Editors, authors, and publishers adopt the guidelines the Committee on Publication Ethics (COPE) developed.

Publication Ethics and Malpractice Statement

Before submitting or reviewing an article, authors and reviewers must carefully read and understand the following Research & Publishing Ethics. They describe, in detail, the authors' and reviewers' duties as understood by the Iraqi Journal of Architecture and Planning (IQJAP), based on Elsevier Publishing Ethics and the Publishing Ethics set by the Committee On Publication Ethics (COPE). Authors wishing to submit their article must ensure they fulfilled these duties completely; they will be asked to confirm following these standards on the Publishing Ethics Agreement page upon submitting their paper to IQJAP. Suppose it is proven that the author did not comply with any of these duties. In that case, IQJAP reserves the right to take any necessary action to overcome the issue, from rejecting/removing the article to banning the author from future publishing at IQJAP. Should any questions arise or further clarification is needed, please get in touch with IQJAP's editorial office.

1)      Reporting Standards

Authors of reports of original research should present an accurate account of the work performed and an objective discussion of its significance. The underlying data should be represented accurately in the paper. A paper should contain sufficient detail and references to permit others to replicate the work. Fraudulent or knowingly inaccurate statements constitute unethical behaviour and are unacceptable. Review and professional publication articles should also be accurate and objective, and editorial 'opinion' works should be identified as such.

2)      Data Access and Retention

Authors may be asked to provide the research data supporting their paper for editorial review and/or to comply with the open data requirements of the journal. Therefore, authors should be prepared to provide public access to such data, if practicable, and should be designed to retain such data for a reasonable number of years after publication.

3)      Originality and Acknowledgement of Sources

The authors should ensure that they have written entirely original works. If the authors have used the work and words of others, this has been appropriately cited or quoted, and permission has been obtained where necessary.

Proper acknowledgement of the work of others must always be given. Authors should cite publications that have influenced the reported work and provide the work with the appropriate context within the larger scholarly record. Information obtained privately, as in conversation, correspondence, or discussion with third parties, must not be used or reported without explicit, written permission from the source.

Plagiarism takes many forms, from 'passing off' another's paper as the author's paper, to copying or paraphrasing substantial parts of another's paper (without attribution), to claiming results from research conducted by others. Plagiarism in all forms constitutes unacceptable behaviour and will be checked for by IQJAP's editorial office and editors.

4)      Multiple, Redundant or Concurrent Publication

An author should not publish manuscripts describing the same research in more than one journal of primary publication. Submitting the same manuscript to more than one journal concurrently constitutes unethical behaviour and is unacceptable.

In general, an author should not submit for consideration in another journal a paper published previously, except in the form of an abstract or as part of a published lecture or academic thesis or as an electronic preprint.

5)      Confidentiality

Information obtained during confidential services, such as refereeing manuscripts or grant applications, must not be used without the author's explicit written permission for the work involved in these services.

6)      Authorship of the Paper

Authorship should be limited to those who have contributed significantly to the conception, design, execution, or interpretation of the reported study. All those who have made substantial contributions should be listed as co-authors. Where others have participated in certain substantive aspects of the paper (e.g. Language editing or data gathering), they should be recognized in the acknowledgements section as researcher assistants/associates. The corresponding author should ensure that all appropriate co-authors are included, no inappropriate co-authors are included in the paper and that all co-authors have seen and approved the final version of the article and have agreed to its submission for publication. The authors take collective responsibility for the work. Each author is accountable for ensuring that questions related to the accuracy or integrity of any part of the work are appropriately investigated and resolved.

Authors are expected to consider the list and order of authors carefully before submitting their manuscript and provide the definitive list of authors at the time of the original submission. Only in exceptional circumstances will the Editor consider (at their discretion) the addition, deletion or rearrangement of authors after the manuscript has been submitted. The author must flag any such request to the Editor. All authors must agree with any such addition, removal or rearrangement.

7)      Declaration of Competing Interests

Conflict of interest is "a divergence between an individual's private interest (competing interests) and his or her responsibilities to scientific and publishing activities, such that a reasonable observer might wonder if the individual's behaviour or judgment was motivated by considerations of his or her competing interests". All authors should disclose in their manuscript any financial and personal relationships with other people or organizations that could be viewed as inappropriately influencing (bias) their work.

All sources of financial support for the conduct of the research and/or preparation of the article should be disclosed, as should the role of the sponsor(s), if any, in study design; in the collection, analysis and interpretation of data; in the writing of the report; and in the decision to submit the article for publication. This should be stated if the funding source(s) had no such involvement.

Examples of potential conflicts of interest that should be disclosed include employment, consultancies, stock ownership, honoraria, paid expert testimony, patent applications/registrations, and grants or other funding. Potential conflicts of interest should be disclosed at the earliest possible stage.

8)      Notification of Fundamental Errors

When an author discovers a significant error or inaccuracy in their own published work, the author must promptly notify the journal editor and publisher and cooperate with the Editor to retract or correct the paper if the editor deems it necessary. Likewise, suppose the Editor or the publisher learns from a third party that a published work contains an error. In that case, the author must cooperate with the Editor, including providing evidence to the Editor where requested.

9)      Image Integrity

Enhancing, obscuring, moving, removing, or introducing a specific feature within an image is unacceptable. Adjustments of brightness, contrast, or colour balance are acceptable if and as long as they do not obscure or eliminate any information present in the original. Manipulating images for improved clarity is accepted, but manipulation for other purposes could be seen as scientific and ethical abuse and will be dealt with accordingly.