1. Human and Animal Research
All research involving humans and animals must have been approved by the authors' institutional review board or equivalent committee, and that board must be named by the authors. In the case of human participants, informed consent must have been obtained, and all clinical investigation must have been conducted according to the principles expressed in the Declaration of Helsinki. Authors should submit a statement from the ethics committee or institutional review board indicating approval of the research. We also encourage authors to submit a sample of a patient consent form, and may require submission on particular occasions.
2. Competing Interests
Authors are asked at submission to declare whether they have any financial, personal, or professional interests that could be construed to have influenced their paper. Reviewers are also asked to declare any interests that might interfere with their objective assessment of a manuscript. Any relevant competing interests of authors must be available to editors and reviewers during the review process and will be stated in published articles.
3. Prior Publication
When submitting an article, all authors are asked to indicate that they have not submitted a similar manuscript for publication elsewhere. If related work has been submitted elsewhere, then a copy must be included with the article submitted to Psychiatry Investigation. Reviewers will be asked to comment on the overlap between related submissions.
4. Reviewer and Editor Exclusions
Upon submission of a manuscript, authors are asked if they wish to exclude any specific academic editors or reviewers from the peer review of their article. The editorial team will respect these requests so long as this does not interfere with the objective and thorough assessment of the article. See the relevant guidelines for reviewers.
5. Scientific and Editorial Misconduct
Scientific misconduct is defined as "fabrication, falsification, plagiarism, or other practices that seriously deviate from those that are commonly accepted within the academic community for proposing, conducting, or reporting research." In cases where there is a suspicion or allegation of scientific misconduct or fraudulent research in manuscripts submitted for review, Psychiatry Investigation reserves the right to pass along these manuscripts to the sponsoring or funding institution or other appropriate authority for investigation. Although Psychiatry Investigation recognizes its responsibility toensure that the suspicion of misconduct has been addressed, we do not ourselves make such determinations. The Psychiatry Investigation is a member of the Korean Association of Medical Journal Editors (KAMJE). Cases of research or publication misconduct may also be referred to KAMJE in an anonymised format.
6. Reporting Guidelines for Specific Study Designs
a. Clinical Trials
Authors must submit original protocols as supporting information to allow editors and reviewers to assess manuscripts fully. Any deviation from the protocol must be explained.
We require that authors of clinical trials adhere to the CONSORT reporting guidelines appropriate to their trial design. Please check the CONSORT statement Web site (http://www.consort-statement.org/) for information on the appropriate guidelines for specific trial types. All reports of the results of randomized clinical trials should include the CONSORT flow diagram as Figure 1, and authors should complete and submit the checklist contained within the CONSORT statement. Information on statistical methods or participants beyond what is indicated in the CONSORT statement should be reported according to the specifications indicated in the Methods section under Preparation of Manuscripts.
Psychiatry Investigation supports the position of the International Committee of Medical Journal Editors (ICMJE) on trial registration. All trials initiated after 1 July 2005 must be registered prospectively in a publicly accessible registry (i.e., before patient recruitment has begun), or they will not be considered for publication. For trials initiated before 1 July 2005, all trials must be registered before submission to our journals. The trial's registration number must be provided at the time of submission.
b. Systematic Reviews and Meta-Analyses of Randomized Controlled Trials
Reports of meta-analyses of randomized controlled studies should use the QUOROM statement as a guide (Moher D, Cook DJ, Eastwood S, Olkin I, Rennie D, Stroup DF. Improving the quality of reports of meta-analyses of randomized controlled trials: The QUOROM statement. Lancet 1999;354:1896900), and should include a copy of the QUOROM checklist.
c. Epidemiological Studies
For reports of epidemiological studies, you should consult the STROBE initiative (http://www.strobe-statement.org/).
d. Microarray Experiments
Reports of microarray experiments should conform to the MIAME guideline (http://www.mged.org/Workgroups/MIAME/miame.html) and the data from the experiments must be deposited in a publicly accessible database.
7. Publication of Studies Sponsored by Pharmaceutical Companies.
We support the development of guidelines for the reporting of studies sponsored by pharmaceutical companies (Current Medical Research and Opinion, 2003).
8. Embargoes and the Media
Authors are of course at liberty to present their findings at medical or scientific conferences ahead of publication. We recommend, however, that authors not contact the media or respond to such contact unless an article has been accepted for publication and an embargo date has been established. Respect for press embargoes will help to ensure that your work is reported accurately in the popular media. If a journalist has covered a piece of work ahead of publication, this will not affect consideration of the work for publication.