Requirements for research papers (master's thesis, bachelor's thesis) or manuscripts of articles

The researcher is responsible for the timely, accurate, fair, and transparent presentation of research results and data. There are many different formats for publishing research results – i.e., a research report, master's thesis, bachelor's thesis, doctoral thesis, monograph, conference report or article in a scientific collection or journal. The most common is to publish an article on the results in a scientific journal.

Pre-review is applied when publishing research works as a scientific publication, but the results can also be published elsewhere, eg as popular scientific articles. It is good practice to share the results with the study participants.

It is important to choose a suitable format for publishing. When choosing a research journal / collection, the quality of the publication is important, as are the published articles and the background information on the publisher's website on the principles of pre-review, selection of reviewers, the review process, and the evaluation criteria of the submitted article. Open access scientific journals and electronic platforms are becoming increasingly important in publishing research results.

Manuscripts of scientific publications are subject to both substantive and stylistic requirements. Requirements for the submitted article / research may relate to the field, methodology, volume of work, structure, style, use of a certain reference system, etc.

The reader must be informed of any support received, financial or otherwise, when publishing the research results, and it is also important to state the restrictions related to the research. The researcher has the right to make corrections to the manuscript submitted for publication or, if necessary, to withdraw the work after submission for publication. Observe confidentiality unless prior consent has been given for publication. All authors mentioned in the manuscript must have contributed to the research.

Most journals that publish research articles find it unethical to submit the same article to two or more publishers at the same time, as reviewing and editing is time-consuming and resource intensive. If you really do, you should notify the publisher of your intention, but double submission will reduce the likelihood of the article being published.

In addition to positive research results, it is important to publish and disseminate negative results to avoid duplication of research.

Acknowledge the work and intellectual contribution of other research and cite sources.

 

Authorship

The author or authors of a research work are the person or persons who have made a significant intellectual contribution to the completion of the research work and who have been named as the authors of the research work. In research ethics, being an author means, on the one hand, access to certain benefits (eg funding, recognition, career opportunities) and, on the other, a willingness to be liable for possible violations or consequences. The Code of Conduct for Research Integrity defines authorship based on the following criteria:

 

1. significant contribution to the development of a research concept or research design or to the collection, analysis, or interpretation of data for the work; and

2. creation of a working version or supplementing it with a significant intellectual contribution; and

3. approval of the final version to be published; and

4. agree to be responsible for all aspects of the work and to ensure that all questions regarding the accuracy and completeness of any part of the work are reviewed and resolved appropriately.

 

Research usually involves collaboration with a variety of stakeholders. This means that all parties must be aware of their responsibility for the ethics / integrity of the research. The first step should be to reach agreements on responsibilities, division of labour, data collection and management, authorship, order of authors, etc., to avoid confusion and infringements in the future. This does not mean that agreements cannot be amended later if necessary, but in this case all parties involved - co-researchers, funder, publisher, research institution, etc. - must also be informed.

 

If a person is involved in the research who does not meet the criteria for authorship but whose contribution still deserves recognition, their role and contribution to the research must be indicated separately. It is unethical to co-author people whose involvement in the project is non-existent or weak - for example, people who joined the project only in the final phase or whose name would contribute to the publication of the research.

 

The parties must also decide on which of them will act as the corresponding author. The corresponding author is one of the authors of the work, who, firstly, mediates the communication between the authors and the publisher and, secondly, is responsible for ensuring that the inquiries made to the article are answered by the authors. The corresponding author and their contact details must be clearly indicated in the publication.

 

Infringements

During the conducting phase, it was mentioned that plagiarism, fabrication, and falsification of data are traditionally considered to be the most serious ethical violations, as they undermine the recording of research results and call into question the credibility of science. Therefore, these three infringements should be the focus of the manuscript creation and distribution phase. In addition to these three, infringements such as manipulation of authorship or reduction of the role of other researchers in publications, selective citations, self-disclosure of research results, inclusion of unnecessary references in bibliographies, support for "junk journals", etc. should be avoided during the dissemination phase.

Self-plagiarism is the re-submission of one's own work or parts of it without reference (eg, the submission of old data, the re-submission of parts of an earlier work or the whole work). When using your previous work, views, ideas, data, etc., you must refer to it.

 

If errors or ethical violations are found in the research after the publication of the work, the further course of events depends on the degree of violation and intent and on the specific institution and / or journal where the violation took place or where the results were published. Infringements and accusations are treated differently by different countries and institutions, but according to the European Code of Conduct for Research Integrity, research participants should always act in accordance with the principles of honesty and fairness.

 

If the author or authors notice errors in their work, they have an ethical obligation to inform the journal or institution that published the research and then work with them to decide how to resolve the situation. According to the guidelines of the International Organization for Publication Ethics (COPE), withdrawal of an article is justified, for example, if it is proven that the research results are unreliable, the work contains plagiarism, the results have already been published, unethical techniques were used, or the authors did not express a conflict of interest. If the errors do not affect the reliability of the research results, it is usually sufficient to publish a correction of the article.