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The same editorial policies apply to every journal we publish.

The editorial process

The same steps apply to journal articles, book chapters and books. Revised manuscripts go through the same steps again.

1. AuthorSubmissionOn the Manuscript Portal, with the first page (author details) as a separate file.
2. Editorial officeInitial checkScope, quality, formatting, completeness and a similarity check.
3. Editor-in-ChiefAssessmentDecides whether the manuscript goes to peer review.
4. ReviewersPeer reviewA panel of three experts; at least two reports are needed.
5. Editor-in-ChiefDecisionAccept, minor or major revision, or reject.
6. AuthorRevisionChanged files and a response to every comment; reviewed again.
7. ProductionEditing & proofsCopy editing, language correction, layout and the author’s proof approval.
8. PublisherOnline FirstPublished with a Crossref DOI, then placed in an issue.

The Managing Editor and the editorial office check every new manuscript for:

• Scope and quality — fit with the journal’s aims and scope, originality and innovation;
• Formatting and completeness — as the Author Guide asks: files, first page, declarations, figures, tables and references;
• Anonymity — nothing in the main file that identifies the authors;
• Similarity — a Turnitin iThenticate report for the handling editor;
• AI-use disclosure, as the AI Use Policy requires.

The Managing Editor forwards only well-prepared manuscripts of good quality to the Editor-in-Chief. A manuscript that needs fixing is returned to the author with a list of corrections and can be resubmitted; only out-of-scope or poor-quality manuscripts are declined.

The editorial office may use an approved AI tool, under confidential terms, to screen completeness, references and integrity signals. Its report only assists: it is seen by the office and the handling editor, and never decides anything.

Similarity report (Turnitin)

Every manuscript is checked with Turnitin iThenticate, which compares it with published articles, books and web pages. The editorial office runs the check; the report can then be opened only by the people working on that manuscript.

Who	What they can do
Editorial office	Runs the check on submitted manuscripts, and again if a check fails. Only the editorial office can start a check.
The manuscript’s authors	Open the report from their author account — a view-only copy.
Its reviewers	Reviewers assigned to the manuscript open it from Active Manuscript(s) or the report form.
Its editors	The editor handling the manuscript and the journal’s editorial board editors open it from the manuscript’s editorial page.
Anyone else	Cannot open it: the button shows “no access”. Reports are never public.

How to open it — sign in to the Manuscript Portal, then:

• Authors: Open Submitted Manuscript(s) and click View on your manuscript. The similarity button is at the top, next to View Manuscript and Compare versions.
• Reviewers: The similarity button is on the manuscript’s row in Active Manuscript(s), and at the top of the report form, next to View Manuscript.
• Editors: Open the manuscript (View). The similarity button is at the top of the editorial page, next to View Manuscript.
• When the check is done, the button shows the score, for example Similarity Report (12%). Click it: the full report opens in a new browser tab in Turnitin’s viewer. If nothing opens, allow pop-ups for gathacognition.com and click again.
• The report highlights each matching passage and lists the source it matches.

The button shows	What it means
Similarity: not yet checked	The editorial office has not run the check yet. Please look again later.
Checking Similarity… / still running — reload later	Turnitin is comparing the manuscript. Reload the page after a few minutes.
Similarity Report (12%)  Use filters	The check is done; the percentage is the overall similarity score. Reports checked from 7 November 2026 already use the filters below; for older ones, open the report and apply them. Use filters shows the same steps.
Similarity Check Failed / report unavailable	Something went wrong at Turnitin. The editorial office runs the check again; write to us if it stays like this.
Similarity report: no access	You are not one of the people on this manuscript, so the report cannot be shown.

Getting the correct % of Overall Similarity: use the filters

Without filters, the overall % also counts text that is not a concern, such as the reference list and properly quoted or cited passages, so it is higher than the real figure. The correct % of Overall Similarity is the one with these filters on. Reports checked from 7 November 2026 are made with these filters already on; older reports may still show the unfiltered %.

Filter	Why
Exclude bibliography	The reference list matches other papers that cite the same works.
Exclude quoted text	Text inside quotation marks is already credited to its source.
Exclude cited text	Passages followed by a citation to their source.
Abstract	The abstract often matches the authors’ own conference or preprint version.
Methods and Materials	Standard methods wording is repeated across many papers.
Exclude small matches	Short common phrases (matches of 10 words or fewer).

• To check or apply them: open the report, click the Filters (funnel) icon, make sure the filters above are ticked (small matches: 10 words), and click Apply. The overall % at the top is then the correct % of Overall Similarity.
• Filters applied by the editorial office or the editor are kept, and the % shown in the portal follows. Reviewers’ and authors’ changes are for their own view only.

The score is never a verdict on its own: the editor opens the report and looks at what matches. Cited quotations, common phrases, methods wording and references are normal; large passages copied without quotation and citation — from others or from the authors’ own earlier work — are raised with the authors, and handled under COPE guidance if needed.

• The Editor-in-Chief (or a handling editor from the Editorial Board) appoints a Panel of Reviewers of three experts in the field.
• The Managing Editor runs the review with the editorial office, following the journal’s guidelines and the Editor-in-Chief’s instructions.
• Review is double-blind: reviewers do not see the authors’ names, and authors are not told who the reviewers are.
• At least two reviewer reports are needed for a decision; the Manuscript Portal^® tells the Editor-in-Chief as soon as two reports are in.

Reviewers assess the manuscript for:

• Innovation
• Scope
• Methods, techniques & data
• Explanations & justification
• Contribution
• Applicability
• Flow of writing
• Language

Reviewers submit their reports on the Manuscript Portal: a recommendation, ratings, a confidential report to the editor and comments for the authors. See the Reviewer Guide.

The Editor-in-Chief decides on the basis of at least two reports — the confidential comments to the editor, the comments for the authors and the ratings — and on their own reading of the manuscript. A further reviewer is asked when the reports disagree.

The decision, with the comments, reaches the corresponding author by email and in the author account. Reviewers are told when their assignment closes.

• Authors revise the manuscript according to the editors’ and reviewers’ comments and resubmit it as early as possible, from the link in the email or in the author account.
• The corresponding author uploads only the corrected files and a response to every comment; files that were already correct need not change.
• The Managing Editor checks the revised manuscript for the expected changes and forwards it to the Editor-in-Chief, who sends it to the reviewers again and decides on their comments.

Stage	What happens
Copy editing	In-house editing for consistency, formatting, flow, figures, tables, captions, references, author and funding details, institutes, acknowledgements, citations and quotations.
Language correction	The Language Editor checks grammar, spelling, syntax, abbreviations, word choice and flow. Manuscripts with poor language are returned to the authors, and sometimes a professional language editor is recommended.
Layout	The editorial office sends the accepted, corrected manuscript to the production unit for the final layout of the article, chapter or book.
Proofreading	The proofs are uploaded to the author account on the Manuscript Portal. The author checks them and suggests corrections; the corrected copy goes back to the author until it is approved for publication. See the Proof Correction Guide.
Copyright or licence	The author signs the Publishing Agreement, or, for Open Access Plus, the article is published under CC BY-NC-ND 4.0.

Our production team may use approved AI tools for layout, mechanical copy editing, graphical abstracts and highlights. They never change the author’s meaning, and everything is shown to the author in the proofs for approval — see the AI Use Policy, 5a.

• Accepted articles and book chapters are published Online First as soon as copy editing, language correction, layout and proof checking are complete — with a Crossref DOI and CrossMark, citable at once.
• They are then placed in an upcoming journal issue or book, so authors need not wait for the issue to appear.
• We follow a green publishing policy: all articles, chapters and books are published electronically at gathacognition.com and archived permanently.
• Long-term preservation: every published journal article is also deposited in the Internet Archive (archive.org) with its PDF, DOI, licence and full details, so it stays available even if our website does not. Every article’s metadata and references are also deposited with Crossref.

• COPE — we follow the Committee on Publication Ethics’ guidance for authors, reviewers, editors and publishers.
• Confidentiality — manuscripts under review are confidential; editors and reviewers never share them or put them into an AI tool.
• Conflicts of interest — authors declare every financial or personal interest that could be seen to influence the work (funding, employment, consultancy, shares, patents, or a close link with an editor) in the Conflicts of interest section of the manuscript, or state that there are none; the declaration is published with the article. Editors and reviewers step aside from manuscripts where they have one, for example a recent co-author, a colleague at the same institution or a competitor. A manuscript by an editor of the journal is handled by another editor, and the author takes no part in its review or decision.
• A score is not a verdict — a similarity score prompts the editor’s judgement; it never decides on its own.
• Fees never affect decisions — APCs and waivers are handled by our office; editors and reviewers do not see them.
• Misconduct — plagiarism, data manipulation, fabricated citations or inappropriate authorship are handled under COPE guidance, up to correction or retraction.

Authorship and contributions

• Everyone listed as an author must have made a real contribution to the work, helped write or revise the manuscript, approved the final version and agreed to be accountable for it. People who helped in other ways are thanked in the Acknowledgements.
• We describe contributions with the CRediT roles (for example Conceptualization, Methodology, Formal analysis, Writing – original draft, Writing – review & editing). Authors may add a short contribution statement before the Acknowledgements.
• The corresponding author acts for all authors and makes sure every co-author has seen and agreed to the submission. Every author is asked for an ORCID iD on the Manuscript Portal, and it is strongly recommended for the corresponding author; it is shown on the published article and sent to Crossref.
• The author list and order are fixed at submission. A change before acceptance needs a request from the corresponding author with the written agreement of every author; no changes are accepted after acceptance.
• AI tools cannot be authors, because they cannot take responsibility for the work. Their use is disclosed as the AI Use Policy sets out.
• Gift, guest and ghost authorship, and authorship bought or sold (for example through paper mills), are misconduct and are handled under COPE guidance.

Data availability

• We encourage authors to make the data behind their results available, so that others can check and build on the work.
• Authors are asked to add a short Data availability statement before the References, saying where the data can be found (a repository with a DOI or link, the paper or its supplementary files) or why they cannot be shared (for example privacy, licence terms or third-party ownership) and how they may be requested.
• Satellite images, maps and other datasets from third parties are cited with their source and, where they have one, their DOI or download link.
• Editors and reviewers may ask to see the data while the manuscript is under review.

Example: “The Landsat images are freely available from USGS EarthExplorer. The field survey data are available from the corresponding author on reasonable request.”

Ethics approval and consent

• Research with people — surveys, interviews, focus groups, field observations of identifiable people, or health data — must have followed the ethical rules of the authors’ institution and country, and, where required, been approved by an ethics committee or review board. The manuscript names the committee and the approval number, or explains why approval was not needed.
• Informed consent must be obtained from every participant (or a guardian for children), and the manuscript says so. Participants are anonymised: no names, photographs or details that could identify them, unless they gave written consent for publication.
• Research with animals follows the relevant national and institutional rules, and the manuscript says which.
• Editors may ask for the approval letter or consent forms, and may decline a manuscript when the ethics of the work are not clear.

Preprints and sharing your work

• Preprints are welcome. A manuscript posted on a preprint server (for example SSRN, EarthArXiv, Research Square or a university repository) can be submitted to us; please tell us the preprint’s DOI or link at submission. Once published, please link the preprint to the published version.
• A preprint does not count as prior publication, and a similarity match with your own preprint is not plagiarism.
• Open Access Plus: after publication, authors may share the published PDF anywhere — repositories, personal and project websites, academic networks — with no embargo, under the CC BY-NC-ND 4.0 licence, citing the article and linking to its DOI.
• Standard publication: authors may post their accepted manuscript (their own final version, not our composed PDF) in an institutional or subject repository or on a personal website with no embargo, citing the article and linking to its DOI. The published PDF is shared through the free author copy and the 50 free e-prints in the author account.
• A manuscript must not be under review at another journal or publisher while it is with us.

Corrections, retractions and expressions of concern

The published record is kept accurate under the COPE retraction guidelines. The original article is never silently changed: every change is published as a notice with its own DOI, linked both ways, and shown in CrossMark.

Notice	When it is used
Correction (corrigendum or erratum)	An honest error that affects part of the work, such as a wrong figure, table, author name or affiliation, while the conclusions still stand. Authors who find an error should write to the editorial office at once.
Expression of concern	Serious questions about the work while an investigation is under way, or when the evidence is not conclusive.
Retraction	The findings are unreliable (major error, fabricated or manipulated data or images), or the work involves plagiarism, duplicate publication, undisclosed conflicts of interest, unethical research, manipulated peer review, paper-mill activity or undisclosed AI use. The article stays online, clearly marked “Retracted”, with the reason.
Removal	Only in rare legal cases (for example defamation or a risk to someone’s safety). The metadata and a notice of removal stay online.

Readers who have concerns about a published article can write to the editorial office. Concerns are handled in confidence, and the authors are given a chance to respond before any decision.

Appeals and complaints

• Appeals. Authors who believe a decision was wrong may appeal once, by writing to the editorial office within 30 days of the decision, quoting the manuscript ID. The appeal should explain, point by point, why the decision should change — for example a factual error in a review, or a reviewer with a conflict of interest. Disagreeing with the reviewers alone is not grounds for appeal.
• The appeal is looked at by the Editor-in-Chief, or by another member of the Editorial Board who was not involved in the decision; they may ask a further reviewer. We aim to reply within four weeks. The decision on an appeal is final, and the manuscript stays out of review while it is considered.
• Complaints. Complaints about the editorial process, delays, an editor, a reviewer or our service can be sent to the editorial office. Each one is acknowledged, looked into by someone not involved, and answered in writing. Complaints about the Editor-in-Chief go to the publisher.
• If you are not satisfied with how a complaint about publication ethics was handled, you may contact COPE.

For Editors & Reviewers (roles of the editors) · AI Use Policy · CrossMark Policy · Open Access Policy

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