Aldrovandiana. Historical Studies in Natural History

Ethical Code

Aldrovandiana – Historical Studies in Natural History is an open access and double-blind peer-reviewed scientific journal. The Journal’s Code of Conduct is inspired by the ethical rules of conduct and standards indicated by COPE (Committee on Publication ethics) in the Code of Conduct and Best Practice Guidelines for Journal Editors (available at the following web page, https://publicationethics.org/files/Code_of_conduct_for_journal_editors.pdf).
Therefore, the Journal takes on all possible precautions and measures against potential negligence in order to guarantee best practices from the ethical perspective.
The ethics of publication and best practices are made explicit, shared and pursued by all the involved actors: Editors (Scientific Direction), Scientific Board, Guest Editors, Editorial Staff, Authors, Reviewers, Publisher.
The Editors guarantee that the development of the editorial product complies with the guidelines envisaged in the SDG 2030 Agenda and the Goals of Sustainable Development as defined by the UN.
The Journal will publish two issues per year.

Duties for the Editors, Scientific Board, Guest Editors, Editorial Staff

Rulings on publication

All Authors are aware that their works are released in open access mode on the online platform aldrovandiana.it, under the Creative Commons Attribution Non Commercial Share Alike (CC BY-NC-SA).
Authors must acquire the exclusive rights of reproduction and distribution from the images’ rights holders, filling the Permission Form available at the submission page on platform aldrovandiana.it. The same Permission Form allows the Publisher to acquire from the authors the right to reproduce all the texts in the printed version of the journal, available at the Publisher’s website (https://buponline.com/riviste/).
The Journal accepts papers and original submissions that the authors declare have not been published and are not under consideration for publication elsewhere. The Journal accepts papers in English and in Italian.
The Journal uses peer review as the main method of selection of articles, which can be waived only in exceptional cases and giving notice of it at the time of publication.
The Journal promotes research independence, condemns plagiarism and copyright infringement, requests and promotes the publication of original contributions based on rigorous data, takes action to correct errors in published articles.
The Editors-in-chief and the Guest Editors, after consultation with the Scientific Committee, are responsible for the final decision to publish or not to publish the proposed articles. The Editors-in-chief shall consult with the peer-reviewers to decide.

Correctness

The Editors, Guest Editors and the Scientific Board evaluate the proposed articles for publication based on originality, congruence with the research field, scientific rigour, relationship to literature, methodology, results and conclusions, without any form of discrimination based on race, gender, sexual orientation, religious belief, ethnic origin, citizenship, scientific, academic and political orientation of the authors. The articles accepted by the Scientific Direction, are evaluated by anonymous Reviewers through a double-blind peer review. The publication of the articles is subjected to any change required to the Authors, along with the changes required by the peer-reviewers and the final opinion of the Scientific Direction. The publication process guarantees articles being edited in open access mode on the online platform aldrovandiana.it and the issues are available to the audience both in digital version and in print available on the Publisher’s website BUP.

Confidentiality

The Scientific Direction, Guest Editors and all members of the Editorial Staff or Scientific Board must refrain from revealing any information about the articles submitted for review, before the eventual publication or the explicit rejection.

Conflict of interest and disclosure

Unpublished materials and the contents of the submissions can’t be used for research purposes neither by the Scientific Direction, nor by the Guest Editors or members of the Board, without the express written consent of the Author, before the eventual publication.

Duties for Authors

The Journal accepts papers and original submissions that have not been published and are not under consideration for publication elsewhere. The authors must respect the following ethical principles: originality and prohibition of plagiarism; absence of conflict of interest; disclosure of any research funding linked to the submitted materials; the submission of the same contribution to other journals during the evaluation phase is prohibited; the submission of already published materials to the Journal is not allowed unless authorized by the Editors or the Editorial Board; timely reporting of errors in submitted contributions; correct indication of sources; veracity of submitted data. It is the Editors’ responsibility to check the frequency of publication of content that has the same author or co-author: therefore, it is customary to withhold worthy contributions from recently published authors to publish them in the following issue or year. This rule is not valid in the case of authors invited by the Editors on topics related to his expertise and well-known scientific activity.

Compliance with the Guidelines

Authors shall comply with the editorial guidelines for submitting an article to the Journal.

Sources

Authors shall always provide the correct identification of sources and contributions mentioned in the article, by quoting the works that have particularly influenced the content submitted for publication. A proper accreditation of other’s scientific work shall always be guaranteed and made explicit.

Originality and plagiarism

Authors shall guarantee original scientific contributions, ensuring that the submitted article has never been published elsewhere or by others. The proposed manuscripts must not have been published as copyrighted material in other journals or volumes. Manuscripts subjected to Journal review should not be submitted to other journals for publication.

Authorship of work

The authorship of the work must be limited to those who have made a significant contribution to the conception, writing and interpretation of research content. The main Author (who interacts with the Editors) must guarantee that all Co-authors are properly included and have supervised and approved the final version of the work and they agree to the publication. Any additional contributors to the research presented in the article may be mentioned by the Authors in a final note of the article, along with a note of acknowledgement . Author names will be listed in the article in the same order that authors are listed in the submission.

Conflict of interest and disclosure

Authors must guarantee that no competing interest could influence the results obtained by the research or the proposed interpretation. Authors must declare all the financial support for their research.

Errors in the published articles

If the Author identifies a significant error or relevant inaccuracy in the submitted article, the Author must promptly notify to the Scientific Direction and to the Editorial Staff, providing all the information necessary to make clarifications and/or corrections of the case.

In case of dispute

Anyone who finds violations of the above rules can raise the issue with the Editors of the Journal. The Editors, with the contribution of the Scientific Board, will respond to the request within 30 days. Where necessary, the Editors and the Scientific Board may avail themselves of the opinion of specially qualified external individuals. The decisions of the Editors and the Scientific Board will always be motivated. Any retraction of a publication will be accompanied by a complete and public motivation of the action taken.

Duties for Reviewers

Contribution to the editorial decision

Acceptance of articles for publication is subject to double-blind peer review. Independent anonymous Reviewers are chosen based on their specific competence and research fields. Through the double-blind peer review procedure, Reviewers help the Scientific Directions and the Guest Editors in reaching a final editorial decision. They must suggest to Authors, through the mediation of the Journal’s Staff, corrections aiming to improve the manuscript. Submissions received will be subjected to a first consultation among Editors, Guest Editors and the Scientific Board; subsequently contributions will be subjected to the revision of two anonymous reviewers (double-blind peer review), in respect to specific criteria of evaluation such as: originality, congruence with the research field, scientific rigour, relationship to literature, methodology, results and conclusions. Once reviewers’ evaluations are submitted for each paper, Editors and Guest Editors will take into consideration the evaluations and shall communicate to the author the result. Reviewers’ work is voluntary and free. Reviewers shall:

The result of the Review is communicated to the Journal by filling in a specific form, with the addition of any comments. The result of the evaluation can be accepted, accepted with minor revision, accepted with moderate evision, accepted with major revision, rejected with recommendation, rejected. Following the review process and the evaluation by the Editors and Scientific Board, some manuscripts may be rejected or published later.

Compliance with time schedule

Reviewers must promptly communicate to the Editors whether they don’t feel adequate to the mission or are not able to carry out reading-evaluation within the required timeframe.

Confidentiality

Each submission must be considered confidential; therefore, these manuscripts must not be discussed or evaluated with other persons without explicit consent of the Editors-in-Chief.

Stringency of the peer-review

The review (peer-review) of the contents must be conducted in a rigorous way. Reviewers must notify to the Editors-in-Chief any analogy and/or similarities with other works of the received submissions. Reviewers hereby undertake to accurately indicate any bibliographic details regarding works on which the article is based that may have been omitted by the author.

Conflict of interest and disclosure

The double-blind peer review is based on the assurance of the Reviewers’ anonymity for the Author. Reviewers is required to disclose any potential competing interests before agreeing to review a submission. All information and guidance obtained during the peer-review process must be considered confidential and may not be used for other purposes. For more information, email to redazione@aldrovandiana.it