Reviewer Ethics

Reviewers must uphold high ethical standards to protect the integrity, fairness, independence, and confidentiality of the peer-review process. This Reviewer Ethics page defines the ethical obligations applicable to all reviewers appointed by the Celebes Nursing Journal (CNJ) and complements the journal’s Reviewer Guidelines and Peer Review Policy. These requirements are informed by the COPE Ethical Guidelines for Peer Reviewers and relevant principles of the ICMJE Recommendations.

1. Core Ethical Principles
Reviewers must:

• Conduct reviews honestly, independently, objectively, and in good faith;
• Evaluate manuscripts according to their scholarly merit, article type, study design, and stated claims;
• Provide constructive, evidence-informed, respectful, and sufficiently reasoned comments;
• Avoid discrimination or bias based on nationality, ethnicity, gender, religion, institutional affiliation, geographic origin, seniority, personal characteristics, or other irrelevant considerations;
• Disclose any actual, potential, or perceived conflict of interest and decline the review when impartiality cannot reasonably be assured;
• Accept assignments only when they possess appropriate expertise and can complete the review within the agreed timeframe;
• Not use unpublished information, data, ideas, methods, or findings obtained through peer review for personal, academic, professional, commercial, or financial advantage;
• Not manipulate the peer-review process or attempt to influence an editorial decision for an improper purpose; and
• Remain personally accountable for the accuracy, integrity, originality, and content of the review submitted under their name.

2. Confidentiality and Secure Handling
Submitted manuscripts, supplementary materials, reviewer reports, editorial correspondence, and related unpublished information are confidential scholarly communications. Reviewers must:

• Access and use manuscript materials only for the authorized purpose of conducting the assigned review;
• Not share, reproduce, distribute, publicly discuss, or disclose manuscript content to unauthorized individuals;
• Not contact the authors directly concerning the manuscript;
• Not attempt to identify authors whose manuscripts are undergoing double-blind peer review;
• Not involve a colleague, trainee, or another person in the review without prior permission from the editor;
• Ensure that any person authorized to assist with the review is identified to the editor and complies with the same confidentiality and ethical requirements;
• Not upload manuscript content, excerpts, tables, figures, supplementary materials, or editorial correspondence to generative AI systems, external similarity-checking services, or other third-party systems where confidentiality cannot be assured;
• Delete locally downloaded manuscript files and working copies after completing the review, unless retention is expressly authorized by the editor or required by applicable law; and
• Continue to protect confidential information regardless of whether the manuscript is accepted, revised, rejected, withdrawn, or published.

3. Objectivity and Professional Conduct
Reviewer comments must focus on the manuscript and its scholarly content. Reviewers must not:

• Use hostile, abusive, defamatory, discriminatory, humiliating, or personally critical language;
• Allow personal, political, ideological, institutional, commercial, or competitive interests to improperly influence their evaluation;
• Request unnecessary citations of their own work or other publications for the purpose of increasing citation counts;
• Make unsupported allegations concerning the authors or their work;
• Misrepresent the content, quality, methods, findings, or limitations of the manuscript;
• Delegate substantive scientific or methodological evaluation to an unauthorized person or technological system; or
• Use information obtained through peer review to disadvantage, compete with, or pre-empt the authors.

Reviewer recommendations are advisory. Reviewers must not represent their recommendation as the journal’s final decision or communicate an editorial decision directly to the authors. Final responsibility for acceptance or rejection rests with the Editor-in-Chief or designated editor.

4. Conflicts of Interest
Reviewers must disclose any relationship, activity, or circumstance that could reasonably affect, or appear to affect, their impartiality. If a relevant conflict becomes apparent after accepting the assignment or during the review, the reviewer must stop the review and notify the editor promptly.

Detailed requirements are provided in CNJ’s Reviewer Conflict of Interest policy. Reviewers should not attempt to determine whether a conflict exists solely by investigating or attempting to identify the authors of a blinded manuscript.

5. Reporting Suspected Misconduct
If reviewers identify possible plagiarism, duplicate or redundant publication, fabrication, falsification, inappropriate data or image manipulation, citation manipulation, authorship irregularities, undisclosed conflicts of interest, ethical non-compliance, peer-review manipulation, or another research-integrity concern, they must:

• Report the concern confidentially to the handling editor;
• Provide a clear explanation and relevant evidence or manuscript location where possible;
• Refrain from contacting or directly accusing the authors;
• Refrain from conducting an unauthorized external investigation; and
• Maintain confidentiality while the concern is assessed through the journal’s established procedures.

A suspected concern must not be presented as established misconduct before it has been appropriately evaluated. The editor is responsible for determining the appropriate next steps in accordance with CNJ’s Publication Ethics & Malpractice Statement (PEMS) and related policies.

6. Artificial Intelligence in Peer Review
Scientific evaluation, interpretation, reviewer comments, recommendations, and editorial judgments must remain human-led and human-accountable. Any use of artificial intelligence or AI-assisted technology must comply with CNJ’s Reviewer AI Policy and must not compromise manuscript confidentiality, reviewer independence, or personal accountability.

7. Non-Compliance
Suspected breaches of reviewer confidentiality, undisclosed conflicts of interest, coercive citation practices, unauthorized delegation, improper use of manuscript content, prohibited use of AI, intentionally biased evaluation, or other reviewer misconduct will be assessed in accordance with CNJ’s editorial and publication-ethics procedures. Depending on the nature and seriousness of the concern, CNJ may disregard the affected review, obtain an additional independent review, discontinue future reviewer assignments, or take other proportionate editorial action.