Plagiarism and Text Similarity Policy

1. Statement of Principle

Pediatrics & Nursology publishes only original work. Presenting another person's words, ideas, data, images or structure as one's own is a breach of research integrity, regardless of whether it was deliberate. The journal applies this standard uniformly to all submissions, including those from members of the editorial board, and to all published articles, however long ago they appeared.

This policy follows the Core Practices of the Committee on Publication Ethics (COPE) and the Recommendations of the International Committee of Medical Journal Editors (ICMJE).

2. What Counts as Plagiarism

• Verbatim copying — reproducing text from another source without quotation marks and citation.
• Mosaic or patchwork plagiarism — reassembling phrases from one or more sources, or substituting synonyms while retaining the original sentence structure, with or without a citation. Citing a source does not license reuse of its wording.
• Plagiarism of ideas — presenting another researcher's hypothesis, design, interpretation or conclusion as one's own.
• Data and results plagiarism — reproducing another study's data, tables or analytical output without attribution.
• Image plagiarism and manipulation — reusing figures, photographs or graphical elements without permission and attribution, or altering an image so that it no longer represents the original observation.
• Translation plagiarism — translating published material into English and presenting it as original work. Translated text is subject to the same rules as text in its original language, and similarity software will not reliably detect it.
• Text recycling (self-plagiarism) — reusing substantial portions of the authors' own published work without citation. See Section 3.

3. Text Recycling and Redundant Publication

Limited reuse of the authors' own wording is unavoidable in methods sections, particularly where a series of papers reports on the same cohort or protocol. Such reuse is acceptable provided the earlier work is cited and the overlap is disclosed in the cover letter.

What is not acceptable is reuse that misleads the reader about the novelty of the work: republishing findings already reported elsewhere, dividing a single study into multiple minimally distinct papers ("salami slicing"), or reusing an introduction or discussion wholesale.

Where a manuscript overlaps with any of the authors' other work — published, in press or under consideration elsewhere — that work must be cited and a copy supplied at submission so that the editors can assess the extent of the overlap.

Material previously posted as a preprint, or presented as a conference abstract, is not considered prior publication and does not constitute text recycling, provided it is disclosed at submission with a DOI or citation where available.

4. Screening Procedure

Every manuscript is screened for textual similarity using [iThenticate / Turnitin eg. ]  at two points: on receipt, before it is sent for peer review, and again after acceptance, before publication. The second check is performed because material can be introduced during revision.

Screening reports are reviewed by an editor, not applied automatically. The similarity index produced by any software is a starting point for editorial judgement, not a verdict.

Working thresholds

Excluding the reference list, correctly attributed quotations and standard instrument or scale descriptions:

• Overall similarity is normally expected to remain below 20%.
• No single source should account for more than 5%.

These figures guide the editors; they do not replace them. A manuscript with an overall index of 8% may still be rejected if that 8% is an unattributed passage lifted from another author's discussion. Conversely, a manuscript with an index of 25% may proceed if the matches consist of the names of validated instruments, standard methodological terminology and correctly cited quotations. Editors assess where the matches fall, whether they are attributed, and whether they concern original intellectual content.

5. Action Taken

Published articles are never silently removed or edited. Corrections, expressions of concern and retractions are issued as citable notices linked to the original record, in accordance with COPE flowcharts.

Where an allegation is substantiated, the editors may decline to consider further submissions from the authors concerned for a period of  three years.

6. Investigating Concerns

Concerns are handled in a defined sequence: the corresponding author is contacted and given a reasonable period  normally 21 days  to respond; the response is assessed by an editor with no involvement in the original handling of the manuscript; where the matter cannot be resolved at journal level, it is referred to the authors' institution for investigation.

Allegations are treated confidentially while under assessment. Authors are given a full opportunity to respond before any notice is published, and may appeal a finding in writing to the Editor-in-Chief. Anonymous allegations are considered on their evidence rather than dismissed for want of a named source.

7. Authors' Responsibilities

• Cite every source of text, ideas, data and images, including your own earlier publications.
• Place any reproduced wording in quotation marks with a page reference. Paraphrasing means rewriting the idea in your own sentence structure, not replacing individual words.
• Obtain and upload written permission for any copyrighted material reproduced from another source.
• Disclose in the cover letter any overlap with your own published, in-press or submitted work.
• Verify that every reference corresponds to a real source that says what you have attributed to it. References produced by reference managers or AI-assisted tools are frequently inaccurate, and fabricated citations are treated as a form of research misconduct.
• Note that AI-assisted paraphrasing tools do not make reused text original. Text generated from a source without attribution remains plagiarism, and the disclosure requirements in the Author Guidelines apply.

All co-authors are jointly accountable for the integrity of the submitted manuscript. Attributing an overlap to a co-author, a student, a translator or a language service does not discharge that responsibility.

8. Reporting a Concern

Concerns about a manuscript under consideration or an article published in Pediatrics & Nursology may be sent to the editorial office at editor@pediatricsnursology.com. Please include the article title, the specific passages or figures at issue, and the source you believe they derive from. Every substantiated report is acknowledged, and the outcome is communicated to the person who raised it once the matter is concluded.