For editors

l Overview

The Editorial Office of a journal employs various editorial staff, including managing editors, assistant editors, copyediting editors, typesetting editors, and proofreading editors. Apart from the Editorial Office staff, there are Editors-in-Chief, Associate Editors, and Academic Editors coming from different academic institutions. The Editorial Office invites Academic Editors to collaborate to enhance the journal’s growth. Academic Editors are responsible for ensuring the quality of the journal’s content, while the Editor-in-Chief supervises the entire editorial process. All editors must have professional publishing knowledge and adhere to ethical standards. Ensuring high standards throughout the process will contribute to standardizing the publication and maintaining the content’s quality. All editors must be aware of the journal’s editorial and publishing policies, as detailed on the journal’s webpage.

l Procedures for processing manuscripts

1. Evaluation of new manuscripts

Before reviewing a new submission, please evaluate whether you have any links or relationships with the author or organization associated with the manuscript. If you do have any such conflicts of interest, please notify the Editorial Office immediately so that we can assign the manuscript to someone else. To learn more about the Conflict of Interest of each journal.

2. Pre-check

Please be advised that editors will only consider manuscripts that are within the scope of the journal and adhere to the article structure outlined in the author guidelines. Additionally, please keep in mind that manuscripts with more than a 30% similarity index may be rejected. If the content is similar to what the author has already published, they must revise it to ensure the innovation of the content. Lastly, authors must ensure that there is no suspected academic misconduct in their submission before the manuscript moving on to the next step.

At this stage, editors should consider the following questions:

1) Does the manuscript include all the necessary graphs and corresponding data?

2) Is there any potential academic misconduct in the manuscript? Please refer to the journal’s Misconduct Policy for details.

3) Is the manuscript consistent with the journal’s scope?

4) Does the manuscript require the authors to provide authorization consent, institutional ethics approval number, or informed consent?

5) Is the research complete and scientifically sound?

6) Is the content of this manuscript appropriate to the article type?

Editors can read about the policy in the Editorial and Publishing Policies of each journal.

3. Peer review

Editors are required to understand the whole Peer Review Policy of the journal, and find a minimum of two independent external reviewers for each manuscript, in order to obtain at least two valid review reports. Reviewers are expected to have the following qualifications:

1) They should have continuous involvement in their field of study.

2) They should have published at least 1 WoS article in their field.

3) They should not be employed at the same institution as the authors.

4) They should not be listed by the author as a recused reviewer.

If an editor has a potential conflict of interest with a person or institution mentioned in this article, they must declare it beforehand. In such cases, the article will be assigned to a different editor for the subsequent peer review process.

l Journal development

Editors have the responsibility to promote and develop their journals. There are many ways to achieve this, including but not limited to:

1. Calling for papers from scholars who have already published papers in the field via emails.

2. Inviting scholars to contribute to the journal during conferences.

3. Proactively communicating with academic institutions and inviting scholars to learn about the journal.

4. Adding journal names or links to business cards, PowerPoint presentations, email signatures, and other relevant materials.

5. Promoting it on various academic and social media platforms.

l Development of Editorial Board

In addition to contributing to or recommending manuscripts for the journal, Editorial Board Members are also responsible for suggesting improvements to the journal. Editorial board membership should be dynamic to ensure that enthusiastic scholars are involved in scholarly publishing.

When considering new members for the Editorial Board, it is essential to take into account factors such as regional diversity, international representation, gender balance, language variations, and a willingness to participate actively. The Editorial Office should maintain regular communication with the editorial board to ensure that the board members are updated on the progress and dynamics of the journal.