Asia Book Registry requires full transparency in all relationships — financial, personal, professional, and institutional — that could influence the submission, review, or indexing of scholarly works.
| ▶ ICMJE Guidelines | ▶ COPE Standards | ▶ WAME Principles | ▶ Full Disclosure Required |
Core Principle: A conflict of interest exists when a person's private interests — financial, professional, personal, or institutional — could inappropriately influence their judgment in submitting, reviewing, or making decisions about scholarly works. The existence of a conflict does not itself constitute wrongdoing. What matters is transparent disclosure. Undisclosed conflicts are a form of research misconduct.
Asia Book Registry adopts the ICMJE definition: a conflict of interest exists when a participant in the publication process has "relationships with industry, government, academic, and other organizations that might inappropriately influence — or be seen to inappropriately influence — their independent judgment."
This policy applies to all parties involved in the submission and review process, including:
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Financial
Employment, ownership, equity, stocks, patents, honoraria, grants, consulting fees, speaker fees, paid advisory roles |
Personal
Family ties, close friendships, romantic relationships, known personal animosity or rivalry with authors or reviewers |
Academic / Professional
Collaboration within last 3 years, mentorship (supervisor/student), co-authorship history, academic competition, public positions on the subject |
Institutional
Same department or institution as author, institutional funding relationships, organizational affiliations that could create a perceived bias |
"When in doubt, disclose." ABR strongly encourages disclosure of any relationship that a reasonable person might question — even if the individual does not personally believe it to be a conflict. Disclosure protects both the author and the integrity of the registry.
All authors — including corresponding and contributing authors — must disclose all relationships and interests that could be perceived as influencing the research, its presentation, or its conclusions. Disclosure is required at the time of submission and must be updated if circumstances change during the review process.
| What Must Be Disclosed | Examples |
|---|---|
| Financial relationships | Research grants, funding sources, employment, consultancies, stock holdings, honoraria, paid expert testimony, patent applications related to the book's subject matter |
| Non-financial relationships | Personal or professional relationships that could be seen to compromise the objectivity of the work; political, religious, or ideological commitments relevant to the subject |
| Funder involvement | Any funder that had a role in: study design, data collection or analysis, interpretation of findings, or the decision to submit the work |
| AI tool relationships | Commercial relationships with AI tool providers (e.g., employed by or financially compensated by an AI company whose tools were used in the work) |
| Publisher relationships | Any financial or professional relationship with the book's publisher that could create a perception of bias in reporting results |
Time frame: Authors should disclose relevant relationships from the past 36 months (3 years), consistent with ICMJE recommendations. Past relationships that are directly relevant to the subject matter should also be disclosed even if older than 3 years.
Editors hold a position of significant authority in the publication process and are held to the highest standard of impartiality. Editors must recuse themselves from any editorial decision — including assignment of reviewers, review of assessments, and final indexing decisions — when a conflict of interest exists.
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Editors MUST recuse when:
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When recused, editors must:
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Editor-in-Chief conflicts: If the Editor-in-Chief has a conflict of interest with a submission, management of that submission is delegated entirely to a Senior Editor or a member of the Editorial Board who has no conflict. The Editor-in-Chief's involvement in that submission ceases at the point of recusal.
Reviewers must declare any conflict of interest before accepting a review assignment. If a conflict becomes apparent during the review, the reviewer must immediately notify the handling editor and withdraw from the review.
| Reviewer MUST decline or withdraw when: | Reviewer MUST NOT: |
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Uncertainty is not an excuse for non-disclosure. Reviewers who are unsure whether a relationship constitutes a conflict should err on the side of disclosing to the editor and letting the editor decide whether recusal is appropriate.
The growing use of AI tools in academic writing, editing, and review creates new dimensions of potential conflict of interest that authors, editors, and reviewers must actively consider and disclose.
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▶ Author COI — AI
Authors who are employed by, financially compensated by, or hold equity in an AI company must disclose this when using AI tools from that company in their work — even if the use is disclosed separately. Commercial relationships with AI providers constitute a financial COI. |
▶ Reviewer COI — AI
Reviewers must not use AI tools to conduct or assist in the review without prior editor approval. Using a competitor's or same employer's AI to evaluate a submission may itself constitute a conflict requiring disclosure. |
▶ Editorial COI — AI
Editorial Board members with financial ties to AI detection or writing tool providers must recuse from editorial decisions where those tools are used to evaluate a submission, to avoid any perception of commercially motivated bias. |
COI disclosure is a mandatory part of the ABR submission process. Authors must complete the COI declaration in the submission form. Editors and reviewers declare COI during their editorial workflow. All declarations are stored in the submission record.
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1
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At submission (Authors)
Complete the COI declaration form as part of the online submission. State either that you have no conflicts, or provide specific details of each relationship. All contributing authors must provide their own declarations — the corresponding author may not declare on behalf of co-authors. |
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2
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Upon review assignment (Reviewers)
When invited to review, reviewers must confirm they have no conflict of interest before accepting. If a conflict is identified, the reviewer declines the invitation and briefly explains the nature of the conflict to the handling editor. |
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3
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Upon editorial assignment (Editors)
Editors review each assigned submission for any personal or professional conflict. If found, the editor immediately notifies the Editor-in-Chief and the submission is reassigned before any editorial action is taken. |
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4
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After indexing (Updates)
If a previously undisclosed conflict of interest is discovered after a work has been indexed, authors must notify ABR immediately at contact@explorerfrontier.com. Depending on severity, this may lead to an erratum, expression of concern, or retraction per ABR's Corrections and Retraction Policy. |
Authors may use the templates below in their submission. Place the completed declaration in the submission form's COI field, or include it as a separate file in your submission package.
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A
Template A — No Conflict of Interest
The authors declare that they have no known competing financial interests or personal relationships that could have appeared to influence the work reported in this submission. No funding was received from organizations that could benefit from the publication of this work, or such organizations played no role in the study design, data collection, analysis, or interpretation.
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B
Template B — With Conflict(s) Declared
[Author name(s)] declare the following financial interests and/or personal relationships which may be considered as potential competing interests: [describe each specific interest, e.g., "Author X received research funding from [Funder] during the conduct of the study. Author Y is a paid consultant for [Organization], whose products are discussed in this book. Author Z holds stock in [Company] relevant to the book's subject."] All other authors declare no known conflicts of interest.
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Failing to disclose a relevant conflict of interest is considered a form of research misconduct under ABR's Publication Ethics Policy and is handled consistent with COPE guidelines. The severity of the response depends on the nature of the conflict and whether non-disclosure appears intentional.
| Scenario | Likely Outcome |
|---|---|
| Minor, inadvertent omission discovered pre-indexing | Author informed and required to update the declaration before review continues. No further action if disclosure is made promptly. |
| Significant conflict discovered post-indexing | Erratum or Expression of Concern published. Full investigation initiated. Registry record updated with disclosure notice. |
| Intentional concealment of major financial conflict | Retraction of the indexed work, notification of authors' institutions and relevant funders, referral to COPE if appropriate. |
| Editor or reviewer conflict — undisclosed | Removal from the Editorial Board or reviewer list, re-evaluation of all decisions made by that individual, possible re-review of affected submissions. |
Transparency is the cornerstone of ABR's COI policy. All disclosed conflicts of interest are published openly in the registry record alongside the indexed work.
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Published in Registry Record
Declared COI statements from all authors are included in the bibliographic metadata of each indexed work and are visible to all registry users. |
Included in OAI-PMH Metadata
COI declarations are propagated through OAI-PMH metadata harvesting, making them available to search engines and aggregators that harvest ABR records. |
Confidential: Reviewer & Editor
COI disclosures from reviewers and editors are recorded in the internal editorial system but are not published externally, consistent with standard peer review confidentiality. |
Standards & ReferencesICMJE Recommendations — Section on Conflicts of Interest · COPE Guidelines on Conflicts of Interest (2023) · WAME Policy on Conflicts of Interest · WHO Guidelines on Declaration of Interests · COPE Position Statement on AI and Authorship (2023) · STM Integrity Hub — COI Best Practices |
Policy Details
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