Statement of Editorial Ethics and Good Practices

Universidad ORT Uruguay is committed to guaranteeing the ethics of the manuscripts that are published in the journal InMediaciones de la Comunicación. It is essential that all parties involved in the editorial process, both the Editorial Team —Director, Associate Editors, Academic Committee, Technical Staff, Guest Editor— as well as the authors and external referees, know and abide by the established criteria and respect the guidelines established for the publication of articles, reviews, interviews and other genres of academic production. InMediaciones de la Comunicación adheres to the code of ethics and the declaration of good editorial practices indicated by the Committee on Publication Ethics (COPE) and to the suggestions and recommendations established in the San Francisco Declaration on Research Evaluation (DORA) to guarantee good practices related to the evaluation of scientific-academic productions. Likewise, InMediaciones de la Comunicación  follows the provisions of the Singapore Statement on Research Integrity.

1. Ethics for the Editorial Team

2. Ethics for authors

3. Ethics for external referees

4. Violation of editorial ethics

5. Post-publication revisions and corrections

6. Plagiarism control and prevention

1. Ethics for the Editorial Team

-The Editorial Team is responsible for publishing or not publishing the submitted manuscripts. These will be evaluated without taking into account religion, sexual or political orientation, ethnic origin, institutional membership, citizenship or any other peculiarity outside the academic parameters and editorial criteria set by InMediaciones de la Comunicación.

-They undertake to publish updated guidelines for authors, establishing the responsibilities of those who submit the manuscript application and the required style standards for the materials sent to the journal (Guidelines for authors). They also agree to specify the arbitration system used to evaluate the manuscripts and the evaluation parameters that external referees must take into account.

-They undertake to guarantee the confidentiality of the evaluation process. This encompasses the anonymity of external referees and authors and the privacy of the opinions produced, the content evaluated and the exchanges or queries raised to the Associate Editors, Academic Committee and the Guest Editors.

-They guarantee the publication of corrections, clarifications and/or apologies in all cases deemed necessary.

-They guarantee that the articles received will not be used as input for other research, nor be subject to any type of manipulation without the consent of their authors.

-They pledge to have strict respect for authorship. Papers will be subjected to plagiarism control using the Turnitin prevention service (Plagiarism control and prevention) and reasonable measures will be taken to prevent the publication of manuscripts in which there have been cases of misconduct in the research.

-They will try to avoid conflicts of interest, taking into account the sources of funding and the affiliation of the authors when selecting the external referees.

-They declare their commitment to the respect and integrity of the manuscripts already been published.

2. Ethics for authors

-Authors are responsible for the statements, the content and the opinions expressed in the manuscripts sent to InMediaciones de la Comunicación. They must guarantee they are the owners or co-owners of the nominated manuscript and, therefore, they are also owners of its intellectual property rights (Document of authors’ rights and originality).

-They must send original manuscripts written by those who declare their authorship and guarantee that they will not be submitted to other publications while under evaluation. The journal considers a manuscript to be original when it is unpublished: that is, when it has not been published in an academic journal or as a chapter in a digital or printed book, nor is it undergoing evaluation in another publication.

-In the event that the submitted manuscript includes advances from research previously presented at Conferences, Colloquiums and/or Congresses or has its origin in an undergraduate or postgraduate thesis, the authors must include an explanatory note indicating the first instance in which they were presented. They may not, in any case, retain the same title as their first version. InMediaciones de la Comunicación does not consider as a prior publication the abstracts or advances presented in academic events such as those mentioned above or those available as research documents in institutional, thematic or general repositories. Likewise, the submitted manuscripts may have their origin in undergraduate or graduate thesis. They may not, in any case, keep the same title as their first version.

-They must state that the contents, materials or resources used in the manuscript do not infringe the copyrights of third parties. In case of reproducing copyrighted material (photographs, still or moving images, graphics, videos, infographics or any type of previously published material) they must be cited or indicated in the manuscript’s body and, if necessary, obtain and send the corresponding permission to be published in InMediaciones de la Comunicación in print and online format. Any material received without these citations or permissions will be presumed to originate from the authors of the submitted manuscript.

-In the case of manuscripts submitted by two or more authors, they must indicate the order of appearance and, at the end of the manuscript, indicate in percentages the contributions made by each author. In addition, they must present a certificate that expresses the consent of all the authors for its publication.

-They pledge to recognize and indicate possible conflicts of interest that could be perceived as bias in the manuscript. In this sense, and in the event the authors of the manuscript receive any type of financial support, they must include a note indicating their origin.

-They pledge to inform the Director, the Associate Editors, the Academic Committee and the Guest Editors when they detect a relevant error in the published manuscripts, in order to rectify and introduce the necessary corrections.

3. Ethics for external referees

-They undertake to make a rigorous, critical and impartial review of the evaluated manuscript. They must guarantee their acceptance or rejection according to the thematic relevance and pertinence, the innovation or novelty of the contents, the approach to the methodology used, the coherence of the analysis carried out and compliance with the authors’ rules required by the journal. For this purpose, the arbitration must take into account the evaluation parameters or guides that are established in the Evaluation Form.

-They must take into account the same ethical and confidentiality recommendations indicated in Ethics for the Editorial Team.

-They undertake not to divulge or use, under any circumstances, the contents of the articles evaluated. This will only be possible with the explicit permission of the authors and the Director and/or the Associate Editors and the Academic Committee of InMediaciones de la Comunicación.

-They pledge to respect the evaluation period established by the Associate Editors and Academic Committee: 20 days from submission of the nominated manuscript. In case of contingencies preventing compliance, they must notify the Director or a member of the Associate Editors or the Academic Committee with sufficient advance so that the journal can make a decision and assess the planned evaluation schedule.

-They must notify the Director or a member of the Associate Editors and the Academic Committee of the existence of conflicts of interest or lack of suitability and expertise to evaluate the assigned manuscript.

-They must notify the Director or a member of the Associate Editors and the Academic Committee in the event of detecting possible plagiarism or breach of ethics.

-They will avoid suggesting citations from their own articles or academic production in order to expand their own citations or those of the research team they belong to.

4. Violation of editorial ethics

InMediaciones de la Comunicación will strictly monitor the papers to ensure compliance with ethics and good editorial practices. In this sense, and in accordance with the provisions of COPE, accusations of alleged misconduct or the detection of a possible anomaly will imply the activation of a protocol which, in general terms, consists of the following steps:

- A meeting will be held between the Associate Editors and the Academic Committee where the relevance of the accusation made, or the detection of a possible anomaly, will be evaluated.

- The Associate Editors and the Academic Committee will prepare a report contemplating the measures or actions to be undertaken in accordance with the general criteria and the Declaration of Editorial Ethics and Good Practices of the journal.

- The authors will be informed of the accusation received or the detection of a possible fault or anomaly.

- A period of no more than 10 days will be established, according to the type of fault or anomaly subject to consideration, for the authors to make the clarifications or discharge they deem pertinent.

- If necessary, the legal advisors of Universidad ORT Uruguay will be consulted.

- The Associate Editors or the Academic Committee will apply the measures determined. If the anomaly or fault reported is verified: the manuscript will be rejected. If the manuscript is already published: it will be removed from the issue of InMediaciones de la Comunicación and a corresponding retraction will be made. The author will be prevented from any future publishing in the journal.

5. Post-publication revisions and corrections

InMediaciones de la Comunicación guarantees the publication of corrections, clarifications and/or apologies in all cases considered necessary. Complaints will be received at the following email: inmediaciones@ort.edu.uy

6. Plagiarism control and prevention

Manuscripts will be subjected to plagiarism control using the Turnitin prevention service that is used to reveal verbatim copies of resources from the Internet. This control is carried out in two stages of the evaluation process: upon receipt of a manuscript's application and, subsequently, before its publication (that is, after having gone through the evaluation process and once the modifications suggested by the external arbitrators, have been made). In case of identifying a possible plagiarism, the Associate Editors and the Academic Committee of the journal will initiate the protocol established in accordance with the criteria mentioned in Violation of editorial ethics. Such control includes self-plagiarism or the extended use of identical phrases from a manuscript already published by the same author. The Associate Editors and the Academic Committee will communicate the results of the plagiarism control to the responsible authors and they will be asked to make the pertinent clarifications within 10 days before defining whether it is plagiarism behaviour. Manuscripts in which such behaviour is verified will not be published.