Peer Review

Received articles are subject to peer review. The review aims to help the Editor-in-Chief decide whether the article should be accepted or rejected and, through the process of communication with the authors, improve the manuscript’s quality.

Reviews are doubly anonymous: authors’ identities are unknown to reviewers, and vice versa. The identity of reviewers remains unknown to authors and vice versa before, during, and after the review process. Editors guarantee that the personal data of authors (primarily, name and affiliation) will be removed from manuscripts before they are sent for review and that all reasonable measures will be taken so that the identities of authors remain unknown to reviewers. Throughout the process, reviewers act independently of each other. Reviewers do not know the identities of other reviewers. If the decisions of reviewers are not the same, editors may seek the opinion of other reviewers.

The deadline for completing the review process is 30 days from the date when reviewers receive the manuscript.

The choice of reviewers falls within the discretionary rights of the Editor-in-Chief and the Deputy Editor-in-Chief. Reviewers must have relevant knowledge related to the field that manuscripts deal with. Reviewers cannot be authors who The choice of reviewers falls within the discretionary rights of the Editor-in-Chief and the Deputy Editor-in-Chief. Reviewers must have relevant knowledge related to the field that manuscripts deal with. Reviewers cannot be authors who have recently co-authored publications with any of the authors of submitted articles, nor can they be from the same field institutions as authors.

Editors send submitted manuscripts with a peer review form to two reviewers who are experts in the scientific field the articles deal with. The review form contains a series of questions that need to be answered and which indicate to reviewers which aspects should be covered in order to make a decision about the fate of a manuscript. In the final part of the form, reviewers must provide their observations and suggestions on how to improve the submitted manuscript.

During the review process, editors may require authors to provide additional information (including primary data) if it is needed to make a judgment about the scientific contribution of the manuscript. Editors and reviewers must keep such information confidential and must not use it for personal gain.

In cases where authors have severe and well-founded objections to reviews, editors will check whether the review is objective and meets academic standards. If there is doubt about the objectivity or quality of the review, editors will seek the opinion of other reviewers.