For Editors

Editorial Responsibilities and Ethics

The editorial team of the Malaysian Online Journal of Educational Technology (MOJET) is responsible for ensuring the quality, integrity, transparency, and scholarly contribution of all published content. Editors are expected to uphold high standards of academic publishing and publication ethics throughout the editorial and peer review processes.

Editor in Chief Responsibilities

The Editor in Chief has overall responsibility for the journal's editorial policies, peer review process, publication quality, and ethical standards.

Key responsibilities include:

Defining, implementing, and maintaining the journal's editorial policies and publication standards.
Ensuring that submitted manuscripts receive fair, objective, confidential, and timely evaluation.
Overseeing the peer review process and ensuring that appropriate and qualified reviewers are selected.
Evaluating reviewer reports, revised manuscripts, and authors' responses to reviewers.
Making final publication decisions based on scholarly merit, reviewer recommendations, ethical considerations, and editorial assessment.
Safeguarding the integrity, independence, and confidentiality of the peer review process.
Ensuring consistent application of the journal's editorial policies and evaluation criteria.
Addressing concerns related to research integrity, publication ethics, authorship, conflicts of interest, plagiarism, duplicate publication, and other forms of academic misconduct.
Promoting ethical publishing practices and adherence to internationally recognized standards of scholarly publishing.

Initial Editorial Screening (Desk Review)

All submissions undergo an initial editorial assessment before being considered for external peer review.

During this stage, manuscripts may be returned to authors or declined if they:

Fall outside the aims and scope of the journal.
Do not comply with the journal's submission, formatting, or manuscript preparation requirements.
Demonstrate insufficient originality, novelty, or scholarly contribution.
Contain substantial methodological or conceptual weaknesses.
Present inadequate academic writing, organization, or clarity that prevents effective peer review.
Fail to provide an adequate theoretical or empirical foundation for the study.
Raise concerns regarding research ethics, plagiarism, duplicate or redundant publication, authorship, data integrity, or other aspects of academic integrity.

The purpose of the desk review is to ensure that manuscripts meet the journal's minimum scholarly, methodological, ethical, and presentation standards before proceeding to external peer review.

Management of the Peer Review Process

Manuscripts that successfully pass the initial editorial screening are considered for external peer review.

The editorial team is responsible for:

Identifying and inviting reviewers with appropriate expertise in the subject area and methodology of the manuscript.
Avoiding reviewers with known or potential conflicts of interest.
Monitoring the progress and timeliness of the review process.
Ensuring that reviewer reports are sufficiently detailed, constructive, and relevant to the manuscript.
Requesting additional reviewer opinions when existing reports are insufficient, inconsistent, or raise substantial concerns requiring further evaluation.
Communicating reviewer comments and editorial decisions clearly to authors.
Evaluating revised manuscripts and authors' responses to reviewer comments.
Determining whether additional rounds of review are necessary.
Ensuring that editorial decisions are based on the scholarly quality of the manuscript rather than the identity, status, or institutional affiliation of the authors.

Editorial Evaluation Criteria

Editors evaluate manuscripts according to their scholarly merit, relevance to the journal, methodological quality, clarity, and contribution to the field.

Scope and Relevance

Manuscripts should demonstrate:

Clear relevance to educational technology and related fields.
Alignment with the aims and scope of MOJET.
Potential interest and value to the journal's international readership.

Originality and Contribution

Editors consider:

The originality and significance of the research problem.
The novelty of the research question, theoretical perspective, methodology, or findings.
The extent to which the study advances existing knowledge.
The theoretical, methodological, practical, or educational implications of the research.

Theoretical Foundation

Manuscripts should demonstrate:

Clear articulation of the research problem.
Appropriate engagement with relevant and current literature.
A convincing rationale for conducting the study.
Appropriate integration of previous theoretical and empirical research.
Clear research questions, objectives, or hypotheses where applicable.

Methodological Quality

Editors assess:

The suitability of the research design for addressing the research questions.
The appropriateness of sampling, data collection, instruments, and analytical procedures.
The transparency and reproducibility of research procedures.
The validity, reliability, credibility, or trustworthiness of the methods and findings, as appropriate to the research design.
Adequate reporting of ethical procedures where human participants, personal data, or other ethically sensitive research contexts are involved.

Results and Interpretation

Manuscripts should provide:

Clear, accurate, and logically organized reporting of findings.
Appropriate analyses that address the research questions or hypotheses.
Interpretation of results that is supported by the data.
Appropriate engagement with previous research in the discussion.
Consistency between the results, discussion, implications, limitations, and conclusions.
Conclusions that do not extend beyond the evidence provided by the study.

References and Supporting Materials

Editors consider:

The relevance and adequacy of cited literature.
The accuracy and currency of references.
Appropriate acknowledgement of relevant previous research.
Compliance with APA 7th Edition guidelines.
The adequacy and transparency of tables, figures, appendices, data availability information, and supplementary materials when applicable.

Ethical Obligations of Editors

Editors are expected to:

Evaluate manuscripts solely on their academic and scholarly merit, without discrimination based on authors' nationality, ethnicity, gender, institutional affiliation, seniority, religion, political beliefs, or other personal characteristics.
Ensure a fair, objective, independent, and confidential editorial and peer review process.
Avoid conflicts of interest and withdraw from handling manuscripts when impartiality may reasonably be questioned.
Protect the confidentiality of submitted manuscripts, reviewer reports, editorial correspondence, and reviewer identities.
Not use unpublished information contained in submitted manuscripts for personal research or advantage without the explicit permission of the authors.
Take appropriate action when concerns arise regarding plagiarism, data fabrication or falsification, duplicate or redundant publication, inappropriate authorship, undisclosed conflicts of interest, ethical approval, or other forms of research or publication misconduct.
Provide authors with appropriate opportunities to respond when allegations of misconduct or serious ethical concerns are raised.
Respect the intellectual independence and academic freedom of authors.
Ensure that editorial decisions are based on scholarly merit, the quality and integrity of the research, and the journal's editorial standards.
Take reasonable steps to correct the scholarly record when significant errors or ethical problems are identified before or after publication.

Editorial Independence and Conflicts of Interest

Editorial decisions must remain independent of commercial, institutional, personal, or other external influences.

Editors should not handle manuscripts in which they have a relationship or interest that could reasonably affect, or be perceived to affect, their impartiality. When a potential conflict of interest exists, responsibility for handling the manuscript should be transferred to another appropriate member of the editorial team.

Manuscripts submitted by members of the editorial team must be handled through an independent editorial and peer review process in which the submitting editor has no involvement in reviewer selection, editorial evaluation, or the publication decision.

Confidentiality

All manuscripts submitted to MOJET are treated as confidential documents. Information concerning a submitted manuscript should not be disclosed to individuals who are not directly involved in the editorial or peer review process.

Editors must also protect the confidentiality of reviewer identities and reviewer reports in accordance with the journal's peer review policy.

Editorial Decisions

Editorial decisions are based on the scholarly quality, methodological rigor, originality, relevance, ethical integrity, and contribution of the manuscript.

Possible editorial decisions may include:

Rejection following initial editorial screening.
Revisions required.
Resubmission for further review.
Acceptance.
Rejection following peer review.

The Editor in Chief has final responsibility for publication decisions. Reviewer recommendations inform editorial decisions but do not determine them independently.

Editorial Ethics and Best Practices

MOJET follows internationally recognized principles of publication ethics and supports the guidelines and core practices of the Committee on Publication Ethics (COPE).

The editorial team is committed to maintaining the integrity of the scholarly record and to addressing ethical concerns in a fair, transparent, confidential, and appropriate manner. Editors are expected to contribute actively to maintaining the academic quality, credibility, independence, and reputation of the journal.