Artificial Intelligence Policy

These policies were initially triggered by the rise of generative AI and AI-assisted technologies, which were expected to increasingly be used by researchers, and have now been updated to reflect evolving good practice. These policies aim to provide greater transparency and guidance to authors, reviewers, editors, readers, and contributors.

BRANDA: Journal of Community Service and Empowerment will continue to monitor developments in this area and will adjust or refine policies as appropriate. This policy follows and refers fully to international publishing standards and best practice guidelines regarding Generative AI policies for academic journals.

FOR AUTHORS

The Use of Generative AI and AI-Assisted Technologies in Manuscript Preparation — An Overview

BRANDA: Journal of Community Service and Empowerment recognizes the potential of generative AI and AI-assisted technologies (“AI Tools”), when used responsibly, to help researchers work efficiently, gain critical insights fast, and achieve better outcomes. Increasingly, these tools—including AI agents and deep research tools—are helping researchers synthesize complex literature, provide an overview of a field or research question, identify research gaps, generate ideas, and provide tailored support for tasks such as content organization and improving language and readability.

Authors preparing a manuscript for the journal can use AI Tools to support them. However, these tools must never be used as a substitute for human critical thinking, expertise, and evaluation. AI Tools should always be applied with human oversight and control. Ultimately, authors are responsible and accountable for the contents of their work. This includes accountability for:

  • Verifying Accuracy: Carefully reviewing and verifying the accuracy, comprehensiveness, and impartiality of all AI-generated output (including checking sources, as AI-generated references can be incorrect or fabricated).

     

  • Ensuring Authenticity: Editing and adapting all material thoroughly to ensure the manuscript represents the author’s authentic and original contribution and reflects their own analysis, interpretation, insights, and ideas.

     

  • Maintaining Transparency: Ensuring the use of any tools or sources, AI-based or otherwise, is made clear and transparent to readers — for the use of AI Tools, we require a disclosure statement upon submission.

  • Protecting Rights & Privacy: Ensuring the manuscript is developed in a way that safeguards data privacy, intellectual property, and other rights, by checking the terms and conditions of any AI Tool that is used.

     

Responsible Use of AI Tools

 

Authors must check the terms and conditions of any AI Tool they use to ensure that the privacy and confidentiality of their data and inputs, including their unpublished manuscripts, are maintained. Particular care should be taken with any personally identifiable data. Images that duplicate or refer to existing copyrighted images, real people, or others’ identifiable products or brands must not be generated, nor any likeness of an individual’s voice. Authors should check for factual errors and for any potential bias.

 

Authors should also check the terms and conditions of any AI Tool they wish to use to ensure that they only grant to the AI Tool the right to use their materials to provide the service to them, and that they do not grant to the AI Tool any other rights to the materials input into the AI Tool (including without limitation the right to train the AI Tool on those materials). They must also ensure that the AI Tool does not impose constraints on the use of outputs from the AI Tool in a way that could restrict the subsequent publication of the relevant article.

Disclosure

Authors should disclose the use of AI Tools for manuscript preparation in a separate AI declaration statement in their manuscript upon submission, and a statement will appear in the published work. Authors should document their use of AI, including the name of the AI Tool used, the purpose of the use, and the extent of their oversight. Declaring the use of AI Tools supports transparency and trust between authors, readers, reviewers, editors, and contributors and facilitates compliance with the terms of use of the relevant AI Tool. Basic checks of grammar, spelling, and punctuation need no declaration. AI use in the research process should be declared and described in detail in the methods section.

Authorship

Authors should not list AI Tools as an author or co-author, nor cite AI Tools as an author. Authorship implies responsibilities and tasks that can only be attributed to and performed by humans. Each (co-)author is accountable for ensuring that questions related to the accuracy or integrity of any part of the work are appropriately investigated and resolved, and authorship requires the ability to approve the final version of the work and agree to its submission. Authors are also responsible for ensuring that the work is original and has not been previously published, that the stated authors qualify for authorship, and that the work does not infringe third-party rights, and should familiarize themselves with the journal's Publication Ethics policy before they submit.

 

The Use of Generative AI and AI-Assisted Tools in Figures, Images, and Artwork

 

We do not permit the use of Generative AI or AI-assisted tools to create or alter images in submitted manuscripts. This may include enhancing, obscuring, moving, removing, or introducing a specific feature within an image or figure. Adjustments of brightness, contrast, or color balance are acceptable if and as long as they do not obscure or eliminate any information present in the original. Image forensics tools or specialized software might be applied to submitted manuscripts to identify suspected image irregularities.

 

The only exception is if the use of AI or AI-assisted tools is part of the research design or research methods (such as in AI-assisted imaging approaches to generate or interpret the underlying research data). If this is done, such use must be described in a reproducible manner in the methods section. This should include an explanation of how the AI or AI-assisted tools were used in the image creation or alteration process and the name of the model or tool, version and extension numbers, and manufacturer. Authors should adhere to the AI software’s specific usage policies and ensure correct content attribution. Where applicable, authors could be asked to provide pre-AI-adjusted versions of images and/or the composite raw images used to create the final submitted versions for editorial assessment.

 

The use of generative AI or AI-assisted tools in the production of artwork, such as for graphical abstracts, is not permitted. The use of generative AI in the production of cover art may, in some cases, be allowed if the author obtains prior permission from the journal editor and publisher, can demonstrate that all necessary rights have been cleared for the use of the relevant material, and ensures that there is correct content attribution.

 

FOR REVIEWERS

 

The Use of Generative AI and AI-Assisted Technologies in the Journal Peer Review Process

 

When a researcher is invited to review another researcher’s paper submitted to BRANDA: Journal of Community Service and Empowerment, the manuscript must be treated as a confidential document. Reviewers should not upload a submitted manuscript or any part of it into a generative AI tool, as this may violate the authors’ confidentiality and proprietary rights and, where the paper contains personally identifiable information, may breach data privacy rights.

 

This confidentiality requirement extends to the peer review report, as it may contain confidential information about the manuscript and/or the authors. For this reason, reviewers should not upload their peer review reports into an AI tool, even if it is just for the purpose of improving language and readability.

 

Peer review is at the heart of the scientific ecosystem, and BRANDA abides by the highest standards of integrity in this process. Reviewing a scientific manuscript implies responsibilities that can only be attributed to humans. Generative AI or AI-assisted technologies should not be used by reviewers to assist in the scientific review of a paper, as the critical thinking and original assessment needed for peer review are outside of the scope of this technology, and there is a risk that the technology will generate incorrect, incomplete, or biased conclusions about the manuscript. The reviewer is responsible and accountable for the content of the review report.

 

This Journal AI author policy states that authors are allowed to use generative AI and AI-assisted technologies in the manuscript preparation process before submission, but only with appropriate oversight and disclosure, as per our instructions in the journal's Guide for Authors. Reviewers can find such disclosure at the bottom of the paper in a separate section before the list of references.

 

Please note that the journal utilizes identity-protected screening technologies that conform to international data privacy and responsible AI principles, such as those used during the screening process to conduct completeness and plagiarism checks and identify suitable reviewers. These technologies respect author confidentiality. Our systems are subject to rigorous evaluation of bias and are compliant with data privacy and data security requirements.

 

FOR EDITORS

 

The Use of Generative AI and AI-Assisted Technologies in the Journal Editorial Process

 

A submitted manuscript must be treated as a confidential document. Editors should not upload a submitted manuscript or any part of it into a generative AI tool, as this may violate the authors’ confidentiality and proprietary rights and, where the paper contains personally identifiable information, may breach data privacy rights.

 

This confidentiality requirement extends to all communication about the manuscript, including any notification or decision letters, as they may contain confidential information about the manuscript and/or the authors. For this reason, editors should not upload their letters into an AI tool, even if it is just for the purpose of improving language and readability.

 

Peer review is at the heart of the scientific ecosystem, and BRANDA abides by the highest standards of integrity in this process. Managing the editorial evaluation of a scientific manuscript implies responsibilities that can only be attributed to humans. Generative AI or AI-assisted technologies should not be used by editors to assist in the evaluation or decision-making process of a manuscript, as the critical thinking and original assessment needed for this work is outside the scope of this technology, and there is a risk that the technology will generate incorrect, incomplete, or biased conclusions about the manuscript. The editor is responsible and accountable for the editorial process, the final decision, and the communication thereof to the authors.

 

BRANDA's AI author policy states that authors are allowed to use generative AI and AI-assisted technologies in the manuscript preparation process before submission, but only with appropriate oversight and disclosure. Editors can find such disclosure at the bottom of the paper in a separate section before the list of references. If an editor suspects that an author or a reviewer has violated our AI policies, they should inform the publisher.

 

Please note that the journal uses identity-protected AI-assisted technologies which conform to responsible AI principles, such as those used during the screening process to conduct completeness and plagiarism checks and identify suitable reviewers. These tools respect author confidentiality, are evaluated for bias, and comply strictly with data privacy and security requirements.

 

PUBLICATION PROCESS

How BRANDA Uses AI and AI-Assisted Technologies in the Publication Process

As part of our ongoing commitment to enhancing the experience for authors, reviewers, and editors, we continually explore innovative ways to improve the publication process. Our goal is to leverage reliable technology to support our experts in maintaining the highest quality of publications and preserving trust in the content we publish.

 

Currently, AI is utilized in the publication process in the following ways:

 

  • Editorial Support: Editors have access to screening tools that assist in identifying relevant reviewers, matching the scope of submissions, and detecting duplicate submissions.

     

  • Author Support: Authors are supported with tools that help identify suitable thematic sections for their work and streamline submission workflows.

     

  • Technical & Integrity Checks: Our teams use verified tools to support technical checks of submitted papers (adherence to submission guidelines and completeness assessment) and to perform research integrity checks.

     

  • Post-Acceptance Processing: Supporting the post-acceptance stage of publication, including proof preparation, copy editing, and identifying inconsistencies or inaccuracies in the final paper.

We are firmly committed to ensuring that human oversight remains at the core of all decision-making