Ethics for authors

Being published in a peer-reviewed journal is essential to every researcher's career. Benefits to you as the author (and to your funder and institution) come from the work done to ensure that every article adheres to specific standards. For example, researchers must report their work accurately so that others can use and apply it.

Case 1: Authorship

Every author listed in a journal article should have contributed significantly to work reported. This could be in terms of research conception/ design, data acquisition, or data analysis and interpretation. As an author or co-author, you share responsibility and accountability for the content of your article.

What to avoid

• Gift (guest) authorship: where someone is added to the list of authors who have not been involved in writing the paper.
• Ghost authorship: where someone has been involved in writing the paper but is not included in the list of authors.

Case 2: Plagiarism

"When somebody presents the work of others (data, words or theories) as if they were his/her own and without proper acknowledgement." Committee of Publications Ethics (COPE)

When citing others' (or your own) previous work, please ensure you have the following:

• Marked quoted verbatim text from another source with quotation marks.
• Attributed and referenced the source of the quotation clearly within the text and in the Reference section.
• Obtained permission from the original publisher and rightsholder when using previously published figures or tables.
• If you discuss one source at different points in your paper, correctly cite every instance.

Make sure you avoid self-plagiarism

Self-plagiarism is the redundant reuse of your work, usually without proper citation. It creates repetition in the academic literature and can skew meta-analyses if you publish the same data sets multiple times as "new" data. Therefore, if you're discussing your previous work, cite it.

Sports Business Journal uses CrossCheck to screen for unoriginal material. Authors submitting to it should be aware that their paper may be submitted to CrossCheck at any point during the peer-review or production process.

The journal's editor will investigate any allegations of plagiarism or self-plagiarism made to a journal. If the allegations appear to be founded, we may also choose not to accept future submissions.

Case 3: Data fabrication

All data must be accurate and representative of your research. Data sharing is increasingly prevalent, increasing the transparency of raw data.  We may then ask authors to provide supporting raw data where required. We may also ask Journal Editorial Board members to assist in further evaluating the paper and allegations. If the explanation is not satisfactory, we will reject the submission. We may also choose not to accept future requests.

Case 4: Competing interests

It is essential to be honest about any competing interests, whether sources of research funding; suppose an author does not declare a competing claim to the journal upon submission or during the review. It affects the actual or potential interpretation of the results. In that case, the paper may be rejected or retracted.

Ready to submit your paper? Your ethics checklist

Before you submit, make sure you've:

• Read the journal's instructions for authors and checked and followed any instructions regarding data sets, ethics approval, or statements.
• Named all authors on the paper and the online submission form.
• Referenced all material in the text clearly and thoroughly.
• Carefully checked data and included any supplemental data required by the journal.
• Declared any relevant competing interests to the journal.
• Obtained (written) permission to reuse figures, tables, and data sets.
• Only submitted the paper to one journal at a time.

Finally, notify all the co-authors once you have submitted the paper.