Editorial policy

Best practices in research reports

Articles submitted to Craniofacial Research must adhere to globally accepted standards for research practices and reporting. This includes guidelines for data management, figure preparation, reproducibility, and reporting.

We have the right to implement standards that may be more stringent than local legal or ethical frameworks. Any issues discovered after publication will be addressed in accordance with the Committee on Publication Ethics (COPE) guidelines. This may lead to a correction, retraction, or expression of concern. We may also contact the authors' institutions, if required.

Ethical supervision

Rights to research on humans or animals

Researchers who are submitting studies involving human participants need to meet certain requirements. First of all, they must get approval for human subjects research beforehand from an institutional review board or equivalent ethics committee. Secondly, they must confirm compliance with ethical practices when submitting an article. Thirdly, they must provide details about how they obtained informed consent for the research (or explain why consent was not obtained). Fourthly, they must submit documentation from the institutional review board or an equivalent ethics committee confirming approval of the research upon request from the journal. Lastly, they must confirm that an identified person has given written consent for the use of that information.

Similarly, researchers who are submitting studies involving animal participants need to meet certain requirements. They must perform animal studies in accordance with internationally accepted standards. They must also obtain prior approval from an institutional review board or equivalent ethics committee. The name of the institutional review board or equivalent ethics committee, along with relevant permission numbers, must be provided at the time of submission. This information must be reported in the article.

All submissions describing human or animal research will be reviewed by journal staff to ensure that the above requirements are met. Failure to comply with the requirements may lead to rejection. If problems are discovered after publication, we may issue a correction or retraction as appropriate. We also reserve the right to contact the author's institution. For more information, please download the "Rights to Research" document.

Publication ethics

Craniofacial Research adheres to the Committee on Publication Ethics (COPE) code of conduct and follows its good practice guidelines. It is expected that authors, editors, and reviewers are familiar with and comply with the best practices in publication ethics.

Authors must follow the best practices in publication ethics concerning authorship, dual publication, attribution, plagiarism, manipulation of figures, and conflict of interest.

The editor, editorial board, and reviewers must treat articles fairly and confidentially while declaring any potential competing interests.

In cases of suspected or alleged misconduct, we will follow COPE flowcharts and may also seek advice on the COPE forum. Issues discovered after publication will be handled in accordance with COPE guidelines and may lead to correction, retraction, or expression of concern.

Additional resources on publication ethics are available from COPE and the World Association of Medical Editors (WAME).

If you have any concerns about possible misconduct, please email the journal and direct correspondence to the editor, editor@craniofacialres.com. When notifying Craniofacial Research of your concerns, please provide the full citation and DOI of the article, details about your specific concerns, and a statement of any potential competing interests you have with respect to the authors, funding, and/or sponsors of the article.

Plagiarism

Craniofacial Research has a strict policy against plagiarism in articles submitted for evaluation. If an article contains plagiarized content, it will not be considered for publication. We follow the guidelines set by COPE.

Plagiarism includes copying text, ideas, images or data from other sources without proper attribution. Reusing text from previous posts without attribution is also considered plagiarism. However, it is permissible to reuse some text from the “Material and Method” section in previous publications, provided that the source is cited. COPE's text recycling guidelines for editors provide further information on this.

To ensure that all content submitted to Craniofacial Research is original, we use software such as Dupli Checker, Paper Rater and Plagiarism Checker to filter submitted content. If the software raises any concerns, we will conduct a follow-up investigation. We also expect the reviewers and editorial board to carefully evaluate submissions and notify the journal editor of any identified plagiarism.

To ensure that all content submitted to Craniofacial Research is original, we use software such as Dupli Checker, Paper Rater and Plagiarism Checker to filter submitted content. If the software raises any concerns, we will conduct a follow-up investigation. We also expect the reviewers and editorial board to carefully evaluate submissions and notify the journal editor of any identified plagiarism.

Please read more about our policy and COPE guidelines for plagiarism at our website.

Confidentiality

We are dedicated to upholding the integrity of the peer review process, which complies with COPE guidelines. All submitted materials are treated with utmost confidentiality until they are published.

The peer review process is confidential to all parties involved. Correspondence exchanged during the review process is also considered confidential by all parties, including the authors.

Authors are allowed to provide basic details about the research presented in articles that are currently under review.

The publisher will not disclose any information about articles that have been received or are under review. Information about the content, status in the review process, the reviewers' criticisms, and its final destination will only be shared with the authors and/or reviewers, as appropriate.

Reviewers are required to maintain strict confidentiality regarding articles, associated materials, and any information they contain. Reviewers and the editorial board should not publicly discuss the authors' work, and reviewers should not appropriate the authors' ideas before publishing the article. Reviewers should not keep the article for personal use and should dispose of paper copies of articles and delete electronic copies after submitting their reviews.

We will take action against any breaches of confidentiality. If there are any concerns about misconduct during the review process, we will follow COPE guidelines.

Conflict of interest

A conflict of interest refers to anything that could interfere, or that might reasonably be perceived to interfere, with the impartial presentation, peer review, editorial decision making, or publication of submitted research or non-research articles to Craniofacial Research.

Conflicts of interest could be financial or non-financial, professional or personal, and may arise in relation to an institution, organization, or another person.

At Craniofacial Research, it is mandatory to declare all potential conflicts of interest, which is a crucial aspect of transparent research reporting. If an author fails to disclose a conflict of interest, their manuscript may face immediate rejection.

In the event that an undisclosed conflict of interest comes to light after publication, Craniofacial Research will adhere to COPE guidelines and issue a public notification to the community.

What to declare

It is mandatory for all individuals involved in the peer review process, such as authors, editors, and reviewers, to disclose any potential conflicts of interest that may have arisen within 5 years of conducting the research or preparing the article for publication. If any interests exist outside this 5-year time frame that could be interpreted as competing, they must also be declared under the same definition.

Financial conflicts of interest

Financial conflicts of interest refer to various situations where a person or organization's financial interests or incentives could potentially influence their decision-making in a certain situation. These situations may include, but are not limited to: employment, consultancies, stock ownership, honoraria, paid expert testimony, patent applications/registrations, research grants (from any source, restricted or unrestricted), travel grants, and honoraria for presentations or participating in meetings or other funds. It is important to recognize and disclose any financial conflicts of interest to maintain transparency and credibility in decision-making processes.

Non-financial conflicts of interest

Non-financial conflicts of interest refer to situations where a person has a personal or professional connection with an organization, funding body, or individual that may influence the publication process of an article. This could include being an expert witness, serving on a government or advisory board, having a relationship with non-governmental organizations, research institutions, or charities, or having personal relationships with individuals involved in the submission or evaluation of an article such as authors, reviewers, editors, or members of a journal's editorial board. Personal convictions related to the topic of an article, including political, religious, ideological, or other beliefs, that may interfere with an impartial publication process are also considered conflicts of interest. Such conflicts of interest can arise at any stage of the authorship, peer review, or decision-making process of an article, including editorials or publication.

Who must declare competing interests?

Authors

When submitting their research, authors are required to disclose all conflicts of interest that are relevant to their work. This may include, but is not limited to:

• Names of all funding sources.
• Description of the funder's role in study design, data collection, analysis, interpretation, writing, and/or decision to submit for publication.
• Any past or current editorial board membership of the journal to which the research is being submitted.
• Any past or current involvement as an expert in relevant judicial proceedings.
• Any past or current involvement in a committee of an organization that may benefit from the publication of the research.

Please ensure that all conflicts of interest are accurately disclosed at the time of submission.

Editors and reviewers

Editors and reviewers, whether professional or academic, paid or unpaid, are required to declare any potential competing interests they may have and disqualify themselves from participating in the manuscript evaluation process if necessary.

There are several reasons why editors and reviewers may recuse themselves from the peer review process, such as:

• working in the same institution or organization as an author (currently or recently), collaborating with an author (currently or recently);
• publishing with one author for the last 5 years;
• having fellowships with an author (currently or recently);
• having a financial relationship with the company that funded the research;
• having a personal relationship with an author that may prevent them from evaluating the manuscript objectively.

Editorial actions and decisions

The editor of Craniofacial Research must consider all conflicts of interest during the review process and ensure that any relevant conflicts are disclosed in the published article.

If there is a conflict of interest that, in the editor's opinion, could introduce bias or a reasonable perception of bias, the editor of Craniofacial Research will not publish commissioned articles or any other non-research articles.

The editor of Craniofacial Research will not consult with reviewers who have competing interests that could interfere with an impartial review, in the editor's judgment.

Disclosure of funding sources

Authors of Craniofacial Research must disclose the support they received to conduct their research. This involves identifying the funding sources, acknowledging donor contributions, fulfilling funding requirements and enhancing transparency in the research process.

The information should include the names of the granting agencies and grant numbers. In the event of inaccurate funding information being discovered after publication, it may need to be corrected.

Data availability

Authors submitting to the Craniofacial Research journal must make all data necessary to replicate their study's findings available to the public without any restrictions at the time of publication. To achieve this, authors must deposit the relevant data in a public data repository or include the data in the manuscript. These repositories can either be subject-specific repositories that accept structured data and/or software or interdisciplinary repositories that accept multiple types of data and/or software.

If there are specific standards for data deposition within a particular field, authors must ensure compliance with these standards. They should select repositories that are appropriate for their field of study.

The data availability statement should include the name(s) of the repository(s), as well as digital object identifiers (DOIs), access numbers or codes, or any other persistent identifiers for all relevant data.

Data access restrictions

The policy of Craniofacial Research acknowledges that there may be instances where authors are unable to release their underlying data set to the public due to legal or ethical reasons. It is important to note that this policy does not override any local regulations, legislation, or ethical frameworks. In cases where these frameworks restrict or prohibit the publication of data, authors must clearly state these limitations in the Data Availability Statement during the submission process.

Literary paternity

All individuals who are listed as authors must meet our authorship criteria. This means that anyone who meets our criteria must be included as an author.

At Craniofacial Research, we hold all authors accountable for the content of the manuscript they submit. Therefore, we expect all authors to take public responsibility for the content of their work. Additionally, all authors' contributions to the manuscript must be clearly described.

Qualification for authorship

The International Committee of Medical Journal Editors (ICMJE) has set certain standards for authorship criteria for individuals submitting manuscripts to biomedical journals. To be included on the authorship list, one must meet all four conditions:

1. Make significant contributions to the conception and design, acquisition of data, or analysis and interpretation of data.
2. Draft the article or revise it critically for important intellectual content.
3. Provide final approval of the version that is to be published.
4. Agree to be responsible for all aspects of the work to ensure that any issues related to the accuracy or integrity of any part of the work are appropriately investigated and resolved.

Author contributions

It is important to describe the contributions of all authors to the work. Craniofacial Research utilizes the CRediT taxonomy to describe each author's individual contributions. The submitting author is responsible for providing contributions from all authors at the time of submission. We expect that all authors have reviewed, discussed, and accepted their individual contributions before this date.

Contributors must accurately reflect their contributions to the final article.

Acknowledgments

Contributors who do not meet authorship criteria should be acknowledged in Acknowledgments after their permission to be named is obtained.

Authorship changes

The journal Craniofacial Research adheres to COPE guidelines for modifications in authorship.

In the event that changes need to be made to the author list after submission, all authors must agree to the changes. This includes the addition, removal, or reordering of authors. The corresponding author must initiate the request and provide an explanation for the change. If the change is deemed appropriate, the corresponding author must obtain consent from all authors - including those who are added, removed, or rearranged - and provide it to Craniofacial Research.

Author identification

Craniofacial Research requires corresponding authors and co-authors to provide ORCID iD email and registration number upon manuscript submission.

We will include the ORCID iD of the corresponding author and any co-authors provided in the manuscript upon acceptance.

What is ORCID?

An ORCID iD (Open Researcher and Contributor Identifier) is a unique and persistent digital identifier that distinguishes researchers from one another. Your ORCID iD ensures that your work is attributed correctly and that you get credit for all your contributions as a researcher. By integrating with other databases and services such as Researcher ID, Scopus, LinkedIn, Crossref, among others, your ORCID profile automatically consolidates all your academic contributions.