Reviewing process

Peer-reviewing process is conducted according to the COPE Ethical Guidelines for Peer- Reviewers (Ethical guidelines for peer reviewers, COPE guidance). All submitted manuscripts received by the Editorial Office will be checked whether it is properly prepared and whether the manuscript follows the ethical policies of the journal. Manuscripts that do not fit the journal’s ethical policy will be rejected before peer-review. Manuscripts that are not properly prepared will be returned to the authors for revision and resubmission. After these checks, Editor-in-Chief or the Guest Editor (or an Editorial Board member in case of a conflict of interest) will determine whether the manuscript fits the scope of the journal and whether it is scientifically sound. No judgment on the significance or potential impact of the work will be made at this stage. Reject decisions at this stage will be verified by the Editor-in-Chief.

Editorial Board members may also submit scientific articles to the journal. This, however, may be done in exceptional cases and especially if the topic of the article limits the selection of journals for publication. In such a case, Editorial Board members will make a special effort to make the double-blind review process absolutely transparent, rigorous, and non-biased. This is reflected in a particularly cautious selection of handling editors and reviewers, and by taking additional care that the reviewer is not informed who the author of the paper is. If the paper gets accepted for publication, the final publication may be accompanied by a statement on the transparency of the review process conducted.

The journal uses suitable software to screen article submissions for plagiarism.

Editorial workflow


Peer-Review

Once a manuscript passes the initial checks, it will be assigned to at least two independent experts for peer-review. The reviewers’ identities are not disclosed to the authors, nor are the authors' identities disclosed to the reviewers. Peer review comments are confidential and will only be disclosed with the express agreement of the reviewer. The Editor is responsible for the final decision regarding acceptance or rejection of articles. The Editor's decision is final.

In the case of regular submissions, assistant editors will invite experts. These experts may also include Editorial Board members and Guest Editors of the journal. In the case of a special issue, the Guest Editor will advise on the selection of reviewers.

Potential reviewers suggested by the authors may also be considered. Reviewers should not have published with any of the co-authors during the past five years and should not currently work on one of the institutes of the co-authors of the submitted manuscript.

Editorial Decision and Revision

All the articles, reviews and communications published in Journal of Soft Computing and Decision Analytics go through the peer-review process and receive at least two reviews. The editor will communicate the decision, which will be one of the following:

  • Accept after Minor Revisions: The paper is in principle accepted after revision based on the reviewer’s comments. Authors are given seven days for minor revisions.
  • Reconsider after Major Revisions: The acceptance of the manuscript would depend on the revisions. The author needs to provide a point-by-point response or provide a rebuttal if some of the reviewer’s comments cannot be revised. Usually, only one round of major revisions is allowed. Authors will be asked to resubmit the revised paper within fifteen days and the revised version will be returned to the reviewer for further comments.
  • Reject and Encourage Resubmission: An article where additional experiments are needed to support the conclusions will be rejected and the authors will be encouraged to re-submit the paper once further experiments have been conducted.
  • Reject:
    The article has serious flaws, makes no original contribution, and the paper is rejected with no offer of resubmission to the journal.

All reviewer comments should be responded to in a point-by-point fashion. Where the authors disagree with a reviewer, they must provide a clear response.

Author Appeals

Authors may appeal a rejection by sending an e-mail to the Editorial Office of the journal. The appeal must provide a detailed justification, including point-by-point responses to the reviewers' and/or Editor's comments. The Editor-in-Chief of the journal will forward the manuscript and relating information (including the identities of the referees) to an Editorial Board member. If no appropriate Editorial Board member is available, the editor will identify a suitable external scientist. The Editorial Board member will be asked to give an advisory recommendation on the manuscript and may recommend acceptance, further peer-review, or uphold the original rejection decision. A reject decision at this stage will be final and cannot be revoked.

In the case of a special issue, the Editor-in-Chief will be asked to give an advisory recommendation on the manuscript and may recommend acceptance, further peer-review, or uphold the original rejection decision. A reject decision at this stage will be final and cannot be revoked.