Plagiarism means presenting another person’s ideas, words, data, or creative material—including figures, tables, graphs, and images—as one’s own without proper citation. It is an unethical practice. Self-plagiarism occurs when an author reuses a large amount of their own previously published work without adequate referencing. It also includes submitting a manuscript that has already appeared elsewhere after only minor changes or the addition of some new data.
The Scientia Journal is a peer-reviewed journal published by Global Science Publisher. It does not tolerate plagiarism or duplication in any figure. Every manuscript submitted and considered for publication is checked for similarity using Turnitin. Manuscripts found to contain high plagiarism or copied material during initial review are rejected immediately and will not proceed further. If plagiarism is discovered after publication, the Editor-in-Chief will begin a preliminary investigation, with or without a team formed for that purpose. If plagiarism is found after acceptance, the journal will contact the author’s affiliated institution, university, or funding agency. Once misconduct is confirmed, the journal will take necessary action, including publishing a linked statement that refers both to the original publication and to the plagiarized manuscript. A paper with significant plagiarism may receive a clear mark on each page of its PDF file. If the extent of plagiarism is confirmed, the journal may formally retract the paper.
Types of Plagiarism
The Scientia Journal considers the following forms of plagiarism:
- Full Plagiarism: The manuscript is identical or nearly identical to already published content, in grammar as well as in idea. This also includes presenting the same text from an author’s own previously published source.
- Partial Plagiarism: The manuscript combines material from various sources, with the submitting author having extensively rephrased text taken from those sources.
- Self-Plagiarism: The author reuses all or part of their own previously published research. “Total self-plagiarism” refers to republishing an author’s own previously published article in another journal.
Policy and Action for Plagiarism
The Scientia Journal values intellectual property and works to protect and encourage original work by authors. Papers containing plagiarized content do not meet the journal’s standards for quality, research, and innovation. Authors who submit to the journal are expected to follow accepted ethical standards and to avoid plagiarism in any form. If an author is accused of plagiarism in a submitted or published manuscript, the journal will contact the author for clarification within two weeks. The matter may also be referred to the Fact Finding Committee (FFC) established by the journal. If no proper response is received within the prescribed period, the journal will contact the head of the organization to which the author is affiliated so that appropriate action can be taken.
The Scientia Journal takes strong action against published papers found to contain significant plagiarism and will remove them completely from the journal website and from third-party websites where the paper has been listed or indexed. If an article already published in the journal’s database is reported as plagiarized, the journal will immediately form a Fact Finding Committee (FFC) to investigate. If the investigation confirms that the manuscript plagiarized previously published work, the journal will support the original author and publication without restriction or consideration of the publisher. The following actions may be taken, individually or together, or the FFC may recommend other action:
- The editorial office will immediately contact the director, dean, head of the college, institution, or organization concerned, or the vice-chancellor of the university with which the author is associated, so that strong action can be taken against the author under investigation.
- The journal will immediately delete the PDF file of the plagiarized manuscript from its website and suspend all links to the full-text article. The published article will also be labelled “Plagiarized Manuscript.”
- The author’s account will be restricted or blocked from all future submissions to the journal for at least 3–10 years, or permanently.
- Any other action recommended by the committee, considered appropriate for the case, or decided by the Editorial Board from time to time may also be taken.
This policy applies to The Scientia Journal under Global Science Publisher.