For authors, editors and reviewers
Editorial Policies
How manuscripts are assessed, how review is conducted, and the integrity obligations that apply to everyone involved.
These policies govern every submission to the journal. They are stated here in full so that authors, editors and reviewers work from the same document.
Some of these policies apply to every Open Access Pub journal; others are specific to this journal.
The journal
- Published by
- Open Access Pub
- ISSN
- 2641-9181
- Short code
- IJNR
- Access
- Open access, CC BY 4.0
Assessment
How manuscripts are handled
Screening, review and decision are separate stages with separate criteria.
Initial screening
All submissions undergo initial editorial screening. Manuscripts that meet the journal’s scope and minimum requirements proceed to independent peer review.
Peer-review model
Single-blind by default; double-blind review is available on request. Manuscripts that proceed to external peer review are normally evaluated by at least two independent subject-matter experts.
Double-blind handling
When double-blind review is requested, author-identifying information is kept from reviewers. Authors provide it separately in the title-page file or submission form, editors ensure that it is not shared with reviewers, and reviewers must not attempt to identify the authors.
Assessment of eligible manuscripts
IJNR publishes rigorously conducted research reporting negative, null, non-confirmatory or inconclusive findings across scientific disciplines, including unsuccessful replications, evidence-supported methodological limitations, and systematic reviews or meta-analyses of such findings. Eligible manuscripts are assessed on methodological quality, ethical standards and transparent reporting. Positive confirmatory findings fall outside the journal's remit.
In applying these standards, editors and reviewers assess each manuscript against the expectations for its article type, considering study design; sample-size justification, statistical analysis and use of controls, where applicable to the study design; analytical transparency; acknowledgment of limitations; whether the conclusions are proportionate to the evidence; and data availability.
Decision criteria
Editorial decisions are based on scope, scientific quality, methodological rigor, ethical compliance, reporting quality, and relevance to the journal.
Decisions remain independent of fees, services, memberships, and editorial or reviewing roles.
Editorial independence
Editors recuse themselves from decisions on their own submissions and wherever a conflict is present, and those manuscripts are handled independently. No commercial, membership or institutional relationship affects the assessment of a manuscript.
Reviewers and editors
Confidentiality in review
These rules apply to everyone who handles a submitted manuscript.
Manuscripts under review
A submitted manuscript is confidential. It is not shared, cited or used outside the review process, and after submitting the review, reviewers should securely delete downloaded manuscript files and must not retain or use unpublished material.
AI use in review
Reviewers must obtain journal permission before using AI to assist with a review. Any permitted use must be disclosed, and confidential manuscript content must not be uploaded where confidentiality cannot be assured.
Integrity
Publication ethics
The obligations below apply from submission through to the published record.
Research ethics
Research involving human participants requires approval from an institutional review board or ethics committee and informed consent, or a waiver documented by the ethics committee, where applicable; animal research requires IACUC or equivalent approval, a description of the measures taken to protect animal welfare and reporting in line with the ARRIVE guidelines. Patient privacy is protected through de-identification.
Clinical-trial registration
Interventional clinical trials must be registered in an accepted public trial registry at or before the first participant provides consent for enrollment. The registry name, registration number, and registration date must be reported in the manuscript.
Data availability
Every empirical research manuscript must include a data-availability statement.
Authorship and contribution
Every listed author must have contributed substantially to the work, be accountable for it and approve the submitted version. Changes to authorship after submission require written agreement from all authors.
Competing interests and funding
Financial and non-financial competing interests, and all sources of funding, are declared at submission and published with the article.
AI use by authors
Authors disclose any AI-assisted analysis or writing tools and describe how the outputs were validated. Automated outputs must be checked for accuracy, bias and reproducibility.
Originality and preprints
Manuscripts must be original and not under consideration elsewhere. Preprints are permitted; they are disclosed at submission and cited appropriately. A similarity report informs editorial assessment and is read in context rather than against a fixed threshold.
Corrections and retractions
Where the published record needs to change, the journal issues a correction, an expression of concern or a retraction notice that remains permanently linked to the original article, and investigates concerns following COPE guidance. Concerns about a published article should be sent to the editorial office at [email protected].
Rights and terms
Open access, licensing and charges
The journal publishes under one license, and its charges are stated in one place.
License
Articles appear under a Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 International (CC BY 4.0) license, and authors retain copyright.
Article processing charge
The charge is USD 1,800 for all article types and is payable only after acceptance. There is no submission fee. Withdrawal after submission is subject to the journal’s withdrawal policy, which is set out in full on the Article Processing Charges page.
Preservation
This journal’s content is committed to Portico, a not-for-profit digital-preservation archive run by ITHAKA (the organization behind JSTOR). As articles are deposited they enter Portico’s permanent archive, so the scholarly record stays available for the long term — even if a title one day ceases to publish.
Submission routes
Authors must use only one submission route for the same manuscript. The permitted routes are listed below and on the Submit Manuscript page.
Related guidance
Where these policies apply
Author-facing requirements are on Instructions for Authors. The operational guidance for handling manuscripts is on For Editors and For Reviewers.
Questions about any policy on this page can be sent to the editorial office at [email protected].
Submission routes
Primary route
Alternative route
Assisted route