AI Use Policy

The International Center for Promoting Knowledge (ICPK) establishes this AI use policy for academic publishing to support transparent, responsible use of generative AI and AI-assisted tools across the journals it publishes. The policy applies to authors, reviewers, editors, and editorial board members.

An AI tool cannot be listed as an author or co-author. Authorship carries responsibility for the work and the ability to answer for it. An AI system can do neither. Every named author must therefore satisfy the applicable authorship requirements and remain accountable for the submitted and published content.

Principles

AI tools may assist scholarly work, but they do not replace human judgement, verification, or accountability. Authors must control their use, examine the output, verify resulting claims and sources, and ensure compliance with the journal’s requirements.

This policy distinguishes between tools that improve the expression of the authors’ own work and tools that generate or materially shape its substance. The first category ordinarily requires no disclosure; the second requires clear generative AI disclosure.

Uses That Do Not Require Disclosure

Disclosure is not required when an AI-assisted tool is limited to:

• language editing;
• grammar and spelling correction;
• improving readability or clarity; or
• translation.

This exception applies only where the tool improves the expression of material created by the authors without generating its intellectual or scholarly substance. Authors must review every change and confirm that terminology, emphasis, qualifications, findings, and meaning have not been altered. Translation output must be checked for accuracy and context. If a tool goes beyond expression and begins generating arguments, interpretations, evidence, or other substantive material, disclosure is required.

Uses That Require Disclosure

Authors must disclose use of generative AI or an AI-assisted tool when it contributes materially to the manuscript or the work reported in it. Disclosure is required when a tool is used for any of the following:

• generating sections or passages of text;
• producing, modifying, or transforming figures or images;
• generating, estimating, or imputing data;
• writing or substantially assisting with analysis code; or
• conducting any part of a literature review, including identifying, screening, summarising, or synthesising literature.

Comparable substantive uses also require disclosure. Where reasonable doubt exists, authors should disclose the use.

The statement must name the tool, identify its version, and explain what it was used to do. A brief statement in the methods section or acknowledgements is sufficient when it accurately describes the use. For example:

> During preparation of this manuscript, the authors used [tool and version] to [specific purpose]. The authors reviewed and verified the resulting material and take full responsibility for the final content.

Disclosure does not transfer responsibility. It enables editors, reviewers, and readers to understand how the work was produced.

Author Responsibility and Verification

Authors are responsible for every part of a submitted manuscript, whether written or prepared directly, produced with assistance, or generated by a tool and subsequently edited. Before submission, authors must:

• verify factual statements, calculations, interpretations, quotations, and citations;
• confirm that cited sources exist and support the statements attributed to them;
• review generated or transformed figures, images, data, and code for accuracy and integrity;
• ensure that tool use has not introduced plagiarism, undisclosed reuse, bias, confidential information, or misleading content; and
• obtain and document any permissions required for third-party material.

Generative AI systems may produce references that are fabricated, inaccurate, incomplete, or unrelated to the stated claim. Any such reference appearing in a manuscript is the authors’ responsibility. Its presence is treated as a failure of verification; stating that the reference came from an AI tool does not excuse the error.

Authors must not submit confidential, personal, proprietary, or otherwise restricted material to an AI service without lawful authority and compatible safeguards. They remain responsible for protecting research participants, unpublished data, confidential sources, and third-party rights.

AI in Peer Review

AI in peer review is subject to strict confidentiality and independence requirements. A reviewer must not upload a manuscript, an extract, a figure, supplementary material, review correspondence, or any other part of an unpublished submission to a public or third-party AI service. A manuscript under review is confidential and unpublished. Supplying any part of it to an external tool breaches that confidentiality regardless of the reviewer’s intention or whether the service appears to retain the content.

Reviewers must not delegate evaluation to an AI tool. The review must reflect their own reading, expertise, analysis, and judgement. A tool must not determine validity, significance, ethical acceptability, or a publication recommendation. Reviewers remain responsible for their reports.

Responsibilities of Editors

The same restrictions apply to editors, including Editors-in-Chief and editorial board members. They must not upload manuscripts, reviews, author responses, editorial correspondence, or other confidential submission material to public or third-party AI services. They must not delegate editorial assessment, selection of reviewers, interpretation of reports, or accept-and-reject judgement to an AI tool.

Editorial authority remains with each journal’s Editor-in-Chief and editorial board. ICPK provides publishing infrastructure, policy, and administrative support; it does not review manuscripts or participate in accept-or-reject decisions.

Undisclosed or Improper Use

Failure to disclose substantive AI use, false or incomplete disclosure, fabricated references, compromised confidentiality, or delegation of scholarly or editorial judgement may be examined under ICPK’s Research Integrity & Misconduct and Publication Ethics policies. The response will depend on the nature, seriousness, and stage of the matter. Questions about whether a proposed use requires disclosure should be raised with the relevant journal before submission.

For the requirements governing responsibility and contributor status, see Authorship & Contributorship.