Anti-Plagiarism Policy

1. Definition of Plagiarism

Plagiarism includes, but is not limited to, the following actions:

• Verbatim copying or paraphrasing parts of someone else's work without proper citation or acknowledgment.
• Self-plagiarism (salami-slicing), which involves reusing substantial parts of the author's own previously published work without explicit cross-referencing.
• Copying figures, tables, data, or experimental results and presenting them as one's own.

2. Detection Mechanism (Turnitin) & Thresholds

• Mandatory Screening: All submitted research papers undergo rigorous plagiarism check using the Turnitin system before being sent to external reviewers.
• Acceptable Thresholds: The overall similarity index must not exceed 20%, and the similarity from any single source must not exceed 5%.
• Proper Referencing: Even within the acceptable index, all instances of borrowed text must be properly paraphrased and cited according to academic standards.

3. Response Actions

• Pre-Review: If significant plagiarism is detected during the initial screening, the paper is rejected immediately.
• During Review: If plagiarism is reported during review, processing is suspended, the paper is rejected, and explanation from authors is requested.
• Post-Publication: If plagiarism is proven after publication, the article will be retracted formally, and a retraction notice will be linked directly to the online publication page.