editorial policy

The journal is currently in the process of transferring to the new publisher – Elsevier, and we will be using the Digital Commons platform.

This is related to our constant striving to improve the quality of the journal and its publication services.

The journal’s website address – www.balticsportscience.com – will remain unchanged. The current issue will be published very shortly, and all previous issues can be found at the website.

Regrettably, the submissions system ScholarOne is not working anymore.

We have launched the new system at temporary website  https://dcgdansk.bepress.com/journal/

The papers that have already been submitted via ScholarOne by the end of December 2021 will be processed in the meantime outside the system, naturally keeping all publication and ethical standards. 

Baltic Journal of Health and Physical Activity, an official journal published by Gdansk University of Physical Education and Sport (in Polish Akademia Wychowania Fizycznego i Sportu im. Jędrzeja Śniadeckiego w Gdańsku), is a peer-reviewed on-line journal featuring original scientific articles based on original research as well as review and viewpoint articles.

The journal is international in nature and is not limited to any geographic region as for topics or authors.

All articles are available in consistence with the Open Access policy, according Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-NoDerivs 4.0 (CC BY-NC-ND 4.0). For more information go to http://creativecommons.org/licenses/

THE EDITORIAL BOARD includes specialists from many countries, representing various related specialties, guaranteeing a high scholarly level of the published articles. BJHPA is published quarterly. BJHPA is indexed in many databases.

THE SCOPE OF OUR INTEREST includes, among others:
• Biomedical sciences in sport and physical activity;
• Sports training;
• Theory of sport;
• Humanities, physical culture and physical education;
• Public health;
• Sports medicine;
• Movement therapy;
• Sport and recreation.

CATEGORIES OF ARTICLES
Manuscripts submitted for possible publication should be clearly identified as being intended for publication in one of the following categories:
• Original articles: reports of previously unpublished results from scientific experiments or research conducted by the authors in order to confirm or refute a clearly identified hypothesis. A vast majority of articles published in a given issue will belong to this category.
• Review articles: reports on the current state of knowledge in a given area or a field of study, especially current controversies, theoretical and practical approaches to the issues, unresolved problems, etc., with carefully selected references to the literature. Such articles are typically commissioned by the editors of BJHPA, though an unsolicited review article may be accepted if it is exceptionally interesting and carefully prepared.
• Viewpoint articles: authorial discussions of important issues, controversies, and schools of thought in the area of physical education, sport training, physiotherapy; also, educational (training) articles.

The journal will not consider for publication  submissions and redundant publications. 

ETHICS
Baltic Journal of Health and Physical Activity pays great attention to ethical issues. We agree that publication of an article in a peer-reviewed journal is an essential building block in the development of a coherent and respected network of knowledge. It is a direct reflection of the quality of work of the author and the institutions that support them. Peer-reviewed articles support and embody the scientific method. It is, therefore, important to agree upon standards of the expected ethical behaviour.
To minimize the risk of non-ethical behaviour, the following rules are implemented:

  • the Journal uses the advanced editorial system;
  • authors declare an existing / non-existing conflict of interest which ensures transparency and reliability;
  • “ghostwriting” and “guest authorship” as manifestations of scholarly unreliability are unacceptable;
  • a double blind peer-review system is used;
  • reviewers cannot be affiliated in the same institutions as the authors and /or have joint publications over the last 4 years;
  • plagiarism, understood to be an intentional act of quoting or copying parts of another author’s work without attribution, is unacceptable; if found, it results in rejecting or retracting (if published) the article;
  • duplicate publications by the same author are acceptable only provided that they, although based on the same research results, vary and bring a new point of view; otherwise, it is treated as self-plagiarism, which is, same as plagiarism, unacceptable;
  • in special cases, the Journal allows re-publication of the non-English material originally published elsewhere translated into English; however, the consent of the original publisher and the corresponding annotation are required;
  • authors may submit results already presented at meetings as abstracts or posters; however, the editor must decide whether such pre-publication of data would somehow compromise the publication of the article;
  • trivial contribution would not be sufficient to confer the status of author. Lesser contributions to the work can be recognized by clearly crediting such a person as a “contributor,” rather than an “author”. An author submitting an article is required to identify all co-authors and any other contributors (and to obtain consent from them for the publication of the article);
  • in case of a complaint is made against our author, the general rule is that the journal editor should contact the author about whom the complaint has been made, and the author should be given ab opportunity to respond/comment. The editor may decide on the basis of the author’s response (e.g. if the author is responsive, articulates a clear and convincing position – and may draw inferences from the opposite as well); in extreme situations, after a thorough analysis, the Journal can decide to withdraw the paper;
  • if the Editor Board’s members or editors submit as authors, they are subject to the same procedure as other authors.

SUBMISSION
All papers must be submitted through Digital Commons tool (note: the journal is in transition phase at the moment - by the end of January all manuscripts should be submitted via e-mail directly to wydawnictwo@awf.gda.pl).

Both, the submission process and the publication are free of charge.

The editors will accept only those papers which are acknowledged by the reviewers and the editors to be thematically appropriate and making an original contribution to progress in science and/or educational or training practice, or to have educational (training) value.

Submission of the paper means that: • the submitted manuscript is the author’s own work; • the research results have not been published or submitted for publication elsewhere; • all the authors named on the title page have consented to the submission of this work for publication in BJHPA.

Received manuscripts are first examined by the BJHPA editors. Manuscripts considered clearly unsuitable for publication in BJHPA are returned to the author without further review. Manuscripts that are incomplete or not prepared in accordance with the Instructions for Authors (e.g. non-anonymized) will also be returned, though in such a case they may be resubmitted when corrected.

REVIEW PROCESS takes place in the following way:

  • First, the submission is the pre-reviewed by the Editorial Office (checking the completeness of the submission, suitability of the subject matter, etc.). The Editorial Office reserves the right to decline further processing of the manuscript without explaining the reason, even if it meets all the requirements.
  • The registered manuscript is sent to two qualified reviewers for scientific evaluation. The reviewers are specialists in the field covered by the article.
  • The reviewers are chosen by the editors of the journal. During a submission process authors are asked to suggest preferred and non-preferred reviewers, although the editors do not guarantee sending/not sending the article to the suggested reviewers. The Reviewer selected should not be related to the Author, come from the same research centre or be involved in the same research project as the Author. Authors will not be informed about editors’ decisions in this regard. Names of all reviewers, without revealing who has reviewed which article, are published alphabetically once a year in the fourth, final issue of the number for the given year.
  • A double-blind review process is our standard, i.e. neither the reviewer knows the name(s) of the author(s) nor the author(s) are informed who is going to review their article.
  • The review is submitted to the editorial office on-line. Manuscripts are accepted unconditionally if both reviewers agree that the work can be published in its present form. If the reviewers disagree or feel that the manuscript should be accepted subject to specific corrections, the editors may decide to send the work to another reviewer or return it to the author for correction. The ultimate decision to accept for publication, accept subject to correction, or reject a work is the prerogative of the editors and cannot be appealed. The editors are not obliged to justify their decision. 
  • The evaluation process should not take longer than 3-4 months on average, but the editors cannot guarantee an editorial decision within any established deadline. Authors can check the status of their manuscript (awaiting reviewer selection, awaiting reviewer scores, etc.) online in their Author’s centre. Additionally, Authors are notified by e-mail about every decision made by the Editorial Office regarding their manuscript.

PERMISSIONS
Materials taken from other sources must be accompanied by a written statement from the first author and the publisher of the original publication giving permission for reproduction in BJHPA. Permission should be obtained in writing from at least one author of papers still in press, and from the source of any unpublished data or personal communications used in the article.

COPYRIGHT TRANSFER
Upon acceptance of a manuscript for publication, the authors transfer copyright to Gdansk University of Physical Education and Sport. Once an article is accepted for publication in BJHPA, the information it contains cannot be revealed in the public media until the publication date of the issue in which the article appears. Upon acceptance, all published manuscripts become permanent property of Gdansk University of Physical Education and Sport, the Publisher of BJHPA, and may not be published elsewhere without the Publisher’s written permission.

FINANCIAL DISCLOSURE
Authors are obliged to present information on sources of funding of the research, the contribution of scientific and research institutions, associations or other establishments.

DISCLAIMER
Every effort is made by the Publisher and the Editorial Board to see that no inaccurate or misleading data, opinions or statements appear in BJHPA. Nevertheless, the substantive content of the articles and advertisements remain the sole responsibility of the author, sponsor, or advertiser concerned. Accordingly, neither the Publisher nor the Editorial Board accept any liability whatsoever for the consequences of any such inaccurate or misleading data, opinion, or statement.

CONTINUITY
In case the journal is no longer published a digital backup and preservation of access to the journal content will be provided at the Gdansk University of Physical Education and Sport website as well as via CLOCKSS.