The AJCT Editorial Process

AJCT operates a rigorous and transparent peer-review process that aims to maximise quality. Peer review is handled by researchers and scholars.

We believe that peer-review needs to be efficient, rigorous, and fair for everyone involved.

In the AJCT journal, peer review is a single-blind assessment with at least three independent reviewers, followed by a final acceptance or rejection decision by the Editor-in-Chief or another academic editor approved by the Editor-in-Chief. The Editor-in-Chief is responsible for the academic quality of the publication process, including acceptance decisions, approval of guest editors and special issue topics, and appointing new members to the Editorial Board.

A summary of the editorial process is given in the flowchart below.

The AJCT editorial process

Screening Check 

Immediately after submission, the journal’s managing editor will perform an initial check to assess:

• Checking the similarity index (checking for plagiarism);
• Overall suitability of the manuscript to the journal, section, or special issue;
• Manuscript adherence to high-quality research and ethical standards;
• standards of rigour to qualify for further review.

The academic editor, i.e., the Editor-in-Chief in the case of regular submissions, or an Editorial Board member in the case of a conflict of interest or regular submissions if the Editor-in-Chief allows, will be notified of the submission and invited to perform a check and recommend reviewers. Academic editors can decide to continue with the peer-review process, reject a manuscript, or request revisions before peer-review.

Peer-review

From submission to final decision or publication, one member of the support team coordinates the review process and serves as the main point of contact for authors, academic editors, and reviewers.

The process is a double-blind method, meaning that the author does not know the identity of the reviewer and the reviewer is unaware of the author’s identity.

At least three review reports are collected for each submitted article. Suggestions for reviewers can be made by the academic editor during pre-check. Alternatively, editorial staff will use qualified Editorial Board members, qualified reviewers from our database, or new reviewers identified by web searches for related articles.

Authors can recommend potential reviewers. The AJCT staff ensures that there are no potential conflicts of interest and will not consider those with competing interests. Authors can also enter the names of potential peer-reviewers they wish to exclude from consideration in the peer-review of their manuscript during the initial submission of the manuscript. The editorial team will respect these requests as long as they do not interfere with the objective and thorough assessment of the submission.

If the journal has a reviewer board, these reviewers could apply to review a submitted manuscript if the authors agree to this option during submission.

The following checks are applied to all reviewers:

• that they hold no conflicts of interest with the authors, including if they have published together in the last five years;
• that they hold a PhD (exceptions are made in some fields, e.g., medicine);
• They must have recent publications indexed by SCOPUS or SCI in the field of the submitted paper;

Reviewers who accept to review a manuscript are expected to:

• have the necessary expertise to judge manuscript quality;
• provide quality review reports and remain responsive throughout peer review;
• maintain standards of professionalism and ethics.

Reviewers who accept a review invitation are provided 7–10 days to write their review via our online platform. Extensions can be granted on request.

For the review of a revised manuscript, reviewers are asked to provide their report within seven working days. Extensions can also be granted on request.

 

open peer-review option

AJCT journals operate an open peer-review option, meaning that the authors have the option to publish the review reports and author responses with the published paper (often referred to as "open reports"). In addition, reviewers may choose to sign their reports if the review is published, in which case the reviewer's name appears on the review report (referred to as "open identity"). The default option is for reviewers to remain anonymous and for reports not to be published; reviewers and authors, respectively, must opt into this option. If an article is rejected, no details will be published. Open peer review has the benefit of increasing transparency about the review process and providing further information about the paper for interested readers. We encourage authors to choose open review.

Revision

In cases where only minor or major revisions are recommended, the editor will request that the author revise the paper before referring it to the academic editor. In cases of conflicting review reports or where there are one or more recommendations for rejection, the academic editor will be requested for their judgement before a decision about revisions is communicated to authors.

Revised versions of manuscripts may or may not be sent to reviewers, depending on whether the reviewer requested to see the revised version. By default, reviewers who request major revisions or recommend rejection will be sent the revised manuscript. All reviewers can access the most recent version of the manuscript.

A maximum of two rounds of major revision per manuscript are northe editormally provided. If more rounds are required according to the reviewers, Editor  request a decision from the academic editor.

Editor Decision

After a minimum of three review reports have been received, the academic editor can make a decision on manuscript acceptance.Acceptance decisions are taken by an academic editor (the Editor-in-Chief, a Guest Editor, or another suitable member of the Editorial Board). Guest editors are not able to take decisions on their own papers, which will instead be assigned to a suitable Editorial Board member. When making a decision, we expect that the academic editor will check the following:

• The suitability of selected reviewers;
• Adequacy of reviewer comments and author responses;
• Overall scientific quality of the paper

The academic editor can select from the following options: accept in current form, accept with minor revisions, reject and decline resubmission, reject but encourage resubmission, ask the author for revision, or ask for an additional reviewer.

Reviewers make recommendations, and the editors-in-chief or academic editors are free to disagree with their views. If they do so, they should justify their decision for the benefit of the authors and reviewers.

In some cases, an academic editor will support a manuscript acceptance decision despite a reviewer's recommendation to reject.The editor will seek a second independent opinion from an Editorial Board member or the Editor-in-Chief before communicating a final decision to the authors.

Articles can only be accepted for publication by an academic editor. Edior then informs the authors.

Editorial Board members (including Editors-in-Chief) are not involved in the processing of their own academic work. Their submissions are assigned to and revised by at least three independent reviewers. Decisions are made by other Editorial Board members who do not have a conflict of interest with the authors.

Production

AJCT's in-house teams perform production on all manuscripts, including language editing, copy editing, and conversion to XML. Language editing is carried out by professional English editing staff. In the small number of cases where extensive editing or formatting is required, we offer authors an English editing service for an additional fee (with the authors’ prior approval). The authors are also free to use other English editing services or consult a native English-speaking colleague—the latter being our preferred option.

Editorial Independence

 

All articles published by AJCT are peer-reviewed and assessed by our independent Editorial Boards, and AJCT staff are not involved in decisions to accept manuscripts. When making a decision, we expect the academic editor to base it solely upon:

• The suitability of selected reviewers;
• Adequacy of reviewer comments and author responses;
• Overall scientific quality of the paper

In all of our journals and in every aspect of our operation, AJCT policies are informed by the mission to make science and research findings open and accessible as widely and rapidly as possible.