Ethical statement of the publication

Ámbitos. Revista Internacional de Comunicación (ARIC) is an open access publication committed to the academic community that ensures academic integrity and ethics in scientific production as a basic principle in all phases of the research process: from initial conception to publication and final dissemination.

Our journal accepts and subscribes to the principles of the Committee on Publication Ethics (COPE), a non-profit organisation whose aim is to support researchers in achieving ethical, integral and responsible publication. In this way, the journal guarantees an adequate response to the needs of readers and authors, ensuring the quality of what is published, protecting and respecting the content of the articles and their integrity. Likewise, the Editorial Board undertakes to publish corrections, clarifications, retractions and apologies when necessary.

Ámbitos guarantees the confidentiality of the evaluation process at all times: the anonymity of the reviewers and authors; the evaluated content; the reasoned report issued by those responsible for the evaluation and any other communication issued by the editorial, advisory and scientific boards if appropriate.

Likewise, any possible clarifications, claims or complaints that an author may wish to send to the journal's committees or to the evaluators of the article will be treated with the utmost confidentiality.

In compliance with these good practices, Ámbitos has published the refereeing system it follows for the selection of articles, as well as the evaluation criteria to be applied by external reviewers- anonymous and peer reviewers, external to the Editorial Board-. The journal keeps these criteria up to date, based exclusively on the scientific relevance of the article, originality, clarity and pertinence of the work presented.

Responsibility for authorship

- Authorship of manuscripts submitted to Ámbitos ensures that the work is original, that it does not contain parts of other authors' work or fragments of work already published by the authors. They also confirm the veracity of the data, i.e. that the empirical data have not been altered to verify hypotheses.
- Authors should not publish articles in which the same results are repeated in more than one scientific journal. Simultaneous submission of the same contribution to multiple scientific journals is considered ethically incorrect and reprehensible.
- Authorships must always provide the correct indication of the sources and contributions mentioned in the article.
- Plagiarism in all its forms, multiple or redundant publication, as well as invention or manipulation of data constitute serious ethical misconduct and are considered scientific fraud.
- With regard to the authorship of the manuscript, the authors guarantee the inclusion of those persons who have made a significant scientific and intellectual contribution to the conceptualisation and planning of the work as well as to the interpretation of the results and the writing of the paper. At the same time, authors have been ranked according to their level of responsibility and involvement.
- If deemed appropriate by the editors, the authorships of the articles should also make available the sources or data on which the research is based, which can be kept for a reasonable period of time after publication and possibly made accessible.
- All authors are required to declare explicitly that there are no conflicts of interest that may have influenced the results obtained or the interpretations proposed. Authorships must also indicate any agency and/or project funding from which the research article arises.
- When an author identifies a major error or inaccuracy in his/her article, he/she should immediately inform the journal editors and provide them with all the information necessary to list the relevant corrections at the bottom of the article.
- All authors accept responsibility for what has been written.
- The authors also undertake that a review of the most current and relevant scientific literature on the subject analysed has been carried out, taking into account the different currents of knowledge in a pluralistic manner.

Research involving humans or animals

- Research that so requires and that involves experiments on humans or animals must be approved by an Ethics Committee endorsed in accordance with international legal standards for research. Ámbitos. Revista Internacional de Comunicación supports respect for and protection of participants' right to privacy, which must be evidenced by "informed consent" or anonymisation. In addition, research involving children and adolescents who are minors, and which affects their privacy or private spaces, must be duly authorised by their parents, guardians or legal representatives.

Responsibility of reviewers

- Peer review is a procedure that helps editors to make decisions about proposed articles and also allows authors to improve the contribution submitted for possible publication. Peer reviewers undertake to provide a critical, honest, constructive and unbiased review of both the scientific and literary quality of the writing in the field of their knowledge and skills.
- Any reviewer who does not feel competent in the subject matter to be reviewed or who is unable to complete the evaluation in the scheduled time will notify the editors immediately. The reviewers undertake to evaluate the papers in the shortest possible time in order to respect the deadlines, given that in Ámbitos the limits of custody of manuscripts awaiting review are limited and inflexible out of respect for the authors and their work.
- Each assigned manuscript must be treated as confidential. Therefore, these texts should not be discussed with others without the express consent of the editors.
- Peer review will be conducted in an objective manner. No personal judgement of the authors of the contributions is considered appropriate. Reviewers are obliged to give sufficient reasons for their assessments. The reviewers will submit a full critical report with appropriate references, according to the protocol for Ámbitos reviews and the public regulations for reviewers; especially if it is proposed that the work be rejected. They are obliged to advise the editors if substantial parts of the paper have already been published or are under review for another publication.
- Reviewers undertake to indicate precisely the bibliographical references of fundamental works possibly overlooked by the author. The reviewer must also inform the editors of any similarities or overlaps of the manuscript with other published works.
- Confidential information or information obtained during the peer review process must be considered confidential and may not be used for personal purposes. Reviewers only review a manuscript if there is no conflict of interest.

Responsibility of editors

- The editors will ensure the selection of the most scientifically qualified and specialist reviewers to provide a critical and expert appraisal of the work, with as little bias as possible. Ámbitos chooses to select between 3 and 12 reviewers for each paper in order to guarantee greater objectivity in the review process.
- The editors evaluate articles submitted for publication solely on the basis of the scientific merit of the content, without discrimination of race, gender, sexual orientation, religion, ethnic origin, nationality or political opinion of the authors.
- Editors and working group members undertake not to disclose information about articles submitted for publication to anyone other than authors, reviewers and editors. The editors and the Editorial Board undertake to maintain the confidentiality of manuscripts, their authors and reviewers, so that anonymity preserves the intellectual integrity of the entire process.
- Editors undertake not to use content from articles submitted for publication in their research without the written consent of the author.
- The editors are fully responsible for complying with the time limits for the review and publication of accepted papers, in order to ensure the rapid dissemination of their results. They undertake to comply with the published deadlines (maximum 30 days in the estimation/rejection from receipt of the manuscript in the review platform and maximum 100 days from the start of the scientific peer review process).

The journal Ámbitos. Revista Internacional de Comunicación follows the ethical standards recommended by the COPE: Commitée on Publication Ethics.