethical use of artificial intelligence may result in editorial action, including a request for clarification, manuscript revision, rejection, correction, expression of concern, retraction, or notification of relevant institutions, depending on the nature and seriousness of the case.

Authors’ Use of AI-Assisted Tools

Authors may use generative AI and other AI-assisted tools for limited purposes, such as grammar checking, language editing, improving readability, formatting, translation support, or organising text, provided that such use does not materially alter the scholarly content, argumentation, analysis, interpretation, data, evidence, sources, citations, quotations, images, or conclusions of the manuscript.

Any use of generative AI or AI-assisted technologies that materially contributes to the manuscript must be disclosed at the time of submission. This includes, but is not limited to, the use of AI tools for drafting substantive text, summarising literature, analysing or interpreting data, generating code, producing translations used for scholarly interpretation, creating or modifying figures, or supporting methodological procedures.

Authors bear full responsibility for the accuracy, originality, legality, validity, reliability, and integrity of the submitted work, including any content prepared with the assistance of AI tools. Authors must carefully review, verify, and, where necessary, correct all AI-assisted content before submission.

AI tools may not be listed as authors, co-authors, contributors, or collaborators. Authorship is limited to human individuals who meet the journal’s authorship criteria and who can take responsibility for the work, approve the final version, declare conflicts of interest, and be held accountable for ethical and legal obligations.

Authors must not use generative AI tools to invent, falsify, fabricate, distort, plagiarise, or improperly manipulate research data, evidence, references, citations, quotations, images, translations, source descriptions, peer-review materials, or any other scholarly content.

Disclosure of AI Use

Where disclosure is required, authors must identify the AI tool or service used, describe the purpose of its use, and confirm that the final content was reviewed and approved by the authors. The disclosure should be included in the manuscript in a dedicated statement, acknowledgement, methodology section, or another appropriate location, depending on the nature of the use.

If no generative AI or AI-assisted technologies were used in a manner requiring disclosure, the journal may request authors to state this explicitly during submission.

AI Use as Part of Research Methods

If AI-assisted technologies are used as part of the research design, methodology, data collection, data processing, coding, modelling, statistical analysis, translation analysis, qualitative categorisation, image analysis, or any other research procedure, this must be clearly described in the manuscript.

The description should include, where relevant, the name and version of the tool, the provider, the date or period of use, the input data or prompts used where appropriate, the outputs generated, the extent of human oversight, and the steps taken to verify the reliability, validity, reproducibility, and ethical acceptability of the results.

Images, Figures, Tables, Data, and Source Material

Authors must not use generative AI or AI-assisted tools to create, alter, enhance, or manipulate images, figures, tables, graphs, datasets, source material, or visual evidence in a way that could misrepresent the underlying research, distort the scholarly record, or affect the interpretation of results.

Technical adjustments to visual materials are permitted only when they do not alter, obscure, exaggerate, or misrepresent the original meaning or scientific content. Any AI-assisted creation or modification of figures, images, tables, graphical abstracts, or visual content must be disclosed, unless it is limited to purely technical formatting that has no effect on scholarly interpretation.

Authors are responsible for ensuring that all AI-assisted content complies with copyright law, data protection rules, privacy rights, confidentiality obligations, licensing requirements, and the rights of third parties.

Peer Reviewers’ Responsibilities

Reviewers must treat manuscripts and all related materials as strictly confidential. They must not upload, copy, paste, transmit, or otherwise disclose manuscripts, manuscript excerpts, figures, tables, supplementary materials, unpublished data, author responses, review invitations, or any other peer-review material to generative AI tools or external AI-assisted systems.

Reviewers must not use generative AI tools to create, formulate, evaluate, or substantially revise peer-review reports. Peer review must reflect the reviewer’s own expertise, critical assessment, independent judgement, and ethical responsibility.

Reviewers remain responsible for the content, tone, accuracy, confidentiality, and integrity of their review reports. Any breach of confidentiality or inappropriate use of AI tools in the peer-review process may result in removal from the reviewer database and further editorial action.

Editors’ Responsibilities

Editors must treat submitted manuscripts, peer-review reports, author responses, editorial correspondence, decision letters, unpublished data, and all related publication materials as confidential. Editors must not upload or disclose such materials to generative AI systems or external AI-assisted tools where confidentiality, data protection, intellectual property, or publication ethics may be compromised.

Editors must not rely on generative AI or AI-assisted technologies as a substitute for their own editorial judgement, ethical assessment, or decision-making. Editorial decisions must be made by qualified human editors and must be based on scholarly merit, methodological soundness, ethical standards, journal policy, and the integrity of the peer-review process.

AI-assisted tools may be used by the journal only where they are lawful, secure, appropriate, transparent, and consistent with confidentiality, data protection, research integrity, and publication ethics requirements. Any such use must not compromise the rights of authors, reviewers, editors, or third parties.

Verification, Detection, and Editorial Assessment

The journal may investigate suspected undisclosed or inappropriate use of generative AI or AI-assisted technologies. Such assessment may include requests for clarification, examination of manuscript files, review of citations and sources, methodological checks, image or data integrity checks, and consultation with relevant experts.

The journal will not base editorial decisions solely on automated AI-detection tools. Any concerns regarding AI use will be assessed carefully, proportionately, and in accordance with publication ethics, due process, and the available evidence.

Responsibility and Compliance

By submitting a manuscript to the journal, authors confirm that any use of generative AI or AI-assisted technologies complies with this policy and that they accept full responsibility for the final submitted and published work.

This policy may be updated from time to time in response to developments in artificial intelligence, publication ethics, legal requirements, indexing expectations, and international best practices in scholarly publishing.