Authorship Criteria

The Journal of Responsible AI & Ethics (JRAIE) recognizes authorship as both scholarly credit and academic responsibility. Authorship should accurately identify the individuals who made substantial intellectual contributions to the work and who are willing to accept responsibility for the accuracy, integrity, and scholarly content of the published article.

The journal requires authorship decisions to be based on genuine contribution rather than academic position, institutional authority, seniority, financial support, personal relationships, or other considerations unrelated to the scholarly work. All authors should agree on the authorship list and order before manuscript submission whenever possible.

Criteria for Authorship

An individual listed as an author should normally satisfy all of the following conditions:

  • Make a substantial contribution to the conception, design, methodology, investigation, data collection, analysis, interpretation, development, or other significant scholarly component of the work.

  • Participate meaningfully in drafting the manuscript or critically revising it for important intellectual content.

  • Review and approve the final version submitted for publication.

  • Accept responsibility for the integrity and accuracy of their contribution and cooperate in resolving questions concerning the published work when necessary.

Individuals who do not meet the journal's authorship criteria should not be listed as authors solely because of their institutional position, supervisory role, administrative authority, financial contribution, or general support.

Author Responsibility and Accountability

Each author is expected to understand the principal findings and scholarly contribution of the manuscript and to take responsibility for the areas to which they contributed.

Authors share responsibility for ensuring that the manuscript represents an accurate and ethical scholarly record. If questions arise concerning the validity, originality, authorship, methodology, data, analysis, or ethical conduct of the work, authors are expected to cooperate with reasonable editorial inquiries.

Where responsibility for specific parts of the work can be identified, authors should be able to explain their respective contributions.

Corresponding Author

One author should be designated as the corresponding author.

The corresponding author serves as the principal point of communication between the journal and the author group during submission, peer review, revision, production, and post-publication correspondence.

The corresponding author is expected to:

  • Confirm that all eligible contributors have been appropriately included as authors.

  • Confirm that all listed authors have approved the submitted manuscript.

  • Ensure that author names, affiliations, contact information, and declarations are accurate.

  • Communicate editorial correspondence to the coauthors where appropriate.

  • Coordinate responses to reviewer and editor comments.

  • Ensure that relevant conflicts of interest, funding information, ethics statements, and data-related declarations are disclosed.

  • Obtain agreement from all authors regarding substantive revisions and the final version of the manuscript.

Designation as corresponding author does not imply greater ownership of the research or exemption of other authors from responsibility for the article.

Authorship Order

The order of authors should be determined collectively by the authors according to disciplinary conventions and the nature of their respective contributions.

JRAIE does not normally determine author order and does not assign greater scholarly value to a particular position in the author list unless such meaning is explicitly established by the authors' disciplinary practice.

Authors are encouraged to discuss authorship order at an early stage of the research and to resolve disagreements before submission.

The journal should not be expected to adjudicate private disputes concerning relative contribution where the matter cannot be established through available documentation.

Contributorship

Where appropriate, authors may provide a contributorship statement explaining the roles performed by individual authors.

Relevant contributions may include:

  • Conceptualization

  • Methodology

  • Investigation

  • Data collection

  • Data curation

  • Formal analysis

  • Statistical analysis

  • Software development

  • Validation

  • Visualization

  • Writing of the original draft

  • Critical review and editing

  • Project administration

  • Supervision

  • Resource provision

A contributorship statement should accurately represent the work performed and should not assign roles that an individual did not actually undertake.

Contributors Who Do Not Qualify for Authorship

Individuals who contribute to a project but do not satisfy the journal's authorship criteria may be recognized in an Acknowledgments section where appropriate.

Examples may include individuals who provided:

  • General administrative assistance

  • Technical support

  • Language editing

  • Proofreading

  • Routine data-entry assistance

  • Laboratory or logistical support

  • General academic supervision without substantial intellectual contribution

  • Access to facilities or resources

  • Other limited forms of assistance

Where acknowledgment could imply endorsement of the manuscript, authors should obtain permission from the acknowledged individual where appropriate.

Unacceptable Authorship Practices

JRAIE does not accept authorship arrangements that misrepresent scholarly contribution.

Unacceptable practices include gift authorship, honorary authorship, guest authorship, ghost authorship, purchased authorship, authorship-for-sale arrangements, coercive authorship, and deliberate omission of individuals who satisfy legitimate authorship criteria.

A person should not be added as an author merely to increase the perceived prestige, influence, acceptance probability, or citation potential of a manuscript.

Likewise, a contributor who qualifies for authorship should not be deliberately excluded to conceal involvement, competing interests, institutional relationships, or other relevant information.

Authorship and Institutional Position

Holding a senior academic position, serving as department head, supervising a laboratory, providing funding, or having administrative responsibility for a research group does not by itself justify authorship.

Supervisors, institutional leaders, project coordinators, or funding recipients should be included as authors only when their actual scholarly contribution satisfies the journal's authorship criteria.

Conversely, junior researchers, students, research assistants, or early-career scholars who satisfy the criteria for authorship should receive appropriate authorship credit regardless of academic rank.

Artificial Intelligence Tools and Authorship

Artificial intelligence systems, generative AI applications, large language models, automated writing systems, and similar technologies must not be listed as authors or coauthors.

Such systems cannot assume responsibility for the integrity of a scholarly work, provide legally meaningful approval for publication, disclose competing interests, or respond to questions concerning authorship accountability.

Human authors remain responsible for all AI-assisted material incorporated into a manuscript, including text, references, analyses, code, translations, images, or other generated content.

Where AI-assisted tools have been used substantively, authors should disclose their use in accordance with the journal's Generative AI Policy and other applicable reporting requirements.

Changes to Authorship Before Acceptance

Requests to add, remove, or rearrange authors after initial submission should be made only for legitimate reasons.

The corresponding author should provide:

  • A clear explanation for the requested change.

  • The proposed revised author list.

  • Confirmation that all affected authors agree with the change.

The journal may contact individual authors directly to verify consent.

An authorship change will not be approved solely to accommodate administrative preferences or to alter academic credit without a reasonable scholarly basis.

Processing of the manuscript may be suspended while a significant authorship concern is being evaluated.

Changes to Authorship After Acceptance

Authorship changes requested after acceptance require particular scrutiny because the accepted author list forms part of the publication record.

Authors should provide a substantive justification and written agreement from all affected contributors.

The journal may delay publication while the request is reviewed. If the explanation is insufficient or an unresolved dispute exists, the journal may decline to modify the authorship record until the matter has been appropriately resolved.

Authorship Changes After Publication

Changes to authorship after publication are considered only when there is a legitimate and adequately documented reason.

Where an authorship correction is approved, the journal may publish a formal correction notice linked to the original article so that the modification remains transparent within the scholarly record.

Published author information should not be silently altered where the change materially affects attribution or accountability.

Authorship Disputes

Authors are encouraged to resolve authorship disagreements before submitting a manuscript.

If a dispute arises during editorial processing, the journal may request documentation describing the contributions of the individuals concerned and may temporarily suspend review or publication while clarification is sought.

Editors may evaluate whether the journal's authorship policy has been followed, but the journal is generally not in a position to investigate institutional employment relationships or determine disputed contributions where independent evidence is unavailable.

Where an authorship dispute cannot be resolved through editorial correspondence, the authors may be asked to seek resolution through their institution, research organization, or other appropriate authority.

Removal of an Author

An author should not be removed from a manuscript without appropriate justification and, where practicable, confirmation from the individual concerned.

If an author requests removal voluntarily, the journal may seek confirmation that the individual understands the implications of the request.

Where an author disputes removal, editorial processing may be suspended until the matter is resolved.

Deceased or Unavailable Authors

Where an individual who made a qualifying contribution dies or becomes permanently unavailable before publication, their contribution may still be recognized as authorship when appropriate.

The corresponding author should inform the journal and provide relevant information concerning the individual's contribution.

The remaining authors remain responsible for ensuring the accuracy of the manuscript and for addressing editorial questions that arise during the publication process.

Author Names and Affiliations

Authors should provide their names and institutional affiliations accurately and consistently at the time of submission.

Affiliations should reflect the institution at which the relevant research was conducted or the author's appropriate institutional relationship with the work.

False, misleading, purchased, or fabricated institutional affiliations are not permitted.

Where an author's institutional affiliation changes after the research is completed, the original affiliation may be retained and a current address or affiliation may be provided separately where appropriate.

ORCID Identification

Authors are encouraged to provide a valid ORCID iD where available.

ORCID identifiers can assist in distinguishing authors with similar names and improving the accuracy of scholarly metadata. Authors should provide only their own valid identifier and should not create, alter, or submit an ORCID record on behalf of another individual without appropriate authorization.

Authorship and Conflicts of Interest

Authorship does not remove the obligation to disclose relevant competing interests.

All authors should disclose financial, professional, academic, institutional, personal, or other relationships that could reasonably be perceived as influencing the research, analysis, interpretation, or publication of the manuscript.

Relevant disclosures should be provided in accordance with the journal's Conflict of Interest Policy.

Responsibility for Submitted Information

Authors are responsible for ensuring that all information provided during manuscript submission is accurate.

The use of false author identities, fabricated email addresses, misleading affiliations, fictitious contributors, unauthorized author names, manipulated researcher identifiers, or other deceptive information constitutes a serious publication-integrity concern.

Where such conduct is identified, the journal may suspend or terminate editorial processing and may take further action under its applicable publication-ethics and research-misconduct policies.

Authorship Verification

The journal reserves the right to request clarification concerning individual author contributions where questions arise during editorial evaluation.

Authors may be asked to provide contribution statements, confirmation of authorship consent, institutional information, research documentation, or other reasonable evidence needed to verify the integrity of the authorship record.

Such verification is intended to protect legitimate contributors and maintain accurate scholarly attribution.

Post-Publication Authorship Concerns

Concerns about authorship may be raised after publication by an author, reader, institution, or other relevant party.

Where a credible concern is received, the journal may review the available documentation and seek explanations from the authors.

Depending on the circumstances, the outcome may include no further action, clarification of contribution information, publication of a correction, referral to an appropriate institution, or another proportionate editorial response.

Commitment to Fair Attribution

The Journal of Responsible AI & Ethics (JRAIE) seeks to ensure that authorship accurately reflects scholarly contribution and responsibility.

Appropriate attribution protects the rights of genuine contributors, promotes accountability, reduces the risk of authorship manipulation, and strengthens confidence in the published scholarly record.

All authors are therefore expected to discuss authorship openly, document contributions where necessary, provide accurate submission information, and resolve authorship matters responsibly throughout the research and publication process.