Ethical Consideration

  1. In accordance with the Helsinki Declaration, if any research is done on human subjects, the researcher must explain the purpose and potential risks of mental or physical harm during the course of the study. The informed consent should be obtained from the study subjects or their guardians prior to their participation in a study. Any study involving human subjects or human data must be reviewed and approved by a responsible institutional review board (IRB). Research involving meta-analyses, systematic reviews, and literature reviews does not require IRB review. In case of secondary data analysis, IRB review and approval for an exempt study may be required based on the decision of the Editorial Board. When necessary, the Editorial Board may request any documentation regarding ethical issues of the manuscript such as written consent or the approval of the study by the IRB. Furthermore, for studies involving human subjects, the authors must explicitly state in the paper that the research received IRB approval and was conducted in accordance with the relevant standards.
  2. Research articles that are deemed to violate research ethics for the following reasons will not be published. The Editorial Board will decide on the specific reasons for rejection.
    a) Fabrication: Creating, recording, or reporting non-existent data and results.
    b) Falsification: Manipulating research material, equipment, and experimental processes; changing or omitting data; such that the research is not accurately represented in the research record.
    c) Plagiarism: The appropriation of another person's ideas, research processes, results, or text as the author's own.
    d) Duplicate publication or duplicate submission is prohibited.