Conflict of Interest Policy

A conflict of interest, also called a competing interest, exists when professional judgement about the validity of research could be influenced by a secondary interest such as financial gain or personal relationships. Disclosure allows editors, reviewers, and readers to weigh the work fairly. This policy applies to authors, reviewers, and editors across all Scopapers journals.

Authors

Authors must disclose all financial and non-financial interests that could reasonably be seen as relevant to their work. Financial interests include funding, employment, consultancies, honoraria, patents, and holdings in organisations that may gain or lose from publication. Non-financial interests include personal, academic, or institutional relationships that could affect the work. All sources of funding for the research must be stated, and where authors have no competing interests they should say so explicitly. Disclosed interests are published with the article so that readers can take them into account.

Reviewers

Reviewers must decline to assess any manuscript in which they have a conflict of interest, for example where they have a close relationship with an author, a competing project, or a financial interest in the outcome. Where a lesser interest exists that does not require them to withdraw, they should disclose it to the editor, who will decide how to proceed.

Editors

Editors must not make decisions on manuscripts in which they have a conflict of interest, whether personal, financial, or institutional. In such cases the manuscript is reassigned to another editor who can handle it independently. Editors who are themselves authors on a submission to their own journal take no part in the editorial handling of that submission.

Managing disclosed interests

Disclosure does not by itself disqualify a manuscript, a review, or an editorial role; it allows any interest to be managed transparently. Failure to disclose a relevant interest, however, may be treated as misconduct and may lead to correction or retraction of the published record in accordance with our Corrections, Retractions & Withdrawals policy.