Statement of Ethics and Conflict of Interest Policies

Authors

All manuscripts submitted to the Texas Water Journal (Journal) must be the original work of the authors. Plagiarism is strictly forbidden and when discovered will result in an article’s rejection or retraction as well as a report of the incident to those individuals whose works were plagiarized. Original research should present an accurate account of the work performed and an objective discussion. Data should be represented accurately in the paper. Other authors’ works must be appropriately cited. Authorship of the paper should include only those who have made significant contribution to the conception, design, execution, or interpretation of the article. Contributing authors should be listed as co-authors, and other participants should be acknowledged. Authors may not submit the manuscript to more than one journal concurrently. Authors should only submit papers on work that has been conducted in an ethical and responsible manner. Unethical behavior is unacceptable.

When an author discovers a significant error or inaccuracy in his/her own published work, it is the author’s obligation and responsibility to promptly notify the editor-in-chief and cooperate with the editor-in-chief to retract or correct the paper and publish an Erratum.

Authors should disclose any financial or other substantive conflict of interest that might influence the results or interpretation of their manuscript and acknowledge individuals or organizations that have provided financial support for research. All sources of financial support for the project should be disclosed.

Editors

The editor-in-chief is responsible for deciding which manuscripts submitted to the Journal should be peer reviewed for consideration for publication and for assigning a section editor for each article. In addition to technical merits, the editor-in-chief will make review and publication decisions based on maintaining the integrity and reputation of the Journal, the Texas Water Resources Institute, and Texas A&M University. After peer review, the section editor will make a decision on the acceptance of the article for publication. The editor-in-chief will review each publication decision. If the section editor and editor-in-chief disagree about the publication decision, the editor-in-chief may convene the editorial board, which will make a publication decision by simple majority. Publication decisions should be guided by the policies of the Texas Water Journal 501 (c) (3) Board and should be based exclusively on the academic merit and the decision of the reviewers. All manuscripts must be peer reviewed to assist the section editor in making editorial decisions through the necessary editorial communications. The author will be required to assist the section editor in edits to improve the paper. The editorial board and editorial team must not disclose any information about the submitted manuscript to anyone other than the corresponding author(s), reviewers, potential reviewers, and the publisher. Unpublished materials disclosed in a submitted manuscript must not be used in any of the Journal editors’ own research without the expressed written consent of the author. The editorial board, section editors, advisory board members, reviewers, and editorial team will conduct themselves in a balanced and objective manner, acting out their duties in an unbiased and nondiscriminatory fashion (race, gender, sexual orientation, religious belief, ethnic origin, citizenship, political, or any other major identifiable markers).

Section editors should excuse themselves (i.e. should ask the editor-in-chief to reassign the article to another section editor) from considering manuscripts in which they have conflicts of interest resulting from competitive, collaborative, or other relationships or connections with any of the authors, or companies. When the editor-in-chief is notified or discovers a significant problem regarding errors/inaccuracy, undisclosed conflict of interest, plagiarism, in a published article, the editor-in-chief will promptly notify the corresponding author and the publisher and will undertake the necessary actions to clarify the issue and in case of need to retract the paper or publish an Erratum.

Reviewers

Peer reviewers will assist the section editors in making editorial decisions. If a selected reviewer feels unqualified to review the research reported in a manuscript or knows that its prompt review will be impossible, he/she should notify the section editor and excuse himself/herself from the review process. Any manuscripts received for review must be treated as confidential documents. They must not be shown to or discussed with others except as authorized by the editor-in-chief. Reviews should be conducted objectively. Personal criticism of the author is inappropriate. Reviewers should express their views clearly with supporting arguments. Reviewers should identify relevant published work that has not been cited by the authors. Any statement that an observation, derivation, or argument had been previously reported should be accompanied by the relevant citation. A reviewer should also call to the section editor’s attention any substantial similarity or overlap between the manuscript under consideration and any other published paper of which they have personal knowledge. Privileged information or ideas obtained through peer review must be kept confidential and not used for personal advantage.

Reviewers should not consider manuscripts in which they have conflicts of interest resulting from competitive, collaborative, or other relationships or connections with any of the authors, companies, or institutions connected to the papers.