At Bright Publisher, we uphold the highest standards of academic integrity and ethical publishing. Every manuscript submitted to Artificial Intelligence in Learning (AIL) must adhere to strict ethical principles to ensure transparency, credibility, and the reliability of the scholarly record. Even when misconduct occurs unintentionally, violating publishing ethics can seriously damage a researcher’s reputation and compromise the trust of the academic community. As an author, it is your responsibility to publish responsibly and maintain the ethical standards of scientific communication.

Commitment to Ethical Research and Publication

Bright Publisher aligns its ethical guidelines with the Committee on Publication Ethics (COPE) and Open Access Scholarly Publishers Association (OASPA) best practices. All parties involved in the publishing process including authors, reviewers, and editors are expected to act with honesty, fairness, and professionalism throughout the submission, review, and publication stages. To support researchers, Bright Publisher provides access to guidance, training, and resources on research ethics and responsible authorship through its Author Resource Center.

Ethics Toolkit: Key Areas of Responsibility

Below are the main forms of publishing misconduct and guidance for maintaining ethical compliance:

1. Duplicate Submission
Submitting the same manuscript to more than one journal at the same time is strictly prohibited. Duplicate submission can lead to withdrawal of the paper and potential blacklisting. Authors must wait for an editorial decision before resubmitting elsewhere.

2. Research Fraud
This includes:

• Fabrication – inventing data, results, or experiments and reporting them as real.

• Falsification – manipulating research materials, data, or processes to misrepresent results.
  Such practices are severe violations of research ethics and can result in article retraction and formal reporting to institutions.

3. Plagiarism
Plagiarism occurs when an author uses another researcher’s ideas, text, or data without proper citation or acknowledgment. AIL uses plagiarism detection tools to screen all submissions. Even partial plagiarism, such as copied sentences or ideas, will be treated as serious misconduct.

4. Authorship Misconduct
Authorship must reflect substantial intellectual contribution to the study’s conception, design, data analysis, or interpretation.

• Excluding contributors who meet authorship criteria or adding individuals who do not is unethical.

• The corresponding author must ensure that all co-authors have reviewed and approved the final manuscript.

5. Conflict of Interests
Authors, editors, and reviewers must disclose any potential conflicts whether financial, personal, or professional that could influence their work or its evaluation. Transparency helps maintain trust and impartiality in the peer-review process.

6. Salami Slicing
“Salami slicing” refers to dividing one meaningful research project into several smaller papers for multiple submissions. This practice is discouraged, as it fragments scientific communication and may distort research significance.