For editors
Editor Guidelines
How an editor of International Marine Science Journal handles a manuscript, and the judgments the journal expects to be made consistently.
These guidelines are operational. The rules they implement are on the Editorial Policies page; what reviewers are asked to do is on the Reviewer Guidelines page.
Screening
Screening a submission
All submissions undergo initial editorial screening. Manuscripts that meet the journal's scope and minimum requirements proceed to independent peer review.
Scope
Does the work sit in a core discipline or wider-coverage field, or meet the interdisciplinary test — the marine contribution central and substantive, not incidental? The Aims and Scope page is the authority, including the eight boundaries and their stated exceptions.
Article type
Does the manuscript match the type claimed, and sit broadly within the limits for it? Length alone is not grounds to decline.
Minimum requirements
Are the methods reportable and the declarations present — data availability, funding, competing interests, contributions, AI use, and the permits and approvals the work requires?
Integrity check
Review the similarity report in context. A high score from correctly quoted and cited methods is not misconduct; an uncited overlap of substance is.
Decline early where appropriate
Where a manuscript plainly does not fit, decline at screening and say why briefly. A prompt, clear decline is more useful to an author than a slow one.
Review
Selecting and managing reviewers
- Expertise
- Select reviewers for the specific methods and system in the manuscript, not for the general field. A paper combining acoustics and fish biology usually needs one reviewer for each.
- Number
- Manuscripts that proceed to external peer review are normally evaluated by at least two independent subject-matter experts.
- Independence
- Avoid reviewers at the authors' institution, recent co-authors and collaborators, and anyone the authors have asked be excluded for a stated reason.
- Review model
- Single-blind by default; double-blind review is available on request.
- Double-blind handling
- When double-blind review is requested, editors must ensure that author-identifying information is not shared with reviewers.
- Managing the process
- Agree a timeframe with each reviewer on invitation and follow it up. Where reviews conflict on a material point, seek a further opinion rather than choosing between them.
- Using reviews
- Reviewer recommendations inform the decision; they do not make it. Weigh a review by the reasoning it gives, and set aside a review that is abusive, unsupported or outside its competence.
Decisions
Reaching a decision
Editorial decisions are based on scope, scientific quality, methodological rigor, ethical compliance, reporting quality, and relevance to the journal.
Decisions rest with the handling editor and the editorial board. Payment of an article processing charge, membership of any program, and an author's seniority, institution or nationality play no part in them.
- Accept
- The work is sound, reported sufficiently to be assessed and repeated, and the conclusions are proportionate to the evidence.
- Revise
- The identified problems are addressable. Say specifically what must change, and separate what is required from what is suggested.
- Reject
- The work is out of scope, the design cannot support the question, or the problems cannot be fixed by revision. Give the reason plainly.
- Communicating
- Write the decision so an author can act on it. Do not pass on an unedited abusive review, and do not imply a commitment the journal has not made.
- Appeals
- An appeal on grounds of factual error or material misunderstanding is considered by an editor who was not responsible for the original decision.
Subject judgment
Marine-science judgments
Where an editor's subject knowledge does most of the work, and where reviewers should be asked to look hardest.
- Permits and protected settings
- Confirm that work on protected species, in marine protected areas or in sensitive habitats reports the permit and the issuing authority, and that animal work reports its approval.
- Species identification
- Check that identification is supported — the key or authority used, voucher specimens, or sequence accessions. A first record or range extension needs stronger evidence than a routine occurrence.
- Sampling design
- Check that the design can answer the question: replication at the right level, appropriate controls, and spatial and temporal coverage matched to the variability of the system.
- Fisheries methodology
- Check stock definition, whether data are fishery-dependent or independent, gear selectivity, and whether model assumptions are stated and tested.
- Environmental data quality
- Check calibration, detection limits, quality-control procedures, and how flagged or below-detection values were handled.
- Geospatial sensitivity
- Where precise coordinates could expose a vulnerable population or an exploitable site, agree reduced precision with the authors and record it in the article.
- Reproducibility
- Check that the data-availability statement is real: that a named repository and accession exist, or that a stated restriction is genuine and access conditions are given.
Proportion
Evidence and overclaiming
The most common defect in otherwise sound marine manuscripts is a conclusion larger than the study.
Ask what class of evidence the design actually produces, and require the language to match it.
- Observation
- Something was recorded at a place and time. It supports description, not explanation.
- Association
- Two quantities co-vary. It supports a stated relationship, not a mechanism, and the word "effect" should not stand in for it.
- Mechanism
- A process has been demonstrated, usually experimentally or with a validated model. It supports an explanation within the conditions tested.
- Causation
- Requires manipulation, or an observational design with the confounders addressed explicitly. Rare in field marine science and should be claimed only when earned.
- Management inference
- A recommendation to act requires evidence at the scale of the action. Local studies may support local decisions; regional recommendations require evidence justifying broader inference. A discussion may identify implications while stating the limits of the evidence.
- Climate attribution
- Attributing an observed change to climate forcing requires a record long enough to separate it from natural variability, or an explicit attribution method. Correlation with a warming trend is not attribution.
Conduct
Conduct, conflicts and misconduct
- Confidentiality
- Submitted manuscripts are confidential. Do not disclose, distribute or use unpublished material, and do not discuss a submission outside the review process.
- Competing interests
- Declare interests on appointment and keep the declaration current. Step aside from any manuscript where an interest arises — a shared institution, a recent collaboration, a personal or financial relationship.
- Your own manuscripts
- A manuscript you author or co-author is handled by another editor. You take no part in its assessment and have no access to the reviewer identities or reports.
- AI use
- Obtain journal permission before using AI to assist with handling a manuscript. Any permitted use must be disclosed, and confidential manuscript content must not be uploaded where confidentiality cannot be assured.
- Suspected misconduct
- Where plagiarism, duplicate publication, fabrication, image manipulation or undisclosed conflict is suspected, do not confront the authors directly. Refer the matter to the editorial office, which investigates under COPE procedures.
- After publication
- Where an error or allegation emerges after publication, the outcome is a correction, an expression of concern, or a retraction, published as its own record with a registered DOI and linked to the article.