Focus and Scope

Wearable Technology (WT) provides a medium for disseminating significant advances in wearable technology. The peer-reviewed open-access journal welcomes submissions from worldwide researchers, and practitioners in the field of wearable technology, which can be original research articles, review articles, case reports, commentaries, etc. 

Topics of this journal include, but are not limited to:

• Wearable smart devices
• Sensors/Controllers
• Fitness trackers
• Head-mounted displays
• Biomedical engineering
• Systems simulation
• Digital health
• E-textiles
• Intelligent garments
• Wearable medical products
• Medical implant products
• Intelligent electronic devices
• Technology implementation
• Mobile aids

Section Policies

Original Research Article

Original research article should contain completely new principal research testifying major contributions to the field. The study should represent new findings or discoveries in a subject area that were not published before. The report may contain significant findings, methodology importance and considerable evidence to the conclusions.

Open Submissions

Indexed

Peer Reviewed

Review Article

Review article is summarized descriptions of recent findings and significant developments at particular subject area of research considering the Journal’s scope. They should include critical assessments of novel technologies, evaluation of subject advancement, elucidate unresolved questions, comparative analysis with a substantial coverage of previous works and highlight future prospects. Although there are no restrictions with the length and content of a review, authors should consider drawing readers’ attention and interest with quality information.

Open Submissions

Indexed

Peer Reviewed

Editorial

Editorial reflects the opinion of an Editorial Board member or staff for particular Journal highlighting recent changes, concerned issues or announcements in relevance to the journal. This may include editorial management and policies.

Open Submissions

Indexed

Peer Reviewed

Case Report

Case report summarizes the execution of a collaborative research program that is directly related to the advancement of wearable technology.

Open Submissions

Indexed

Peer Reviewed

Commentary

Commentary contains unsolicited commentaries or analysis from the reader(s) targeting specific published articles in the journal.

Open Submissions

Indexed

Peer Reviewed

Perspective

Perspective contains the author's personal opinions on a subject/topic. Unlike Reviews, Perspective articles may cover a more specific, narrow part of the field. However, these are still required to uphold the spirit of academia to be objective as well as aim to initiate or further discussions and novel experimental procedures in the field.

Open Submissions

Indexed

Peer Reviewed

Method

Method presents new or improved version of experimental methods, tests or procedures pertaining to the field of wearable technology.

Open Submissions

Indexed

Peer Reviewed

Erratum

Erratum is a notification of a significant error made by the editors that affects the scholarly record or the scientific integrity of a published article. An erratum is always accompanied by Publisher Correction of the error. The corrections will not be made directly in the already-published articles. Authors who notice an error in their published articles should contact editorial-wt@apacsci.com.

Open Submissions

Indexed

Peer Reviewed

Peer Review Process

To ensure high-quality publication, Asia Pacific Academy of Science Pte. Ltd. (APASCI) conducts a stringent double-blind peer review process for all manuscripts submitted to its journals:

1. Upon submission, a manuscript is reviewed by the managing editor of the journal to assess for integrality and similarity. Once the manuscript has passed this pre-screening check, it will be passed to one of the academic editors (the Editor-in-Chief for a regular submission, the Guest Editor for a Special Issue submission, or Editorial Board members. Whoever they are, the above-mentioned roles ensure to have no conflicts of interest).
2. The assigned academic editor carefully evaluates the manuscript to determine if its topic and content are suitable for consideration.
3. The assigned academic editor invites at least two independent-external reviewers who are suitably qualified to assess the paper. Authors can recommend reviewers or provide an avoidance list, and basic information for identifying and contacting the reviewers should be given. The recommended reviewers may not be invited upon the decision of the assigned academic editor.
4. Reviewers are asked to evaluate the manuscript’s originality, methodology, contribution to the literature, presentation of results and support for the conclusion, and appropriate referencing of previous relevant studies.
5. According to the evaluation reports by the reviewers along with a review from the assigned academic editor, the Editor-in-Chief editor makes one of the following decisions: accept the submission, accept with minor revisions, accept with revisions required (major revisions), require resubmission for review, or decline the submission.
6. If the Editor-in-Chief suggests minor revisions, authors are given a maximum of 5 days to revise and resubmit the manuscript.
7. If the Editor-in-Chief suggests major revisions, authors are given a maximum of 14 days to revise and resubmit the manuscript.
8. After the re-submission of the revised manuscript, the above steps are repeated before the manuscript is accepted for publication.
9. Authors of rejected submissions have the right to make an appeal in writing to the editorial office of the specific journal (editorial_office@apacsci.com) within 4 weeks of receiving the decision. The written appeal should include specific reasons for the appeal and point-by-point responses to the reviewers' comments.
10. Decisions made on appeals by the Editor-in-Chief are final and no further considerations will be made.

Publication Frequency

The publication frequency of Wearable Technology is semi-annual.

Open Access Policy

This journal is in the Gold Open Access model. This means that the article is universally and freely accessible without charge to users.

• Higher Visibility, Availability and Citations – free and unlimited accessibility of the publication over the internet without any restrictions increases citation of the article
• Ease of Search – publications are easily searchable in search engines and indexing databases
• Rapid Publication – accepted papers are immediately published online

All published content is distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 International License, permitting all use, distribution, and reproduction in any medium under the condition that the original work is properly cited.

Editorial Policies

Authors should read the “Author Guidelines” before making a submission, and make sure that the manuscripts were written in accordance to the style and specifications of the journal’s policy.

All manuscripts submitted to Wearable Technology are subject to rigorous peer review. Prior to the peer review process, the manuscripts will be screened for acceptable English language, novelty and relevance to the Focus and Scope of the journal.

Any manuscripts submitted to Wearable Technology will be treated as confidential materials. The manuscripts will not be disclosed to anyone except individuals such as editorial staff, reviewers and editors who participate in the initial screening, review, processing and preparation of the manuscript for publication (if accepted).

A manuscript would not be accepted if it has been published or is currently under consideration for publication in any other journals. The authors are required to notify the editorial team if the findings and data in their submissions have been presented in conferences.

Publishing Ethics

APASCI upholds the spirit of strict adherence to high ethical standards. This is consistent with APASCI’s mission of publishing high-quality articles and promoting open scientific exchanges globally. APASCI follows the Ethical Oversight Guidelines of the Committee on Publication Ethics (COPE) in overseeing the publication process, as well as the activities of APASCI journals, editors, and reviewers.

APASCI and all the editors adhere to the following guidelines:

1. Core Practices and Best Practice Guidelines of the Committee on Publication Ethics (COPE);

2. Principles of Transparency and Best Practice in Scholarly Publishing developed by the Committee on Publication Ethics (COPE), Directory of Open Access Journals (DOAJ), Open Access Scholarly Publishers Association (OASPA), and World Association of Medical Editors (WAME).

3. Recommendations for the Conduct, Reporting, Editing, and Publication of Scholarly Work in Medical Journals from the International Committee of Medical Journals Editors (ICMJE).

APASCI is committed to protecting the privacy of its contributors and promises not to disclose personal information to third parties without permission, unless for necessary purposes of the publishing process or required by law.

APASCI takes allegations of misconduct (refer to the Misconduct Policy for more details) seriously and will launch an immediate investigation by a group of investigation members. Decisions will be made by the investigation group based on clear evidence, and the authors will be informed. If there is any appeal against the decision, it must be made to the publisher within 14 days of the decision date, or else actions will be taken after 14 days. The decision on the appeal is final.

Any complaints and appeals against APASCI journals and editors can be directed to the publisher at editorial_office@apacsci.com, and APASCI follows COPE guidelines in handling all complaints and appeals.

Research Involving Human Subjects

Authors who carry out research involving humans must declare that their studies followed the WMA Declaration of Helsinki. They must obtain approval from the concerned research ethics committee before carrying out the research and accept the monitoring by the committee. During the submission stage, authors are required to attach a statement containing the name of the ethics committee, the approval code, etc.

Informed consent to participate in the research must be obtained from all human subjects or their guardians. A statement on the consent to participate should also be included during submission. If there is no need for informed consent, authors must provide the name of the ethics committee and the reason for the absence of the need for informed consent.

Human subjects’ right to privacy right is inviolable. Authors should not disclose any identifying information, including but not limited to names, initials, contacts, and medical record numbers, unless the absence of such information may influence the interpretation of the research. In addition, written informed consent for publication from the participants should be obtained. If participants are vulnerable, informed consent should be given by their guardians. Authors must inform the participants if pictures of their bodies (e.g., faces) have to be included in the manuscript and receive consent for publication. In the case of deceased human subjects, their next of kin or legal representative should be asked for consent.

Research Involving Animal Subjects

All studies involving animals should be approved by an ethics committee before the research is conducted. If ethical approval is not required by national laws, exemption from the ethics committee, the name of the ethics committee, and the reason should be provided by the authors during submission.

The following guidelines can be helpful for authors in upholding high ethical standards and avoiding submission rejection

• Code of Practice for the Housing and Care of Animals Used in Scientific Procedures
• ARRIVE Guidelines
• Three Rs
• The Scientific Basis for Regulation of Animal Care and Use
• EU Regulations on Animal Research

APASCI applies The ARRIVE Essential 10: Compliance Questionnaire for evaluating comparative experiments in living animals. Authors can also use it as a checklist.

Ethical Oversight

WT always follows the Ethical Oversight policy of COPE, and monitors every stage of the completion of best practice followed by the Core Practice and the ethical problem of COPE. All academic misconduct is strictly prohibited. If there is any potential for, including but not limited to academic fraud, plagiarism, and multiple contributions, the manuscript will not be assigned to the next stage for evaluation, and authors are responsible for explaining doubts to the Editorial Office. WT promises that all the submissions are private, and they will not be disclosed to third parties unless the publishing purposes. Authors, editors, and reviewers should expose any potential conflict of interest timely according to the Conflict of Interest Policy.

For subjects involving humans or animals, WT asks authors to be deeply concerned the privacy and welfare of the subjects based on the policy of Statement of Human and Animal Rights. Authors should provide the approval from the institutional ethical regulator or committee. All the information of the subjects is private, and authors should hide the identifiable information such as face picture, name, and fingerprint picture. Most importantly, Informed Content Statement from all the research subjects should be obtained, and authors need to inform the subjects that this research will be published in future. For the vulnerable, it is necessary to obtain oral or written Informed Content Statement from their parent of kinship.

Section Collection Policy

The Section Collection program has been driven by Asia Pacific Academy of Science Pte. Ltd. for a new chance to run an open access journal. This program aims to collect multidisciplinary topics, and concentrate authors from diverse research fields to focus on a special theme. It is great attempt to develop new ideas and applications. Section editorial team is composed of many scientists whose research fields covering various interests. They all supervise the implementation of the program, and the editorial process must comply with editorial policies of the journal.

A Section Collection is usually launched by an expert with great trust among peers and invited by the Editorial Office, or scholars could apply a section collection. Section Editors are representatives focusing on a theme from multidisciplinary topics. They have different research background, and gather to initiate new ideas and collaborations. Great responsibilities of Section Editors include:

• Preparing the title, summary, keywords, submission deadline, etc.
• Preparing a potential contributors’ list.
• Suspecting and contributing to the editorial progress , including but not limited to the initial screening, peer-reviewed process, and final decision making.

 

Workflow of Section Collection

Section Editors are invited to prepare the summary of Section Collections, and advert the project. New manuscripts should be submitted via the open journal system, and then Section Collection Editors will evaluate the research field and the integrality of the manuscripts. Assistant Editors will screen the originality by iThenticate. Any manuscript with potential misconduct must be prevented to the next stage. The Editorial Office will pass it for the double-blind peer-reviewed process for further review comments with no less than two reviewers. The Section Collection Editors have the responsibility to supervise the rigor and scientificity of the whole process. All the comments are collected to Section Editors, who will make the final decision on the manuscript such as acceptance, revision, or rejection. Accepted manuscripts will go through the production stage. Meanwhile, authors will get the article accepted notification. Published papers will be archived in the current issue of the journal, and also collected on the Section Collections page.

Authorship

Based on the guidelines of the International Committee of Medical Journal Editors (ICMJE), authorship should be limited to those who meet the following four criteria:

1. Contributed substantially to the conception or design of the manuscript or the acquisition, analysis, or interpretation of data for the manuscript; AND
2. Drafted the manuscript or reviewed it critically for significant intellectual content; AND
3. Have final approval of the version to be published; AND
4. Agreed to be responsible for the manuscript in ensuring that problems relating to the accuracy or completeness of any part of the manuscript are appropriately investigated and resolved.

Individuals who do not meet the above four criteria should not be listed as authors but should be acknowledged. Authors should disclose whether artificial intelligence (AI)-assisted technologies were used in the preparation of their manuscripts and how they used them. Authors should also report the use of AI for writing assistance in the Acknowledgment section. AI tools should not be used in sections that rely on human intellectual analysis, such as data interpretation and conclusion summarization.

Changes to Authorship

Authorship changes (addition, deletion, or rearrangement of author names) should be made before the acceptance of the manuscript. Confirmation from all authors (including existing authors and author(s) to be added and/or removed) should be provided to the editorial office of the journal, together with the reason for such changes. Changes can be made after the approval of the journal.

Conflict of Interest

Authors are required to declare any potential conflicts of interest (financial or non-financial). Any agreements with study sponsors (for-profit or non-profit), such as those that interfere with the authors’ access to the study’s data or with the authors’ ability to analyze or interpret the data and to publish manuscripts independently according to their own decision, should be avoided by authors at all costs.

APASCI also requires reviewers and editors to declare any (potential) non-financial conflicts of interest and declare any unpaid roles or relations that may influence the decision on the manuscript’s publication. These include, but are not limited to, unpaid roles in a governmental or non-governmental organization, unpaid roles in an advocacy or lobbying organization, and unpaid advisory positions in a commercial organization.

In addition, reviewers and editors must disclose any association that poses a conflict of interest in connection with the manuscript. Examples are personal or work-related relationships with one of the authors or the reviewer is on the authors’ avoidance list.

Misconduct Policy

Following COPE guidelines, APASCI will not accept any misconduct behaviors that may mislead researchers.

Plagiarism

Plagiarism is not acceptable. Using the content from one’s own previously published articles without proper citation is also considered plagiarism. APASCI adopts Crossref Similarity Check (powered by iThenticate) for checking the originality of submissions. Manuscripts with a high similarity index may be rejected.

Fabrication and falsification

Fabrication and falsification of data or images will mislead researchers. APASCI strongly opposes such practices and will reject suspicious submissions.

Duplicate submission

Duplicate submission of a manuscript that has been published or submitted to other journals at the same time will not be considered.

Correction, Retraction and Withdrawal

Correction

Authors are responsible for approving the final version of their manuscript and they should avoid any errors prior to publishing. In the case of errors that occur in a published article and have no influence on research results, APASCI will issue a correction/erratum.

Authors, readers, and editors are encouraged to report any errors found in published papers. Please contact the editorial office of the particular journal.

Retraction

Based on COPE guidelines, the following conditions can lead to the retraction of a published article:

• Unreliable findings
• Plagiarism
• Published elsewhere without proper attribution to previous sources, disclosure to the editor, permission to republish, or justification
• Containing material or data without the authorization for use
• Infringement of copyright, violation of privacy, or other legal issues
• Unethical research
• Dubious peer review processes
• Failing to disclose a major competing interest

If any of the above misconduct proved to be true, a retraction notice will be issued with the reason, while the PDF of the retracted article will be watermarked with “Retracted”. The journal editors will inform the authors of the retraction.

Paid Article Processing Charges will not be refunded to the authors if retraction occurs.

Withdrawal

Although not encouraged, authors can initiate the withdrawal of their submission before and during the peer review process by providing the reason. However, authors should note that a penalty fee of US$200 will be imposed for the withdrawal of a submission undergoing the peer review process due to the spent efforts on the evaluation of the manuscript by the editors and reviewers. Upon the approval of submission withdrawal, the submission will be removed from the journal’s operation system, and the authors be informed.

Accepted articles and articles in press may also be withdrawn due to infringements of professional ethical codes (similar reasons to those for retraction).

Language

The language of all manuscripts must be English (either British or American) and non-English words should be used sparingly. Poor English may lead to article rejection. Authors are encouraged to seek language polishing by a native English speaker or a professional editing service.

Copyright & License

Authors contributing to APASCI journals retain the copyright.

All articles published by Wearable Technology are licensed under the Creative Commons International Licenses. Without any explicit request from the corresponding author during the submission stage, a paper will be published under the Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 International License (CC BY 4.0) by default. Authors who would like to publish their work under the Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial 4.0 International License (CC BY-NC 4.0), they should express their request during the submission stage. Please include the statement below in the "Comments for the Editor column" on the submission page:

The contributors or authors for this submission entitled “[MANUSCRIPT TITLE]”, i.e. [NAMES of ALL AUTHORS], have given their consents to alter the Creative Commons License to *CC BY-NC 4.0* under which this submission will be published in Wearable Technology.

Preprint Policy

APASCI allows authors to post preprints of the manuscript of their original research articles (limited to only this type of article) on community preprint servers, such as arXiv, bioRxiv, and PeerJ Preprint, prior to or simultaneous with their manuscript submission to APASCI journals. Authors retain the copyright of the manuscript posted on a preprint server.

Authors should inform the editors of the preprint version of their submitted manuscript in a cover letter, as well as provide any associated accession numbers or DOIs. Revised versions per the result of the peer review process and accepted versions for publication should not be posted on a preprint server.

Upon publication of the article, APASCI encourages authors to link the article in the preprint server to the journal site, so as to guide readers to access and refer to the final version of the article.

Permissions and Reprints

The authors reserve the copyright. Papers will be published under Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 International License (CC BY 4.0) by default. It is free to use, copy, download, distribute and reuse the work as long as the original source is properly cited. All the publications could be explored to the e-version; if you’d like to discuss in more detail how our content could work with your marketing strategy, please contact editorial-wt@apacsci.com.

Statement of Informed Consent

All papers submitted to Wearable Technology should declare that they have obtain the "statement of informed consent" written or oral during submitting. Any paper lacking it will not be considered for publication.

Patients have a right to privacy that should not be infringed without informed consent. Nonessential identifying details should be omitted. All information which could contribute to identify patients, including patients' names, initials, or hospital numbers, should not be published in written descriptions, photographs, etc., unless the information is essential for scientific purposes and the patient (or parent or guardian) gives explicit written or oral informed consent for publication. If identifying characteristics are de-identified, authors should provide assurance that alterations do not distort scientific meaning, and editors will note that. Furthermore, individuals who provide writing assistance should be identified by the authors, and they should disclose the funding source for this assistance.

Statement of Human and Animal Rights

All papers submitted to Wearable Technology should declare agreement with the following "statement of human and animal rights". Any paper lacking it will not be considered for publication. Papers describing procedures involving humans or animals must include an explicit and easily identifiable statement pointing out that the procedures followed were in accordance with the ethical standards of the responsible committee on human experimentation (institutional and national) and with the Helsinki Declaration of 1975, as revised in 2000 and 2008. If any doubt exists as to whether the research was conducted in accordance with the Helsinki Declaration, the authors must explain the rationale for their approach, and then demonstrate that the institutional ethical committee explicitly approved the doubtful aspects of the study.

When reporting experiments on animals, authors should be asked to indicate whether the institutional and national guide for the care and use of laboratory animals was followed.

Indexing & Archiving

• All the articles published online will be archived in Portico for long-term digital preservation.

• Authors are encouraged to self-archive the final version of their published articles into institutional repositories (such as those listed in the Directory of Open Access Repositories).

• Authors are also encouraged to use the final PDF version published on the website of Wearable Technology.

Wearable Technology has been indexed and archived in National Library Board of Singapore, ResearchGate, Scilit, GoogleScholar, Crossref.

Article Processing Charges (APCs)

APASCI’s publishing model is open access. Open access enables readers to freely access and download articles immediately after publication online. APASCI charges authors article processing charges (APCs) so as to cover operation costs, such as those arising from the evaluation and production processes. APCs should be paid upon the acceptance of articles and ahead of publication.

APCs of Wearable Technology are US$800.

Waiver and Discount Policy

APASCI believes there should be no barriers to the dissemination of knowledge, and thus APASCI offers APC waivers and discounts to authors from low-income countries and authors with special circumstances. Authors should write to the editorial office of the specific journal to apply for waivers and discounts. The decision to approve such applications is made by the editorial office on a case-by-case basis.

Declaimer

The opinions, statements, methods, results, and data in APASCI’s published articles are those of the authors and do not reflect the opinions of APASCI and its editors. APASCI disclaims responsibility for any injury to people or property resulting from any ideas, methods, or products referred to in the articles or advertisements.

Advertising Policy

1. APASCI reserves the right to accept or refuse advertising.
2. Advertisements must comply with relevant rules and laws in the country where they will appear.
3. Advertisements should be clearly legible and advertisers identifiable.
4. Advertisements should never influence the content of each journal and editorial decisions.
5. APASCI disclaims responsibility for any damages resulting from advertisements in its journals.

For any advertisement queries, please contact APASCI at editorial_office@apacsci.com.