Submissions

The RTS is committed to adopting and promoting best practices and guiding ethical principles characteristic of scientific publications. Accordingly, it shall be governed by the guidelines of the COPE (Committee on Publication Ethics) Code of Conduct, which may be viewed at https://publicationethics.org.

The RTS assumes the following ethical commitments:

• To incorporate transparency as one of the key principles in management of the journal.
• To convey the goals and functioning of the RTS to readers and potential authors via the journal website.
• To explain clearly the rules for the submission of articles. A checklist will be handed out to help confirm all the submission requirements have been met.
• To encourage the attribution of suitable authorship, incorporating all authors into communications issued by the RTS.
• To base the decision as to whether or not to accept an article for publication solely on the document submitted, valuing such aspects as the relevance of the topic, originality and clarity.
• To specifically define the task entrusted to the team reviewing the articles, incorporating the recommendations of the COPE:
  • To perform objective reviews.
  • To avoid personal criticism of the authors.
  • To reason on valuations giving references, if required.
  • To state any conflict of interest, for instance and by way of indication, a reviewer knowing beforehand that the article was being submitted to the journal, having cooperated recently with one or more of the authors or belonging to the same institution as them.
  • To waive reviewing manuscripts in which there is a competitive interest in relation to the topic addressed, the authorship or the institution submitting the article.
  • To respect the confidentiality of the material provided. An unpublished paper may not be discussed with colleagues and the information may not be used in another project by the reviewers.
  • To ensure the article assessed adheres to ethical aspects, such as: originality of the text, the statement from the authors attesting there is no conflict of interest, and confirmation that the topic researched, the methodology employed and the results presented fall in line with the principles of non-discrimination and respect for dignity.
  • To strive to correctly cite the authorship of works, intervention models or any other acknowledged contribution, as well as the identification of plagiarism.
  • To confirm that the article respects the principles of confidentiality and professional secrecy, and has been compiled by securing all necessary permissions.
• If any malpractice is identified on the part of any of the members of the article review team, said individual will be removed from the RTS reviewer database.
• Reviews of articles shall be conducted by means of the double-blind, peer-review method. The editorial board undertakes to adopt all measures needed to ensure confidentiality in the review process both when it comes to reviewers and authors. The board shall also ensure this process unfolds swiftly avoiding unnecessary delays that would adversely affect the authors.
• If any member of the editorial team submits an article to the RTS for publication, he shall take on the commitment to ensure the same assessment is conducted –the double-blind, peer-review method– as with any other article submitted. If an article from a member of the RTS editorial board is published, the process undertaken for its selection shall be recorded in a note.
• If advertising is incorporated into the publication, the editorial board undertakes to uphold the quality of the journal without commercial considerations affecting editorial decisions.
• Lastly, we accept that the relationship between the RTS and the Board of Governors of the Official Association of Social Work of Catalonia shall be based on the principle of editorial independence.