SJPed is an international, open-access, peer-reviewed medical journal committed to upholding the highest standards of integrity in scholarly publishing. This statement defines the ethical responsibilities and conduct expected of every party engaged in the publication process — authors, editors, peer reviewers, and the publisher — and the procedures the journal follows to safeguard the integrity of the published record.

Responsibilities at a Glance

How Concerns Are Handled

The journal's policies are explicitly aligned with the Core Practices of the Committee on Publication Ethics (COPE), the Recommendations of the International Committee of Medical Journal Editors (ICMJE), and the principles of the World Association of Medical Editors (WAME). These standards correspond to the ethical and governance criteria required for indexing by major international databases such as Scopus and the Web of Science. Where an ethical question is not addressed by this statement, SJPed is guided by the relevant COPE guidance and flowcharts.

Because SJPed publishes research and clinical material involving infants, children, and adolescents, this statement gives particular attention to the protection of children as a vulnerable population, the requirement for parental or guardian consent together with age-appropriate assent, and the safeguarding of children's privacy in identifiable clinical material (see Section 4).

1. Editorial Independence and Journal Governance

Editorial decisions at SJPed are made solely on the basis of scholarly merit and are free from interference by the publisher, advertisers, sponsors, professional societies, or any commercial interest. The publisher guarantees the autonomy of the Editor-in-Chief and the editorial board in all matters of content. Decisions to accept or reject a manuscript are never influenced by the origin of the work, the standing of the authors, or any commercial consideration, including the Article Processing Charge.

2. Duties of Editors

Publication Decisions and Fair Play

The Editor-in-Chief holds final responsibility for deciding which submitted manuscripts are accepted. Decisions are driven exclusively by the clinical significance, scientific validity, methodological rigour, originality, and relevance of the work to the journal's scope. Manuscripts are evaluated without regard to the authors' race, gender, sexual orientation, gender identity, ethnic origin, citizenship, religious belief, institutional affiliation, or political philosophy. Editors are bound by the legal requirements regarding defamation, copyright infringement, and plagiarism.

Confidentiality

Editors and editorial staff must not disclose information about a submitted manuscript to anyone other than the corresponding author, assigned and potential reviewers, other editorial advisers, and the publisher. Submitted manuscripts are privileged communications and may not be used for an editor's own research without the authors' written consent.

Disclosure and Conflicts of Interest

Editors must recuse themselves from handling manuscripts in which they have a competing interest arising from collaborative, competitive, financial, or personal relationships with any author, company, or institution connected to the work, and must arrange for an alternative editor to manage such submissions.

Ethical Oversight

Editors critically assess the ethical conduct of all submitted research. Any study involving children must state compliance with the principles of the Declaration of Helsinki, and editors verify that appropriate ethics-committee approval, parental/guardian consent, and child assent (where applicable) have been documented. Editors may reject without further review manuscripts for which adequate ethical clearance cannot be demonstrated.

Integrity of the Published Record and Post-Publication Vigilance

Editors maintain the integrity of the academic record, issuing corrections, expressions of concern, or retractions in accordance with COPE guidance, clearly and without undue delay. Every reported case of unethical publishing behaviour is investigated, even when discovered years after publication.

3. Duties of Reviewers

Contribution to Editorial Decisions and Promptness

Peer review assists the editor in reaching decisions and helps authors improve their work. An invited reviewer who feels unqualified, or who cannot review promptly, should notify the editor without delay and decline.

Confidentiality

Manuscripts received for review are confidential documents and must not be shown to or discussed with others except as authorised by the editor. Reviewers must not retain copies or use the data, arguments, or interpretations for any purpose prior to publication.

Use of Artificial Intelligence in Review

Reviewers must not upload a submitted manuscript, or any part of it, to generative artificial-intelligence tools or other third-party platforms, as this breaches confidentiality. Any use of AI-assisted tools in preparing a review must be disclosed to the editor; reviewers remain fully responsible for the content and impartiality of their reports.

Standards of Objectivity and Acknowledgement of Sources

Reviews must be objective and evidence-based; personal criticism of authors is prohibited. Reviewers should identify relevant published work not cited by the authors and alert the editor to any substantial similarity with other works.

Disclosure and Conflicts of Interest

Reviewers must decline manuscripts in which they have conflicts of interest arising from competitive, collaborative, financial, or other relationships with the authors or their institutions.

4. Duties of Authors

Reporting Standards

Authors must present an accurate, replicable account of original research, conforming to the recognised reporting guideline for the study design (CONSORT for trials, STROBE for observational studies, PRISMA for systematic reviews, CARE for case reports, ARRIVE for animal studies). Fabrication or falsification of clinical data is unacceptable.

Originality and Plagiarism

Authors must submit entirely original work, with all words and ideas of others appropriately cited. All submissions are screened with similarity-detection software. Plagiarism in any form, including self-plagiarism, is unacceptable.

Data Access, Retention, and Reproducibility

Authors may be asked to provide raw data for editorial review and should retain data for a reasonable period after publication, providing access on reasonable request, subject to the protection of children's confidentiality and applicable law.

Concurrent and Redundant Publication

Authors must not submit the same work to more than one journal concurrently or publish work that substantially overlaps with prior publications.

Authorship of the Manuscript

Authorship is limited to those meeting the four ICMJE criteria; others are acknowledged. The corresponding author ensures all qualifying authors are included and have approved the final version. Any change to authorship after submission requires the written agreement of all authors and the editor's approval. Contributions are declared using the CRediT taxonomy.

Disclosure of the Use of Artificial Intelligence

Any use of generative AI tools in preparing a manuscript must be disclosed in the methods or acknowledgements, specifying the tool and its use. AI tools cannot be authors; authors remain fully accountable for all content.

Protection of Children: Ethical Approval, Consent, and Assent

Children are a vulnerable population, and their participation in research and the publication of their clinical material carry a heightened duty of care. For all studies involving children, authors must:

• Confirm approval by an appropriate Institutional Review Board or research ethics committee, cite the approval number, and confirm that the study complied with the Declaration of Helsinki and recognised standards for research in children (e.g., CIOMS international ethical guidelines).
• Confirm that written informed consent was obtained from the parent(s) or legal guardian of every participant, and that age-appropriate assent was obtained from children who are capable of giving it; the manner of obtaining assent should be described.
• Justify the involvement of children, demonstrating that the research could not equally be conducted in adults and that risks, pain, and distress were minimised, consistent with the best interests of the child (UN Convention on the Rights of the Child).

Consent for identifiable material. For any manuscript containing identifiable information or images of a child — including photographs of the face or other distinctive features — authors must obtain explicit written informed consent for publication from the parent or legal guardian, and the assent of an older child where appropriate, and must state that such consent was obtained. Identifying information (names, initials, hospital record numbers, dates) must be omitted from all text, figures, and supplementary material unless essential and covered by consent. Consent for publication may not be inferred from consent to treatment, and a family may withhold it without any prejudice to the child's care.

Clinical Trial Registration

In accordance with ICMJE policy, clinical trials must be prospectively registered in a recognised public registry before recruitment of the first participant; the registration number must appear in the abstract and at the end of the manuscript.

Disclosure of Funding and Conflicts of Interest

All authors must disclose any financial or other conflict of interest and all sources of funding, including industry funding and the role of any sponsor in the design, conduct, or reporting of the study.

Fundamental Errors in Published Works

Authors discovering a significant error in their published work must promptly notify the editor and cooperate in its correction or retraction.

5. Duties of the Publisher

Phlox Institute safeguards the integrity of the scholarly record, respects the editorial independence of the journal, provides the infrastructure to detect and respond to misconduct, assists in communications with other journals and institutions where required, and is committed to the permanent preservation of published scholarship.

6. Plagiarism Screening

Every submitted manuscript is screened for textual similarity before peer review and again before acceptance. Manuscripts containing plagiarised or improperly recycled content are handled per COPE guidance and may be rejected or, if published, corrected or retracted (see the Plagiarism Policy).

7. Conflicts of Interest and Competing Interests

All parties must declare any relationship or interest that could be perceived to bias their work; declared interests are managed transparently to protect editorial objectivity.

8. Complaints, Appeals, and Allegations of Misconduct

SJPed welcomes substantive appeals and complaints, addressed to the Editor-in-Chief. Allegations of misconduct — including data fabrication or falsification, plagiarism, image manipulation, redundant publication, undisclosed conflicts, and authorship disputes — are investigated impartially per the relevant COPE flowcharts, whenever the concern is raised. Authors are given a fair opportunity to respond, confidentiality is protected, and matters may be referred to institutions or regulators where appropriate.

9. Corrections, Retractions, and Expressions of Concern

SJPed maintains the published record through timely corrections (errata), retractions, and expressions of concern, each linked to the original article, clearly labelled, and freely available, in keeping with COPE retraction guidelines.

10. Data Sharing and Research Reproducibility

SJPed encourages openness and reproducibility. Authors must include a data-availability statement describing whether, where, and under what conditions the underlying data can be accessed, consistent with the protection of children's privacy and applicable law.

11. Intellectual Property, Copyright, and Open Access

SJPed is a fully open-access journal. Articles are distributed under the Creative Commons Attribution–NonCommercial–ShareAlike 4.0 International (CC BY-NC-SA 4.0) licence; authors retain copyright. The journal respects the intellectual-property rights of others and expects authors to obtain permission for any reused material.

12. Advertising and Direct Marketing

Any advertising is kept entirely separate from editorial decision-making and has no influence on content; the journal may decline any advertisement incompatible with its scientific and ethical standards.

13. Reporting Ethical Concerns

Concerns regarding publication ethics may be raised in confidence with the editorial office at editor.sjped@gmail.com. All concerns are handled in accordance with this statement.

This statement adheres to the COPE Core Practices, the ICMJE Recommendations, and the principles of the World Association of Medical Editors. It is reviewed periodically and may be amended to reflect evolving best practice.

Editorial Office
Scientific Journal of Pediatrics (SJPed)
Phlox Institute: Indonesian Medical Research Organization
Jl. Sirnaraga, 8 Ilir, Ilir Timur III, Palembang, South Sumatra, Indonesia
E-mail: editor.sjped@gmail.com · Phone: +62 877-8809-0173 · e-ISSN 3025-6224
Licensed under CC BY-NC-SA 4.0.