Journal Policy

Journal of Nutrition and Health Care (JUNIC) is committed to maintaining integrity, transparency, fairness, editorial independence, and responsible scholarly communication. The following policies govern manuscript submission, peer review, research ethics, authorship, publication, open access, copyright, publication charges, and post-publication procedures.

1. Peer Review Policy

JUNIC applies a double-anonymous peer review process. The identities of authors and reviewers are concealed from each other throughout the review process.

Manuscripts that pass initial editorial screening are normally evaluated by at least two independent reviewers with expertise relevant to nutrition, health sciences, food science, public health, clinical research, or the specific subject of the manuscript.

Initial screening considers alignment with the journal's focus and scope, originality, scientific contribution, methodological quality, ethical compliance, clarity of presentation, and adherence to the Author Guidelines.

Reviewers are expected to provide objective, constructive, evidence-based, confidential, and academically reasoned evaluations.

The final editorial decision is made by the Editor based on reviewer reports, scientific quality, originality, methodological soundness, ethical compliance, relevance, and contribution to nutrition and health research.

2. Publication Ethics and Research Integrity

JUNIC is committed to responsible scholarly publishing and research integrity. Its publication practices are informed by internationally recognized principles of publication ethics, including guidance from the Committee on Publication Ethics (COPE).

Authors must report research accurately, honestly, transparently, and with sufficient methodological detail. Fabrication, falsification, selective manipulation of data, duplicate publication, inappropriate image manipulation, citation manipulation, peer-review manipulation, and other forms of research misconduct are prohibited.

Informed Consent: Informed consent must be obtained where required for participation in research and for publication of identifiable personal information, images, or clinical details.

Animal Research: Studies involving animals must comply with applicable institutional and national ethical requirements and should report approval by the relevant animal ethics or research oversight body where required.

Clinical Trials: Prospective clinical intervention studies should provide trial registration information where registration is applicable, together with the registration number and registry name.

Research Data Integrity: Authors are responsible for the authenticity, accuracy, appropriate analysis, and transparent presentation of research data. The journal may request clarification, supporting documentation, or underlying data when serious questions concerning research integrity arise.

3. Plagiarism Policy

Manuscripts submitted to JUNIC may be evaluated using similarity-detection software before or during the editorial process.

Similarity reports are interpreted contextually. JUNIC does not use a numerical similarity percentage as the sole criterion for determining whether plagiarism has occurred.

Editors consider the source, extent, location, nature, and attribution of overlapping material. Properly cited methodological terminology, standard expressions, references, or limited legitimate overlap should not automatically be treated as plagiarism.

Substantial unattributed copying, inappropriate paraphrasing, duplicate publication, or unethical reuse of previously published material may result in rejection, correction, retraction, or other appropriate editorial action.

4. AI Use Policy

Artificial intelligence tools, including generative AI systems, cannot be listed as authors because they cannot assume responsibility for the accuracy, originality, integrity, or ethical compliance of scholarly work.

Authors remain fully responsible for all content submitted to JUNIC. Substantive use of generative AI in preparing text, analysis, programming code, figures, data interpretation, or other research materials should be transparently disclosed where relevant.

AI-generated or manipulated data, fabricated references, invented participants, false quotations, or synthetic research evidence presented as genuine are prohibited.

Editors and reviewers should not upload confidential manuscripts, unpublished research data, participant information, reviewer reports, or editorial correspondence to publicly accessible AI systems when confidentiality, privacy, intellectual property, or data security cannot be assured.

5. Authorship and Conflict of Interest Policy

Authorship should be limited to individuals who have made substantial scholarly contributions to the conception, design, data acquisition, analysis, interpretation, or preparation of the research and who accept responsibility for the published work.

Guest, honorary, purchased, or ghost authorship is not acceptable. Individuals who contributed to the research but do not meet authorship criteria should be acknowledged appropriately.

Requests to add, remove, or rearrange authors after submission must include an explanation and agreement from all affected authors.

Authors, editors, and reviewers must disclose financial, institutional, professional, commercial, personal, or other relationships that could reasonably be perceived as influencing the research, peer review, or editorial decision.

6. Copyright and License

Authors retain copyright in their published work and grant JUNIC the right of first publication.

Articles published by JUNIC are distributed under the Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 International License (CC BY 4.0).

This license permits sharing and adaptation of published material provided appropriate credit is given to the authors and original publication, the license is identified, and modifications are indicated where applicable.

7. Open Access Policy

JUNIC provides immediate open access to published scholarly content. Readers may access articles without subscription or registration fees.

The journal supports open scholarly communication and the broad dissemination of nutrition and health research to researchers, healthcare professionals, policymakers, students, and the public.

8. Article Processing Charge (APC)

Authors are not required to make any payment during manuscript submission, initial editorial screening, or peer review.

The APC becomes payable only after the manuscript has successfully completed the editorial and peer-review process and has received a formal acceptance decision.

Payment does not influence reviewer selection, reviewer recommendations, editorial decisions, manuscript acceptance, or publication priority.

9. Archiving and Digital Preservation Policy

JUNIC is committed to maintaining the accessibility and long-term availability of its published scholarly content. Published articles and associated metadata are maintained through the journal's online publishing platform.

Additional recognized digital preservation services may be adopted as they become available. Any specific preservation service will be publicly identified when it is actively implemented by the journal.

10. Repository Policy

Authors may deposit and share their published articles in institutional repositories, subject repositories, personal academic websites, research profiles, and other lawful scholarly platforms in accordance with the journal's CC BY 4.0 license.

Authors should provide complete bibliographic information and, where available, a link to the official published article and DOI.

11. Corrections, Retractions and Complaints Policy

JUNIC is committed to protecting the accuracy and integrity of the scholarly record. When significant errors or ethical concerns are identified after publication, the journal may issue a correction, retraction, expression of concern, or other appropriate notice.

Corrections may be published when errors affect the accuracy, interpretation, attribution, or completeness of an article without invalidating the principal findings.

Retraction may be considered when findings are unreliable because of major error or misconduct, including fabrication, falsification, plagiarism, duplicate publication, unethical research, manipulated evidence, or serious breaches of publication ethics.

An Expression of Concern may be issued when substantial concerns exist but a complete investigation or resolution has not yet been reached.

Complaints concerning editorial procedures, peer review, publication ethics, or published content should be submitted through the journal's official communication channel and will be reviewed objectively.

Authors may submit a reasoned appeal when they believe that a significant factual or procedural issue affected an editorial decision. An appeal does not guarantee reconsideration or acceptance.