This policy defines research and publication misconduct and explains how Widyakara Journal prevents, detects, and handles it, following the COPE Core Practices and flowcharts. Every allegation is handled confidentially and fairly, and the people involved can respond before any decision.

1. Definitions

Research misconduct: fabrication of data or results; falsification of data, instruments, processes, or images; and plagiarism (Plagiarism Policy).

Other unacceptable practices: duplicate or redundant publication and salami slicing; authorship misconduct; undisclosed conflicts of interest; citation manipulation; peer review manipulation; paper mills or purchased manuscripts; research with people without consent or required ethics approval; undisclosed or prohibited use of generative AI; falsifying submission, acceptance, or publication dates.

2. Prevention and Detection

• Turnitin checks for every manuscript, with the report stored in OJS.
• Required statements on authorship, funding, conflicts of interest, ethics, data, and AI use.
• Verification of reviewer identities through institutional emails and public profiles.
• Article dates in the PDF taken from the OJS record.

3. Reporting an Allegation

Anyone may report suspected misconduct to the Editor-in-Chief at journal_widyakara@uny.ac.id, identifying the manuscript or article and describing the concern with evidence. Allegations against the Editor-in-Chief go to the Head of the Department of Administration Education, Faculty of Economics and Business, Universitas Negeri Yogyakarta.

4. Procedures

• Submitted manuscript: the review may be paused; the authors explain within 14 days; if the explanation is unsatisfactory, the manuscript is rejected and, in serious cases, the institution is informed.
• Published article: the authors respond within 30 days; the editor may consult reviewers, the board, or the institution; the outcome may be an expression of concern, a correction, or a retraction.
• Reviewers or editors: proven misconduct leads to removal from the reviewer database or editorial team, and affected decisions are reviewed.

5. Outcomes

Outcome	Possible action
Honest error	Correction; no sanction.
Minor misconduct	Rejection or correction; education of the authors.
Serious misconduct	Rejection or retraction; a ban on submissions by the responsible authors for up to three years; notification of their institutions.

Records of each case are kept for at least five years. People who report concerns in good faith are protected.

Sources: COPE (2017) Core practices; COPE Flowcharts.