Japanese Society of Animal Science
Guidelines for Article Submission

1. Objective and Purpose
These guidelines aim to prevent so-called fraudulence such as dual submission and fraudulent
submission to the bulletins of the Japanese Society of Animal Science, namely Animal Science Journal(hereafter, ASJ) and Nihon Chikusan Gakkaiho (hereafter, NCG), as well as to maintain bulletins thatare academically and socially reliable by protecting authors’ rights and publishing appropriate articles.
Although dual submission is a type of fraudulent submission, dual submission and fraudulent
submission are often treated separately in these guidelines because this has been controversial in manycases and many other academic societies’ guidelines mention dual submission and fraudulentsubmission separately.
In particular, our guidelines prescribe 1) the definition of an article, 2) the definition of (and criteriafor) dual submission, 3) the definition of (and criteria for) fraudulent submission, and 4) application of
the guidelines.
At the time of application of these guidelines, individual judgments are entrusted to the Editorial
Board of the bulletin (hereafter, Editorial Board). However, if conflicting opinions arise, for example,
between the board and a contributor, the Japanese Society of Animal Science is to act responsibly forthe settlement.

2. Definition of an Article
1) Categories of submitted articles that are subject to the guidelines of our bulletins
Subjects of the guidelines include all articles published in our bulletins, i.e., for ASJ: original
papers (including rapid communications) and reviews; for NCG: general papers (original), technicalreports, reviews, commentaries, and resources.
2) Definition of an article in our guidelines
Definition of an article: An article is defined as a body of text reviewed before publication in anacademic periodical through a print or electronic medium (in a written format), including all or partof an abstract, introduction, materials and methods, results, discussion, references, figures, andtables, consisting of more than approximately 750 English words or 2000 Japanese characters.
Therefore, an abstract in the proceedings of a meeting of the Japanese Society of Animal Science is
not regarded as an article. However, even abstracts of an academic conference/meeting are regarded
as articles if they are reviewed and contain more words/characters than those mentioned above. Evenabstracts with fewer words/characters than those mentioned above are regarded as articles if they arecited in Web of Science and PubMed, among others.
With the promotion of information disclosure on the Web and growing interest in frauds in article
submission, not only relatively long abstracts in an academic conference/meeting but also writing inan article format for a commercial journal/book, reports of a public/private research institute,research grant reports, and theses tend to be treated as equivalent to articles if these are publicly
available and accessible by a normal literature search, Web search, and so on. In particular, in casethe data are related to a specific right such as a patent and/or the writing includes a figure(s)/table(s),attribution of the original data becomes an issue. However, the definition/handling of an article

differs depending on the specialty, academic society, and organization/group in the current status.
“The definition of an article” is to be reconsidered by the Editorial Board as required.

3. Dual Submission
1) Definition of dual submission“Dual submission is defined as the submission of substantially the same article already published inor submitted to an academic periodical as another article.”
Based on this definition of dual submission, the following criteria are prescribed:
2) Criteria for dual submission(1) If an abstract of an academic conference/meeting, writing in an article format for a commercial
journal/book, a report of a public/private research institute, a research grant report, or contents of athesis as an article are submitted, it is not regarded as dual submission only when it is not judged
to be an article according to the “definition of an article” in Chapter 2, Paragraph 2.
(2) Preprinted manuscripts (using a preprint server) are not considered as dual submissions.
(3) Criteria based on the language in use: If an article that has already been published in one
language is submitted by simply converting the language into another language, it is regarded asdual submission.
(4) Criteria on data: If an article containing data of an already published article is submitted, it isregarded as dual submission in principle.
However, in case the data in another article of the same author(s) are duplicated for a rational orinevitable reason, the reason and originality of the article in the text should be clearly mentioned,
the article should be listed as a reference, and the reprint or an electric file at the time ofsubmission should be submitted. Judgment of the validity of the use of duplicate data is entrusted
to the Editorial Board.
The applicable reasons are as follows:a) Addition of new data to the data used in an article published already as a short/rapid
communication, among others.
b) Provision of a new analysis/interpretation from a different viewpoint of basic data identical tothose of an already published article.
With regard to cases in which a) is applicable, the limit of data duplication with another article isgenerally to be less than 50%. With regard to cases in which b) is applicable, no limit of data
duplication with another article is set.
(4) In case of submitting an article containing data (including figures and tables) that are alreadypublicly available in writing in an article format for a commercial journal/book, a report of apublic/private research institute, a research grant report, or a thesis, among others, through a print
or electronic medium, although not published in an article, the author(s) should submit a document
clearly mentioning the place and method of publication, contents, and the like of these data by allmeans at the time of article submission. The Editorial Board shall judge the originality of thearticle on the basis of the submitted resource.
Originality, which is a requirement for articles, is a criterion for the publication of the articles. For
example, when it is judged that data, among others, have been obtained using a general techniqueat the current technical level but can be easily supposed from a previous article(s), the data, among
others, are judged to have no originality, and an article containing such data may not be published.

However, in this case, the article is not necessarily regarded as a dual submission.
When using already published data (including figures and tables), author(s) must certify
subjectively that they have followed procedures for avoiding conflict with the copyright/right touse the data, as required.

4. Fraudulent Submission
Definition of fraudulent submission1) Intentional submission of an article containing false contents (falsification/fabrication).
2) Submission of any result obtained by individuals other than the author(s)(appropriation/plagiarism).
3) Submission with intentional avoidance of quotation of data that another researcher(s) have alreadypublished in an article.
4) Submission of contents [quoted figure(s)/table(s), long text, and the like] conflicting withcopyright/right to use.
5) Being a co-author without participating in the research (guest/gift authorship).
6) Submission of an article while hiding a potential conflict of interest that may develop as a result ofthe submission, such as being supported by a sponsor such as a company, in the form of acollaboration, or the like (financial conflict of interest).
7) Specification of a preferable peer reviewer(s) with a specialty different from the contents of thearticle or designation of a person in a close or personal relationship (relative, etc.) and/or a personwith a specialty other than that of the author(s) as a peer reviewer(s) (potential conflict of interest).
8) Submission of a set of research data by dividing them into multiple articles that contain the same
hypothesis, population, and methods (salami slicing).

5. Application
Our guidelines are applicable to articles submitted after the establishment of the guidelines inprinciple.
However, in case any fraud is revealed in the data, including
falsification/fabrication/appropriation/plagiarism of data, even if the article has been published before
the establishment of the guidelines, publication of the article may be canceled.
1) In case of a submitted article, the following settlement is to be performed in the process of peer
review.
(1) On the occasion of article submission, the author(s) must submit a statement of compliance withthe guidelines. On the occasion of peer review of the article, the reviewers are requested to comply
with the guidelines.
(2) If the reviewer(s) suspect dual or fraudulent submission, the Editor in Chief and the Editorial
Board member in charge shall discuss and ask the author(s) for a reply.
(3) Based on the reply by the author(s), the Editor in Chief, the Editorial Board member in charge,
and the reviewer(s) shall carry out a consultation.
(4) If the submitted article has been judged to not involve dual or fraudulent submission as a result of
the consultation, the author(s) shall be contacted immediately, the peer review of the article shallbe resumed, and the progress shall be explained to the reviewer(s). If the submitted article has
been judged to involve dual or fraudulent submission, the author(s) shall be requested to withdraw
the article.

(5) If the author(s) agree to withdraw the article, the Editorial Board shall request the author(s) tocomply with the guidelines. If the author(s) do not agree to withdraw the article, the Editor inChief, after discussion with the President and the Editorial Board, shall appoint a submitted article
review board to discuss the validity of the suspicion again. The structure of the board members is
to be entrusted to the Editor in Chief.
(6) In case the article has been judged to not involve dual or fraudulent submission as a result of thediscussion, the board shall contact the author(s) immediately and the peer review of the article
shall be resumed. If dual or fraudulent submission has been confirmed, the author(s) shall be
notified by the President of cancelation of the submission.
2) The following settlements shall be performed in the case of published articles:(1) If a third party (hereafter, indicator) has suspected dual or fraudulent submission, the Editor in
Chief shall appoint a published article review board to discuss the validity of the suspicion. The
structure of the board members is entrusted to the Editor in Chief. In addition, the Editor in Chief
is authorized to request that the author(s) of the article and the indicator attend individual hearingsof their opinions along with the published article review board.
(2) If dual or fraudulent submission has not been confirmed as a result of the discussion, the board
shall request the indicator to comply with the guidelines, as required. If dual or fraudulent
submission has been confirmed, the publication of the article shall be canceled and the author(s)will notified of this by the President.
Supplementary Clause: Enforcement of revisions of the guidelines shall be decided by the Board ofDirectors.
Established on March 26, 2008
Experimentally enforced as of April 1, 2008
Revised/enforced as of March 27, 2016
Revised/enforced as of September 13, 2021