Guidelines for Reviewer

JASF (Journal of Accounting and Strategic Finance) recognizes peer review as an essential component of scholarly publishing and a fundamental mechanism for ensuring the quality, validity, originality, and integrity of scientific research. The journal sincerely appreciates the contributions of reviewers who voluntarily dedicate their expertise and time to evaluating submitted manuscripts.

These guidelines establish the responsibilities, ethical obligations, evaluation criteria, and professional standards expected of reviewers. They are informed by internationally recognized principles of publication ethics, including those developed by the Committee on Publication Ethics (COPE), and established good practices in scholarly peer review.

  1. Peer Review Process

JASF operates a double-anonymized peer review process, in which the identities of authors and reviewers are concealed from one another to promote independent and impartial evaluation.

Manuscripts that meet the journal's initial editorial screening requirements are generally evaluated by at least two independent reviewers with relevant expertise.

Reviewers are expected to provide objective, evidence-based, constructive, and timely assessments of the manuscripts assigned to them. Their recommendations inform editorial decisions; however, the final decision regarding manuscript acceptance, revision, or rejection rests exclusively with the Editor.

  1. Responsibilities Before Accepting a Review Invitation

Before accepting an invitation, prospective reviewers should consider whether:

  • The manuscript falls within their area of academic or professional expertise.
  • They possess the methodological or subject-specific knowledge necessary to provide a rigorous assessment.
  • They can complete the review within the timeframe specified by the journal.
  • They have any financial, institutional, personal, professional, or academic conflicts of interest that could compromise their impartiality.

Reviewers must disclose any potential conflicts of interest to the Editor before accepting an assignment. If a reviewer cannot provide an independent assessment or meet the established deadline, the invitation should be declined promptly.

Reviewers must not delegate their responsibilities or involve another individual in the review process without prior editorial authorization.

  1. Confidentiality and Anonymity

All submitted manuscripts and associated materials must be treated as strictly confidential documents throughout and after the peer review process.

Reviewers must not disclose, distribute, reproduce, or share any part of a manuscript, including its text, tables, figures, supplementary materials, unpublished findings, or associated correspondence, without prior authorization from the Editor.

Reviewers must not use unpublished information obtained during peer review for personal research, professional advantage, or the benefit of another individual or institution.

In accordance with the journal's double-anonymized review model, reviewers must respect the anonymity of authors and should not intentionally attempt to identify or contact them.

Confidentiality obligations extend to all digital platforms, third-party services, and artificial intelligence systems used during the review process.

  1. Ethical Standards and Professional Conduct

Reviewers are expected to maintain the highest standards of academic integrity, professional conduct, and impartiality.

Reviews must focus on the scientific content and scholarly merit of the manuscript rather than the authors' perceived reputation, institutional affiliation, nationality, gender, or personal characteristics.

Critical comments should be respectful, specific, and supported by scientific reasoning. Hostile language, personal criticism, discriminatory remarks, and unsupported allegations are unacceptable.

Reviewers should avoid recommending citations to their own publications or those of colleagues unless such references are directly relevant and scientifically justified.

Any suspected ethical concerns, including plagiarism, duplicate publication, data fabrication, data falsification, inappropriate image manipulation, undisclosed conflicts of interest, or ethical approval irregularities, should be communicated confidentially to the Editor with supporting information where available.

Reviewers should not independently investigate allegations by contacting authors or their institutions.

  1. Scientific Evaluation Criteria

Reviewers should evaluate manuscripts systematically, taking into account the research design, methodological rigor, scientific contribution, transparency, and relevance to the journal's scope.

The following criteria should guide the evaluation:

  1. Originality and Scientific Contribution: Does the manuscript provide original findings, meaningful theoretical insights, or a significant contribution to knowledge in physical education, sports science, physical rehabilitation, or related disciplines?
  2. Relevance and Scope: Is the research relevant to the journal's aims and scope, and does it address a clearly defined scientific or practical problem?
  3. Title and Abstract: Does the title accurately represent the study? Does the abstract appropriately summarize the objectives, methods, principal findings, and conclusions?
  4. Introduction and Research Rationale: Does the introduction establish the scientific background, research gap, significance, and clearly formulated research objectives or hypotheses?
  5. Research Design and Methodology: Is the study design appropriate for the research question? Are sampling procedures, participant characteristics, instruments, interventions, measurements, and data collection procedures described adequately to support reproducibility?
  6. Statistical Analysis and Data Interpretation: Are the statistical methods appropriate for the study design, data characteristics, and hypotheses? Are effect sizes, confidence intervals, statistical significance, and relevant assumptions appropriately reported and interpreted where applicable?
  7. Results and Presentation: Are the results presented accurately, systematically, and transparently? Are tables and figures necessary, readable, properly labeled, and consistent with the reported findings?
  8. Discussion and Scientific Interpretation: Are the findings critically discussed in relation to relevant literature? Are alternative explanations, practical implications, potential biases, and study limitations appropriately considered?
  9. Conclusions: Are the conclusions directly supported by the results and consistent with the study design, without unsupported generalizations or causal claims?
  10. References, Reporting Standards, and Research Ethics: Are the references relevant, sufficiently comprehensive, and current? Does the manuscript follow applicable reporting guidelines, such as CONSORT, STROBE, PRISMA, or relevant qualitative research reporting standards? Are ethical approval, informed consent, and other necessary research integrity statements adequately reported?

Reviewers should consider the methodological requirements associated with each study type and avoid applying inappropriate evaluation criteria to different research designs.

  1. Preparing and Submitting the Review Report

A high-quality review report should provide a balanced evaluation of the manuscript's strengths, limitations, and potential contribution to the scientific literature.

Reviewers should organize their reports into clearly distinguishable sections addressing the major scientific issues and specific revisions required.

Comments to the Authors

Comments intended for authors should identify the manuscript's principal strengths, major methodological or conceptual concerns, and specific recommendations for improvement.

Major comments should address issues that materially affect the validity, interpretation, reproducibility, or scientific contribution of the research.

Minor comments may address clarity, organization, terminology, presentation, or other issues that do not substantially affect the scientific conclusions.

Whenever possible, reviewers should refer to specific manuscript sections, tables, figures, or line numbers to facilitate revisions.

Confidential Comments to the Editor

Reviewers may provide confidential comments concerning significant methodological limitations, potential ethical concerns, competing interests, or other issues relevant to the editorial decision.

Confidential comments should not be used to conceal substantive scientific criticisms that authors reasonably need to address.

Editorial Recommendations

Reviewers may recommend acceptance, minor revision, major revision, or rejection, according to the available options in the journal's review system.

Recommendations must be consistent with the scientific assessment and supported by clear reasoning.

When rejection is recommended, reviewers should explain the fundamental limitations that prevent publication, distinguishing between issues that could be resolved through revision and deficiencies that compromise the validity of the research.

Reviewers provide recommendations rather than final editorial decisions.

  1. Policy on the Use of Generative AI and AI-Assisted Technologies in Peer Review

JASF recognizes that generative artificial intelligence (AI) and AI-assisted technologies may provide limited assistance in scholarly communication. However, peer review requires independent scientific judgment, critical thinking, methodological expertise, and professional accountability that must remain the responsibility of human reviewers.

Accordingly, the journal establishes the following requirements.

7.1. Prohibition on Uploading Confidential Manuscript Materials

Reviewers must not upload, submit, copy, or otherwise disclose any part of an unpublished manuscript to generative AI tools or third-party AI systems.

This prohibition includes manuscript text, abstracts, research data, tables, figures, supplementary materials, unpublished findings, confidential editorial communications, and reviewer comments containing confidential manuscript information.

The restriction applies even when an AI platform claims to provide privacy protection, because the disclosure of unpublished research to an external system may compromise confidentiality, intellectual property rights, or personal data protection.

7.2. Permitted Use of AI-Assisted Technologies

AI tools may be used only in a limited, supportive capacity, provided that confidentiality is fully preserved and the reviewer maintains independent human oversight.

Permissible uses may include improving the grammar, language, readability, or organization of independently prepared reviewer comments that contain no confidential manuscript information, or assisting with general background literature searches using publicly available information.

Reviewers should use only AI tools with verified privacy protections that prevent submitted information from being retained, reused, disclosed, or used for model training.

Institutional or enterprise AI systems may provide additional privacy safeguards, but their privacy conditions must be independently verified before use.

7.3. Prohibited Use of AI in Scientific Evaluation

Reviewers must not use generative AI as a substitute for their own scientific evaluation or professional judgment.

AI systems must not independently assess the scientific validity of a confidential manuscript, generate manuscript-specific peer review assessments from uploaded content, determine the reliability of unpublished findings, assign editorial recommendations, or make publication decisions on behalf of reviewers.

Reviewers must independently evaluate the study design, methodology, statistical analysis, interpretation of findings, and scientific contribution.

Any AI-generated information used in permitted supporting activities must be critically examined and independently verified.

7.4. Transparency and Disclosure of AI Use

Reviewers who use generative AI or AI-assisted technologies in preparing their review reports must disclose the name of the tool and the purpose of its use, except when the tool is used solely for basic spelling, grammar, or punctuation checking.

Such disclosure must not contain confidential manuscript information.

Suggested AI Disclosure Statement

During the preparation of this peer review report, I used [NAME OF AI TOOL/SERVICE] for [SPECIFY PURPOSE, e.g., improving language clarity and readability]. No confidential manuscript content or unpublished research information was submitted to the AI system. I independently evaluated the manuscript, reviewed and verified the AI-assisted output, and take full responsibility for the scientific assessment, comments, and recommendations provided in this report.

The use of AI does not reduce the reviewer's professional or ethical responsibility for the accuracy, objectivity, originality, and integrity of the review report.

7.5. Non-Compliance With the AI Policy

Any suspected violation of this policy may be investigated by the Editorial Board.

Depending on the nature and severity of the violation, the journal may disregard the affected review report, withdraw the review assignment, remove the reviewer from future assignments, or take other appropriate actions consistent with publication ethics principles.

  1. Research Integrity and Ethical Considerations

Reviewers should assess whether submitted research complies with applicable ethical principles, institutional requirements, and accepted standards of responsible research conduct.

For studies involving human participants, particular attention should be given to ethical approval, informed consent, confidentiality, participant safety, and appropriate safeguards for vulnerable populations, including children and adolescents.

For experimental and intervention studies, reviewers should assess whether participant allocation, intervention procedures, outcome measurements, and relevant methodological safeguards are adequately described.

For systematic reviews and meta-analyses, reviewers should assess the transparency of search strategies, eligibility criteria, study selection, risk-of-bias assessment, and evidence synthesis methods.

Any concerns about potentially fabricated data, inconsistent results, inappropriate statistical practices, or misleading reporting should be raised directly with the Editor rather than communicated as unsubstantiated accusations to authors.

Reviewers should distinguish between genuine research misconduct concerns, methodological limitations, and differences in scientific interpretation.

  1. Reviewer Form and Submission Procedure

Reviewers are requested to complete the journal's official Reviewer Form and submit their evaluation through the designated editorial system within the agreed timeframe.

The review report should include the general manuscript assessment, section-specific comments, scientific evaluation, editorial recommendation, and any additional confidential comments intended for the Editor.

Reviewers who anticipate delays should inform the editorial office promptly.

The Editor may request clarification or additional evaluation if further assessment is required before reaching an editorial decision.

  1. Responsibilities After Completing the Review

The obligation to maintain confidentiality continues after the reviewer has submitted the review report and after the editorial decision has been communicated.

Reviewers must not publicly disclose confidential manuscript information, peer review correspondence, or unpublished research findings without appropriate authorization.

Where appropriate, the Editor may share anonymized reviewer reports or editorial feedback with participating reviewers for educational and quality-improvement purposes, subject to confidentiality requirements.

JASF values the intellectual contributions of its reviewers and recognizes peer review as an essential professional service that supports the credibility, transparency, and continuous improvement of scholarly publishing.

  1. Ethical Framework and Supporting Resources

The principles outlined in these guidelines are informed by the following internationally recognized resources:

These guidelines may be periodically reviewed and updated to reflect developments in scholarly publishing, research integrity, peer review standards, and responsible AI governance.