About the journal

Focus and Scope

The International Journal of Information Science and Technology serves as a valuable resource for the global scientific community by publishing both basic and applied research, fostering collaboration among peers from a variety of backgrounds and exploring new horizons through an innovation lens. The journal is designed, in other words, to bring together researchers working within different, yet complementary disciplines, enabling them thus to benefit from each other’s knowledge and expertise. It will equally open up new research perspectives for them to make significant advancements in this area. In a nutshell, the journal aims to contribute to the raising of international scientific standards by ensuring the publication of quality research papers and promoting contributions from fields of study such as Learning Systems for Education, Digital Preservation of Written Heritage and Text Processing Technology, Machine Learning and Natural Language Processing, Optimization and Modelling of Complex Systems, and Smart Cities and Applications.

Peer Review Process

The submitted papers should be original, unpublished, and not in consideration for publication elsewhere at the time of submission to iJIST. Manuscripts submitted to the journal go first through an initial screening by the editorial team. If the content is judged to be appropriate for the journal, the paper is sent to at least two international experts in the relevant subject area for peer single-blind review. The journal editor considers all the feedback from peer reviewers and makes an informed decision to accept or reject the manuscript.

Open Access Policy

This journal provides open access to all of its content on the principle that making research freely available to the public supports a greater global exchange of knowledge. Such access is associated with increased readership and increased citation of an author's work. For more information on this approach, see the Public Knowledge Project, which has designed this system to improve the scholarly and public quality of research, and which freely distributes the journal system as well as other software to support the open access publishing of scholarly resources.

Publication Ethics and Malpractice Statement

The publication of an article in a peer-reviewed journal is an essential building block in the development of a coherent and respected network of knowledge. It is a direct reflection of the quality of the work of the authors and the institutions that support them. Peer-reviewed articles support and embody the scientific method. It is therefore important to agree upon standards of expected ethical behavior for all parties involved in the act of publishing: the author, the journal editor, the peer reviewer, the publisher and the society-owned or sponsored journals.

Duties of Editors

  • Publication decisions;
  • Fair play;
  • Confidentiality;
  • Disclosure and Conflict of Interest;
  • Involvement and cooperation in investigations.

Duties of Reviewers

  • Contribution to Editorial Decisions;
  • Promptness;
  • Confidentiality;
  • Standards of Objectivity;
  • Acknowledgement of Sources;
  • Disclosure and Conflict of Interest.

Duties of Authors

  • Reporting standards;
  • Data Access and Retention;
  • Originality and Plagiarism;
  • Multiple, Redundant or Concurrent Publication;
  • Acknowledgement of Sources;
  • Authorship of the Paper;
  • Hazards and Human or Animal Subjects;
  • Disclosure and Conflicts of Interest;
  • Fundamental errors in published work.

Author's responsibilities

  • Authors are obliged to participate in peer review process;
  • All authors have significantly contributed to the research;
  • Authors include statement that all data in article are real and authentic;
  • Authors are obliged to provide retractions or corrections of mistakes;
  • Reported work is original and written by the authors;
  • Reported work has not been previously published and has been submitted only to that journal;
  • Where material is taken from other sources (including their own published writing), the source is clearly cited and, where appropriate, permission is obtained;
  • The work does not infringe on the rights of others, including privacy rights and intellectual property rights;
  • Data are true and not manipulated;
  • Data are their own or they have permission to use data reproduced in their paper;
  • Any real or apparent conflicting or competing interest is clearly stated upon submission of the paper (this would include funding assistance);
  • Authors should adhere to all research ethics guidelines of their discipline, particularly where human or animal subjects are involved;
  • Authors should contact the editor to identify and correct any material errors upon discovery, whether prior or subsequent to publication of their work;
  • Authorship of the paper is accurately represented, including ensuring that all individuals credited as authors participated in the actual authorship of the work and that all who participated are credited and have given consent for publication.

Responsibility for the reviewers

  • Judgments should be objective;
  • Reviewers should have no conflict of interest with respect to the research, the authors, and/or the research funders;
  • Reviewers should point out relevant published work that is not cited;
  • Reviewed articles should be treated confidentially;
  • Reviewers should maintain the confidentiality of the review process;
  • Reviewers should immediately alert the journal editor of any real or potential competing interest that could affect the impartiality of their review and decline to review when appropriate;
  • Reviewers should conduct themselves fairly and impartially;
  • We are aware, of course, that academics will come from a particular school of thought and/or may have strong ties to a particular interest. All we ask is that reviewers strive to act fairly. If in doubt about whether a conflict exists, a reviewer should be transparent and seek the views of the journal editor.

Editorial responsibilities

  • Editors have complete responsibility and authority to reject/accept an article. They always strive to meet the needs of readers and authors;
  • Editors should have no conflict of interest with respect to articles they reject/accept;
  • Editors should only accept a paper when reasonably certain about the content;
  • When errors are found, editors should promote publication of a correction or retraction;
  • Editors should preserve anonymity of reviewers;
  • Editors should maintain and promote consistent ethical policies for their journals;
  • Editors should oversee and act to enforce those policies as needed in a fair and consistent manner;
  • Editors should ensure the confidentiality of the review process;
  • Editors should exercise the highest standards of personal integrity in their work as editor of the journal, recognizing and planning for instances in which they could have a competing interest or the appearance of a competing interest;
  • Editors should work with authors, reviewers, and editorial board members as necessary to ensure they are sufficiently advised regarding the journal’s ethics and publishing policies and that the journal’s stewardship on ethical matters is fair, unbiased, and timely;
  • Editors should promote fairness and equality and oppose discrimination;
  • Editors should promote transparency of and respect for the academic record;
  • Editors should respect the confidentiality of others.

Publishing ethics issues

  • Monitor/safeguard publishing ethics;
  • Establish guidelines for retracting articles;
  • Maintain integrity of the academic record;
  • Preclude business needs from compromising intellectual and ethical standards;
  • Be willing to publish corrections, clarifications, retractions and apologies when needed;
  • Guard against plagiarism and/or fraudulent data.

Changes to authorship

This policy concerns the addition, deletion, or rearrangement of author names in the authorship of accepted manuscripts. Requests to add or remove an author, or to rearrange the author names, must be sent to the Editor-in-Chief from the corresponding author of the accepted manuscript and must include (a) the reason the name should be added or removed, or the author names rearranged and (b) written confirmation via e-mail from all authors that they agree with the addition, removal or rearrangement. In the case of addition or removal of authors, this includes confirmation from the author being added or removed. Requests that are not sent by the corresponding author will be forwarded by the Editor-in-Chief to the corresponding author, who must follow the procedure as described above.

Role of the funding source

Authors are requested to identify who provided financial support for the conduct of the research and/or preparation of the article and to briefly describe the role of the sponsor(s), if any, in the study design; in the collection, in the analysis and interpretation of data; in the writing of the report; and in the decision to submit the article for publication. If the funding source(s) had no such involvement, then this should be stated.

Publication Frequency

The publication frequency of the iJIST journal is continuous.

Archiving

This journal has an archiving agreement with Portico for longtime preservation of the content of this journal. Learn more....

Screening for Plagiarism

All submissions are checked for plagiarism using iThenticate before they undergo the peer-review process.