The Code of Conduct
The journal Studia Historica Nitriensia (SHN) is published by the Constantine the Philosopher University in Nitra. The editorial office is located at the Department of History, Faculty of Arts, Constantine the Philosopher University in Nitra, Hodžova 1, 949 01 Nitra, Slovak Republic. The current editor-in-chief is Assoc. Prof. Miroslav Palárik, PhD. The journal publishes original articles focused on history, archaeology, museology, and related disciplines, which analyze historical aspects of various phenomena and events. The content is freely accessible without any charges for users or institutions. No fee is charged for publication.
The following rules comply with the guidelines of the Committee on Publication Ethics (COPE) ; Publishing Ethics Resource Kit for editors ; International Committee of Medical Journal Editors ; and with the principles of transparency in line with international organizations promoting good practices in scholarly publishing (COPE, DOAJ, OASPA, WAME).
Role of the Editor-in-Chief:
Initial editorial decision: The editor-in-chief preliminarily reviews submissions sent to the editorial office, evaluating their compatibility with the geographical and thematic focus of the journal and their suitability for peer review.
Exclusion of incompatible submissions: The editor-in-chief will reject submissions that do not align with the journal’s profile, clearly fail to meet scholarly standards, or violate publishing ethics. In contentious cases, consultations are held with members of the journal’s editorial board.
Requests for revisions: The editor-in-chief, or a designated member of the editorial team, may request necessary revisions from authors, such as shortening the text, revising the notes apparatus, or adapting visual materials to meet editorial requirements.
Final decision: The editor-in-chief makes the final decision when assembling individual issues of the journal, taking into account the publisher’s financial resources, the thematic focus (in the case of special thematic issues), and the order in which submissions were received.
Role of the Editorial Board:
Composition: The Editorial Board consists of:
a) the Scientific Board, which includes renowned experts in the fields of history, archaeology, and museology from Slovakia and abroad, and
b) an Extended Editorial Circle, comprising specialists primarily approached for peer review. The Editorial Board may also invite an external expert, who is not a member, to review a manuscript to ensure objective and professional evaluation.
Decision on publication: The Scientific Board makes decisions on the publication of a manuscript based on peer reviews, following ethical principles and academic practice.
Publication of code of conduct: The Scientific Board approves and publishes ethical guidelines, peer review procedures, and author instructions on the journal’s website. These guidelines may be updated as necessary.
Corrections and responses: The Scientific Board ensures the publication of corrections, responses from the academic community, and apologies in cases of ethical violations.
Confidentiality protection: The Editorial Board safeguards the confidentiality of personal data, the content of peer reviews, and correspondence with authors and reviewers. Members of the Editorial Board who publish in their own journal must not misuse their position.
Handling disputes: Any issues are resolved in accordance with the Publishing Ethics Resource Kit, created by Elsevier.
Role of the Executive Editorial Office:
Communication: The executive editorial office facilitates communication between authors, reviewers, the editor-in-chief, members of the editorial board, and the publisher.
Anonymity: The executive editorial office ensures mutual anonymity between authors and reviewers. It handles written correspondence between authors, reviewers, the editor-in-chief, and the scientific board, ensuring the confidentiality of communication between authors and the editorial office.
Conflict of interest: The team works to prevent conflicts of interest between authors, reviewers, and members of the scientific board or the extended editorial circle.
Final preparation of articles for publication: The executive editorial team is responsible for the final preparation of submissions for publication and ensures their approval by the authors.
Peer-Review Process:
Assignment to reviewers: Submitted texts, after an initial review by the editor-in-chief, are assigned to two reviewers selected by the scientific board. If the reviewers are not members of the scientific board or the extended editorial circle of the journal, they are provided with the publishing guidelines of Studia Historica Nitriensia along with the manuscript.
Anonymity: Manuscripts are anonymized and reviewed by two (or three, in case of discrepancy) reviewers. Authors and reviewers remain mutually anonymous throughout the process, even after its conclusion.
Review form: Reviewers provide their assessments of the content, expertise, and scientific quality of the text, as well as its style and formal requirements. A standardized review form is used for this purpose. Reviewers may recommend publication, suggest modifications, or outright reject the submission. If the manuscript is rejected or requires modification, the reviewer must clearly explain their decision.
Second review round: Significantly modified submissions must undergo a second round of review process. The second round of review focuses on the modifications made by the author based on the feedback provided in the first round.
Declining to review: A reviewer may decline to provide a review and must inform the editorial office in writing.
Objectivity in reviewing: Reviewers commit to approaching the review process objectively, avoiding personal attacks on the author, and adhering to academic principles.
Resolving disputes: If one reviewer recommends publication and the other rejects it, the editorial office arranges for a third conciliatory review by another expert.
Controversial texts: The editor-in-chief and the scientific board have the final say in the case of controversial texts ( text that received different or ambiguous opinions by reviewers). The exception is content published in the sections Chronicle, Reviews, and Annotations. Submissions to these sections are included at the discretion of the editor-in-chief without peer review.
Confidentiality: Reviewers must treat the content of reviewed manuscripts as confidential, refrain from misusing it, and not use it in their own work prior to its publication.
Identification of unethical author practices: Reviewers are obligated to inform the editorial office if they are aware that the manuscript is plagiarized, has been published in another journal, or contains manipulated or inaccurate information. This also applies to different language versions of the text.
Publication: Successfully completed peer review does not guarantee the manuscript will be published in the next issue of the journal. The final decision is made by the editor-in-chief, based on the publisher’s financial resources, the order in which manuscripts were submitted to the editorial office, and the thematic focus of special issues.
Ethics and Responsibilities of the Author:
Code of Conduct : The author is obligated to familiarize themselves with the Code of Conduct of the journal and adhere to the author guidelines published on the journal’s website and in the printed version of the journal.
Originality of the Text: The author commits to submitting an original, unpublished text. The same contribution that has already been published in another journal or on a website must not be submitted unless it has been significantly revised or expanded. The author is required to inform the editorial office about this upon submission, including in the case of different language versions of the text.
Simultaneous Submission: Submitting the same manuscript to multiple journals is considered unethical.
Plagiarism: The author is responsible for the accuracy of the information provided in the submission. Plagiarism and the use of unreliable sources violates academic principles.
Citation: The author must familiarize themselves with the citation and reference guidelines published on the journal’s website. They must also provide their professional affiliation, financial support (if applicable), and other required data (such as ORCID, Scopus Author ID, WoS Researcher ID). Authors must submit images, maps, graphs, tables, and other supplementary materials in the required quality and comply with copyright laws. They must also provide evidence of permission to use copyrighted materials, even without being asked by the editorial board.
Article Authorship: The journal adheres to criteria based on the guidelines of the ICMJE (International Committee of Medical Journal Editors) regarding authorship. Although these guidelines were originally developed for medical journals, they offer a useful framework that can also be applied to non-medical fields of science.
Co-Authors: The corresponding author is responsible for listing all co-authors and ensuring that all co-authors have seen and approved the final version of the text.
Copyright: The author grants consent for their work to be included in the journal. The author must own the copyright and agree to the journal’s ethical standards, Open Access, and the Creative Commons CC BY NC 4.0
Peer Review Process: The author is obligated to review the feedback from reviewers, correct the deficiencies pointed out, or respond to the reviewers’ comments. The author has the right to appeal the reviewers’ decision, but the final decision rests with the editorial board, which follows the ethical principles mentioned above.
Reviewer Responsibilities:
Confidential peer review: All submissions undergo anonymous and confidential peer review. Manuscripts are anonymized and reviewed by two reviewers, with exceptions for sections like Reports, Chronicles, and Reviews.
Decision in case of differing opinions: If there are differing opinions among the reviewers, the final decision rests with the editorial board of the journal.
Familiarity with rules: The reviewer is required to familiarize themselves with the Code od Conduct and the author guidelines of the journal.
Double-blind anonymity: Reviewers do not know the identity of the authors, and authors do not know the identity of the reviewers (double-blind peer review) throughout the process. The editorial team ensures the anonymity of the submission by removing all identifying details of both the author and the reviewer.
Conflict of interest notification: Reviewers must disclose any conflict of interest and any inability to meet the deadline for submitting their review.
Confidentiality of the manuscript: The manuscript is a confidential document, and the reviewer must not share it or discuss it with anyone.
Access to reviews: The peer reviews can only be anonymously provided to the authors and the editorial board as a basis for the final decision on publication. These reviews are archived by the journal’s editorial office.
Expert evaluation: The reviewer evaluates the submission based on its scholarly content to the best of their knowledge and in accordance with academic standards. The reviewer should clearly explain their objections to the manuscript, supporting them with comprehensible reasoning, while personal criticism of the authors is unacceptable.
Violation of ethical principles and plagiarism: The reviewer must point out if they are aware that a similar submission has already been published, lacks proper citation, or does not consider relevant works in the field.
Plagiarism:
The editorial board adheres to the definition of plagiarism as outlined on the University of Oxford’s website.
Plagiarism can occur in relation to all types of sources and media, including text, illustrations, material from websites, published and unpublished materials.
Studia Historica Nitriensia does not tolerate plagiarism, and the editorial board reserves the right to check all submissions using appropriate digital plagiarism detection tools. Any manuscript identified as containing plagiarism will be rejected.
The journal’s ethical guidelines instruct authors, reviewers, and editorial members on how to proceed in cases of plagiarism.
The guidelines for authors include information on self-plagiarism, duplicate publication, and text recycling, which are considered unethical.