Journal Policies

Guidelines for Authors

The authors should submit their papers according to the following guidelines:

The submitted articles must be original and should not be under consideration for any other publication at the same time.
The manuscripts should be free from grammatical errors and plagiarism.
The manuscripts should be composed according to APA (American Psychological Association 6^th edition) format for writing text and referencing.
The first page should have the title of the article, author (s)’s names, his/her/their affiliation, E-mail address, and author (s)’s notes.
Give one paragraph introduction of authors in five to seven sentences (for each author) describing their educational background and research achievements on the title page.
Title of the article should be informative and eye-catching.
Title should not be more than 12 words in length and it should not contain abbreviations or words that serve no purpose.
The second page should have the title of the article (font size 14, Times New Roman), abstract (font size 10, Times New Roman) containing 100-150 words summarizing the main points and followed by five key words (in italics).
The remaining pages should have the main text, and list of references.
On the first line of the abstract page, center the word “Abstract” (bold, formatting).
Abstract of the article should be justified and in italics.
Articles should not cross the word limit of 4000-8000.
Headings and subheadings should be on a separate line.
Use A4 size paper with Times New Roman writing style font size 12 for the main text and 10 for the abstract with 1.15 line spacing for the whole document. Left margin should be 3.5 but all other margins should be 2.mm. Tables and figures should not be split on two pages.
Articles should be typed in MS Word and should be paginated.
Do not try to format your submission in the style of a published article.
Plagiarism is not acceptable. If plagiarism is detected during the peer review process, the manuscript may be rejected. If plagiarism is detected after publication, we may publish a correction or retract the paper.

Authorship Criteria

To be listed as an author for PJLS the authors who consider submitting their manuscript must meet the following criteria:

The manuscript they submit must have considerable intellectual contribution to at least one component of the original work in the manuscript under consideration.
They must have substantial contribution in proposing, drafting and/or the editing / revising the manuscript.
They must be aware that the manuscript has been submitted for publication.
The authors must agree that they would be held accountable for any issues related to the correctness and integrity of work.

PJLS has systematized the procedure in such a way that it requires to reach all the authors who want to and has already published their research here. Hence, authors who want to submit their manuscripts must provide PJLS with all the contact information of all the (corresponding and co) authors. It is mandatory for all authors to provide their full (documented) names, affiliations and accurate and latest contact information as has been required in the PJLS rights contract. PJLS does not allow any paper to be published without author name(s), affiliation(s) and contact email.

At the end of paper, before the references, all other contributors can be acknowledged with explicitly described roles, preferably using the roles found in the CASRAI Contributor Roles Taxonomy at http://casrai.org/CRediT.

Ethical Guidelines

Pakistan Journal of Language Studies (PJLS) follows code of ethics as laid down by Higher Education Commission, Pakistan.

For Authors

The following ethical guidelines are obligatory for all author(s) violation of which may result in application of penalties by the editor, including but not limited to the suspension or revocation of publishing privileges.

Reporting Standards

Will ensure that their search report and data contain adequate detail and references.
Fraudulent or knowingly inaccurate statements are unethical and unacceptable.

Originality and Plagiarism

Plagiarism in all its forms constitutes unethical publishing behavior and is not acceptable.
Material quoted verbatim must be placed in quotation marks
If more than 19% similarity index has found, As per HEC’s policy it will either be rejected or left at the discretion of the Editorial Board for the purposes of a conditional acceptance.

Declaration

A declaration is required that the manuscript contains solely author original work that is not under consideration for publishing in any other journal in any form.
A co-authored paper must be accompanied by an undertaking in order to claim right to authorship and to ensure that all have agreed to the order of authorship.

Multiple, Redundant and Current Publication

Authors should not submit manuscripts describing essentially the same research to more than one journal or publication except if is a re-submission of a rejected or withdrawn manuscript.
Concurrent submission of the same manuscript to more than one journal is unethical publishing behavior and is unacceptable.

Acknowledgment of Sources

A paper must always contain proper acknowledgment of the work of others.
The author(s) must also acknowledge the contributions of people, organizations and institutes who assisted the process of research or financial funding (in the acknowledgement).
It is duty of the author(s) to conduct a literature review and cite the original publications.

Authorship Credit

Authorship of the work may only be credited to those who have made a noteworthy contribution in conceptualization, conducting, data analysis and writing up of the manuscript.
The corresponding author should ensure that all co- authors have seen and approved the final version of the paper and have agreed to its submission for publication.

Privacy of Participants

Authors must respect the privacy of the participant(s) of research.
Authors must ensure that in instances where the identity of the participant needs to be revealed in the study, explicit and informed consent of the concerned party is obtained.

Data Access and Retention

The author(s) should provide raw data to the Editor, if any question arises about the accuracy or validity of the research work during the review process.
The author(s) must provide an accurate description of how the images were generated and produced, and will ensure they are free of manipulation.

Disclosure and Conflicts of Interest

The potential conflicts of interest of all author(s) must be conveyed to the editor at the earliest possible stage, including but not limited to employment, consultancies, honoraria, etc.
All sources of financial support for the project should be disclosed.

Manuscript Acceptance and Rejection

During the review period the author can contact the Editor to ask about its status.
In case of revisions, the author(s) must provide an exposition of all corrections made in the manuscript and the revised manuscript should, then, go through the process of affirmation of revisions and be accepted or rejected accordingly.
In case of dissatisfaction over the decision of rejection, the author can appeal the decision by contacting the Editor.

For Reviewers

The Reviewers should:

Inform the Editor, if they do not have the subject expertise required to carry out the review and s/he should inform the Editor immediately after receiving a request.
Be responsible to act promptly and submit review report on time.

Standards of Objectivity

The reviews should be objectively carried out with a consideration of high academic, scholarly and scientific standards.
All judgments should be meticulously established and maintained.
The decision should purely based on the quality of the research paper and not influenced, either positively or negatively, by any personal, financial, or other conflicting considerations.
A reviewer should not use unpublished material disclosed in a submitted manuscript, without the approval of the Editor.
A reviewer must declare any potentially conflicting interests (e.g. personal, financial, intellectual, professional, political or religious).
A reviewer should be honest enough to declare conflicts of interest, if, the research paper under review is the same as to his/her presently conducted study.
If the reviewer feels unqualified to separate his/her bias, s/he should immediately return the manuscript to the Editor without review, and justify to him/her about the situation.

Confidentiality

Reviewers should consider the research paper as a confidential document and must not discuss its content on any platform except in cases where professional advice is being sought with the authorization of the Editor.

Ethical Considerations

If the reviewer suspects that the research paper is almost the same as someone else's work, s/he will ethically inform the Editor and provide its citation as a reference.
If the reviewer suspects that results in the research paper to be untrue/unrealistic/fake, s/he will share it with the Editor.
If there has been an indication of violating ethical norms in the treatment of human beings (e.g. children, female, poor people, disabled, elderly, etc), then this should be identified to the Editor.
If the research paper is based on any previous research study or is replica of an earlier work, or the work is plagiarized for e.g. the author has not acknowledged/referenced others' work appropriately, then this should be brought in the Editor's knowledge.

Originality

For evaluating originality, the reviewers should consider the following elements.

Does the research paper add to existing knowledge?
Are the research questions and/or hypotheses in line with the objective of the research work?

Structure

If the layout and format of the paper is not according to the prescribed version, the reviewers should discuss it with the Editor or should include this observation in their review report. On the other hand, if the research paper is exceptionally well written, the reviewer may overlook the formatting issues. At other times, the reviewers may suggest restructuring the paper before publication. The following elements should be carefully evaluated.

If there is serious problem of language or expression and the reviewer gets the impression that the research paper does not fulfill linguistic requirements and readers would face difficulties reading and comprehending the paper. The reviewer should record this deficiency in his/her report and suggest the editor to make its proper editing. Such a situation may arise when the author(s)’ native language is not English.
Whether the data presented in the paper is original or reproduced from previously conducted or published work. The papers which reflect originality should be given preference for publication.
The clarity of illustrations including photographs, models, charts, images and figures is essential to note. If there is duplication then it should be reported in the review report. Similarly, descriptions provided in the “Results” section should correspond with the data presented in tables/figures, if not then it should be clearly listed in the review report.
Critically review the statistical analysis of the data. Also check the rational and appropriateness of the specific analysis.
The reviewers should read the “Methodology” section in detail and make sure that the author(s) has demonstrated the understanding of the procedures being used and presented in the manuscript.
The relationship between “Data, Findings and Discussion” requires a thorough evaluation thoroughly. Unnecessary conjecture or unfounded conclusions that are not based on the presented data are not acceptable.
Further questions to be addressed are whether: the organization of the research paper is appropriate or deviates from the standard or prescribed format?
Does the author(s) follow the guidelines prescribed by the journal for preparation and submission of the manuscript?
Is the research paper free from typographical errors?

Review Report

The reviewer must explicitly write his/her observations in the section of 'comments' because author(s) will only have access to the comments reviewers have made.
For writing a review report, the reviewers are requested to complete a prescribed form (s).
It is helpful for both the Editor and author(s) if the reviewer writes a brief summary in the first section of the review report. This summary should comprise the reviewer's final decision and inferences drawn from a full review.
Any personal comments on author(s) should be avoided and final remarks should be written in a courteous and positive manner.
Indicating any deficiencies is important. For the understanding of the Editor and author(s), the reviewers should highlight these deficiencies in some detail with specificity. This should help justify the comments made by the reviewer.
When a reviewer makes a decision regarding the research paper, it should be clearly indicated as 'Reject', 'Accept without revision', or 'Need Revision' and either of the decisions should have justification.
The reviewers should indicate the revisions clearly and comprehensively, and show willingness to confirm the revisions submitted by the author(s), if Editor wishes so.
The final decision about publishing a research paper (either accepts or reject) will solely Rest with the Editor and it is not a reviewer's job to take part in this decision. The editor will surely consider reviewer's comments and have a right to send the paper for another opinion or send it back to the author(s) for revision before making the final decision.

For Editors

The Editor’s Responsibilities

Establishing and maintaining quality of the journal by publishing quality papers.
Promotion of freedom of expression within the cultural, constitutional/legal framework.

Good practices

Encouraging new ideas and suggestions for improving quality of EJIS.
Appling the process of blind peer review in its true letter and spirit.
Promoting & implementing anti plagiarism & journal’s policy without institutional pressure.

Fair play and Impartiality

Will ensure impartial evaluation of the content of research papers.
Disregard the all discriminating factors during selection of articles, e.g. gender, race, ethnicity, religious belief, etc. of author(s).

Confidentiality

Confidentiality of the author(s) and reviewers during the peer review process will be ensured.
Confidentiality of the participants of the research should also be ensured.
Prior to publication, the content of the manuscript would be kept confidential.

Editing and Formatting Guidelines

Clear guidelines about preparing and formatting of a paper are available on Journal webpage.

The Review Process

Articles are initially scrutinized and then go through double-blind peer review process.
Sufficient guidelines along with a Reviewer’s Proforma are provided to reviewers.
Sharing the reviewer’s comments with author and incorporation of suggested corrections.
Referring troublesome cases to Advisory Committee.

Dealing with Misconduct

Will encourages reviewers to comment on ethical issues and possible misconduct.
Confirmation of plagiarism through Turnitin and/or searching for similar titles etc.
Will publish a corrigendum, remove and retract a plagiarized article.

Transparency

Only one paper as a PI (Principle Investigator) should be published in the same issue.
Editorial Board Members will only be limited to ONE paper per issue.
Authorship & co-authorship policy will be strictly adopted.

Conflict of Interest

The editors and reviewers will not edit a submitted paper for those author(s) and/or institution against which s/he has any conflicts of interest.

Disclosure

Will not use any unpublished information/data from the submitted research paper without the permission of the author(s).

Publication Decisions

Only shortlisted research papers relevant to the scope of the journal will be published after completion of the review process.
Acceptation or rejection of a paper will be based on academic standards.
The Editor will justifies the reason (s) of rejecting a research paper and will timely communicate the editorial decision to the author(s).

Procedure for Appeal

The Editor is responsible for establishing a proper mechanism for appeals launched against:

The rejection of a research paper.
Objections to publications causing harm to any party.
Infringement of Ethical boundaries in any manner.

Peer-Review Process

PJLS follows a rigorous process of peer review. This practice is carried out to ensure that only the original, standard and quality work find a place in this journal. The peer review process is highly objective and is followed around the globe by all reputable research journals. This process is essential for good scholarly publications. Our reviewers put huge efforts to maintain the quality and high standards of work in PJLS. The peer review process which PJLS follows is outlined below.

Initial manuscript evaluation

After the submission of manuscript, the editor evaluates all the submitted manuscripts. All those manuscripts which do not fall in the scope of PJLS, are not original, are plagiarized, have serious methodological flaws or have unbearable language errors get rejected in this first step. Those manuscripts which meet minimum criteria tend to be sent to at least two reviewers for further evaluation.

Type of Peer Review

PJLS employs double blind reviewing. In this type of review, both the reviewer and the author become anonymous for each other throughout this stage

How the referee is selected

The reviewers, in most cases, are matched to the paper according to their expertise. Fortunately, PJLS has a highly qualified team of reviewers and the PJLS reviewers’ database is being updated on regular basis.

Referee reports

In this step, the reviewer is requested to evaluate the manuscript that whether the manuscript is original. They also evaluate the research methodology adopted in the manuscript, the procedure of data collection and of data analysis, the issues of validity and reliability. They are required to evaluate if the results are clearly presented and are aligned to the conclusions. They also review the way previous research has been referenced and its relevance. Language correctness is not an essential part of this step, however, the reviewer can evaluate and make suggestions to language in the manuscript.

The duration of review process

The duration required for review depends on the response of the reviewers. If the review report from a reviewer is delayed or both the reviewers have contradictory evaluation then the paper would be sent to another expert for the opinion. The decision of the editor would be sent to the corresponding author with the recommendations sent from the reviewers. The authors are required to incorporate the changes to the manuscript according to the recommendations of the reviewers. After revision, the manuscript would be sent to the same reviewers for another evaluation of the manuscript.

Final report

The final decision of the reviewers of acceptance or rejection of the manuscript would be sent to the author along with the comments or recommendations (if any). The editor’s decision is final. The editor is responsible for the final decision, whether to accept or reject the article.