Guide for Editors

The Editors of the International Journal of Theoretical & Applied Computational Intelligence (IJTACI) are responsible for ensuring a fair, transparent, and ethical editorial process while maintaining the scientific quality and integrity of the journal.

Editorial Responsibilities

Editors shall:

  • Evaluate manuscripts solely on academic merit, originality, relevance, and scientific quality.
  • Ensure a fair, unbiased, and confidential peer-review process.
  • Select qualified, independent reviewers with relevant expertise.
  • Make editorial decisions free from commercial, institutional, or personal influence.
  • Maintain confidentiality throughout the editorial process.
  • Ensure compliance with the journal's ethical policies and internationally recognized publishing standards.

Timelines

Editors are expected to:

  • Complete the initial assessment and invite reviewers within 7 days of being assigned a manuscript;
  • Follow up with reviewers whose reports are overdue after two  weeks, and invite replacement reviewers when necessary;
  • Make a decision within 7 days of receiving all reviewer reports, considering the reviewers' recommendations together with their own assessment of the manuscript. If reviewers' recommendations conflict, the editor may invite an additional reviewer;
  • Check revised manuscripts within 7 days of receiving them.

If an editor cannot meet these timelines, they should inform the editorial office promptly so the manuscript can be reassigned

Editorial Decision-Making

Editors consider:

  • Reviewer recommendations
  • Scientific quality
  • Originality
  • Methodological rigor
  • Ethical compliance
  • Relevance to the journal's scope

The Editor may request revisions, accept, or reject a manuscript based on the overall assessment.

Conflict of Interest

Editors must recuse themselves from handling manuscripts in which they have personal, professional, institutional, or financial conflicts of interest. Such manuscripts will be assigned to another qualified editor.

Research Integrity

Editors will investigate allegations of research misconduct, including plagiarism, duplicate publication, fabricated or falsified data, unethical research practices, and authorship disputes, following the recommendations of the Committee on Publication Ethics (COPE).

Where appropriate, the journal may publish corrections, Expressions of Concern, or retractions to preserve the integrity of the scholarly record.

Confidentiality

Editors must treat all submitted manuscripts and correspondence as confidential and must not disclose information to anyone other than those directly involved in the editorial process.

Appeals and Complaints

Authors may appeal editorial decisions by providing a detailed justification. Appeals and complaints will be handled fairly, transparently, and independently in accordance with the journal's editorial policies.

Editorial Independence and Conflict of Interest

IJTACI is committed to impartial editorial decisions. Manuscripts submitted by the Editor-in-Chief, members of the editorial board, reviewers, or staff of the publisher are handled by an independent editor with no conflict of interest. The submitting member has no access to the peer-review process, reviewer identities, or editorial discussions. Such manuscripts are held to the same peer-review standards as all other submissions, and the published article notes that an independent editor handled it. To keep the journal open to the international research community, the editorial office monitors how often the same authors, research groups, and institutions publish in each volume. Editors may defer or decline submissions where a single author or group would otherwise make up a disproportionate share of the volume. Editorial decisions are based only on scholarly merit, and are not affected by an author's role in the journal or by the use of any service offered by the publisher.