Journal of Travel and Tourism Research

Publication Ethics

1. General Ethical Principles

• Editorial decisions are based on academic merit, relevance to the journal’s scope, methodological quality, originality, and contribution to the literature.
• No author is discriminated against on the basis of gender, ethnicity, nationality, religion, political belief, institutional affiliation, disability, age, or other personal characteristics.
• Editorial and peer-review processes must remain confidential, impartial, and free from commercial, institutional, or personal influence.
• JTTR does not tolerate plagiarism, fabrication, falsification, redundant publication, inappropriate authorship, citation manipulation, undisclosed conflicts of interest, or other forms of research and publication misconduct.

2. Responsibilities of Authors

• Authors must submit original work that has not been published previously and is not under consideration elsewhere.
• All data, methods, analyses, and findings must be reported accurately and transparently.
• All individuals listed as authors must have made a substantial scholarly contribution and approved the final manuscript.
• Contributors who do not meet authorship criteria should be acknowledged appropriately.
• All sources must be cited accurately, and verbatim material must be clearly identified and referenced.
• Authors must disclose funding, institutional support, financial interests, personal relationships, and any other potential conflicts of interest.
• Authors must obtain permission for copyrighted material and provide evidence when requested.
• Where required, authors must obtain ethics-committee approval and informed consent and state the approval details in the manuscript.
• Authors must protect participant privacy, confidentiality, and personal data.
• Authors must promptly notify the editor if they discover a significant error or ethical problem in a submitted or published work.

3. Ethics Committee Approval and Informed Consent

In accordance with TR Dizin criteria and relevant legislation, ethics-committee approval is required for research involving human participants, personal data, interviews, surveys, experiments, observations, clinical or behavioural interventions, and other activities that require formal ethical oversight.

• The name of the approving committee, decision date, and approval number must be stated in the manuscript.
• Informed consent must be obtained from participants where applicable.
• For research involving vulnerable groups or minors, additional legal and ethical safeguards must be observed.
• If ethics approval is not required, authors should provide a clear justification when requested by the editors.

4. Responsibilities of Editors

• Editors evaluate manuscripts independently and fairly, without regard to the identity or status of the authors.
• Editors protect the confidentiality of submitted manuscripts, author information, reviewer identities, and editorial correspondence.
• Editors must recuse themselves from manuscripts where a conflict of interest may exist.
• Editors select reviewers on the basis of subject expertise, methodological competence, independence, and absence of conflicts.
• Editors investigate credible allegations of misconduct and follow appropriate correction, retraction, or institutional-notification procedures.
• Editors must not use unpublished material from a submitted manuscript for personal or professional advantage.
• Final publication decisions remain independent of the publisher, institutional ownership, sponsorship, or commercial considerations.

5. Responsibilities of Reviewers

• Reviewers must evaluate manuscripts objectively, constructively, and within the agreed time.
• Reviewers must treat manuscripts and related materials as confidential documents.
• Reviewers must disclose conflicts of interest and decline assignments where impartial evaluation is not possible.
• Reviewers must not use unpublished information for personal benefit or share it with third parties.
• Reviewers should identify relevant uncited work and alert the editor to possible plagiarism, duplication, fabrication, or other ethical concerns.
• Personal criticism, hostile language, discriminatory comments, and unsupported allegations are unacceptable.

6. Peer-Review Policy

JTTR applies a double-anonymized peer-review process. Author identities are concealed from reviewers, and reviewer identities are concealed from authors. Manuscripts that pass the initial editorial assessment are normally evaluated by at least two independent reviewers.

• The editor may request additional reviews where reports conflict or specialist expertise is required.
• Revised manuscripts may be returned to the original reviewers.
• Editors may reject submissions before external review when they fall outside the journal’s scope, do not meet minimum scholarly standards, or contain serious ethical or technical deficiencies.
• The Editor-in-Chief has final responsibility for publication decisions.

7. Plagiarism and Similarity Screening

Submitted manuscripts may be screened using similarity-detection software. Similarity is assessed qualitatively as well as quantitatively; no single percentage automatically determines acceptance or rejection.

• Unattributed copying, close paraphrasing, mosaic plagiarism, self-plagiarism, duplicate publication, and inappropriate reuse of data or figures are prohibited.
• Authors may be asked to revise, explain, or document overlapping material.
• Serious cases may lead to rejection, retraction, notification of institutions, or other corrective action.

8. Research Misconduct and Complaints

Allegations concerning fabrication, falsification, plagiarism, authorship disputes, peer-review manipulation, undisclosed conflicts, unethical research, or other misconduct are examined fairly and confidentially. Editors may request evidence from the parties involved and may contact relevant institutions or authorities where necessary.

• Complaints and appeals must identify the manuscript or publication and explain the concern with supporting evidence.
• Complaints are reviewed by an editor who was not directly involved whenever practicable.
• Editorial decisions may be reconsidered where procedural error, factual misunderstanding, or relevant new evidence is demonstrated.
• Disagreement with an editorial decision alone does not constitute evidence of misconduct.

9. Corrections, Retractions, and Expressions of Concern

• Minor errors that do not affect the conclusions may be corrected through an erratum or corrigendum.
• Articles may be retracted where findings are unreliable because of misconduct or major error, where plagiarism or redundant publication is confirmed, or where research was conducted unethically.
• An expression of concern may be issued while a serious matter remains under investigation.
• Corrections and retractions are linked transparently to the original publication, which remains part of the scholarly record.

10. Conflicts of Interest

Authors, editors, and reviewers must disclose financial, institutional, professional, academic, or personal relationships that could reasonably be perceived to influence their work or judgment. A disclosed conflict does not automatically prevent publication, but it must be managed transparently.

11. Data, Reproducibility, and Record Retention

• Authors should retain research data, ethics documentation, consent records, permissions, and analysis files for an appropriate period.
• Editors may request underlying data or supporting documentation during evaluation or after publication.
• Data sharing is encouraged where legally and ethically permissible, subject to confidentiality, consent, intellectual-property, and data-protection requirements.
• JTTR maintains relevant editorial and administrative records in accordance with its institutional policies.

12. Use of Artificial Intelligence Tools

• Artificial intelligence tools cannot be listed as authors because they cannot assume responsibility for the work.
• Authors must disclose substantive use of generative artificial intelligence in writing, translation, data processing, coding, image production, or analysis.
• Authors remain fully responsible for accuracy, originality, citations, confidentiality, and compliance with ethical and legal requirements.
• Confidential manuscripts, reviewer reports, personal data, or unpublished findings must not be entered into external AI systems unless appropriate safeguards and permissions are in place.

13. Editorial Independence and Publisher Responsibility

JTTR is published by the Faculty of Tourism at Aydın Adnan Menderes University. The publisher assumes administrative and financial responsibility while guaranteeing the editorial independence of the journal. Institutional ownership, sponsorship, advertising, or external funding does not determine editorial decisions.

14. Direct Marketing and Privacy

• JTTR communicates with authors, reviewers, and readers only for legitimate journal-related purposes and in accordance with applicable data-protection rules.
• Personal information is used only for editorial, publication, indexing, archiving, and communication functions.
• Unsolicited or misleading marketing practices are not permitted.