The AJHS is the owner of the iThenticate Plagiarism Checking Software, which is powered by Turnitin and allows it to check each submitted work for potential plagiarism. The document must be uploaded to our system together with the plagiarism reports that the software generates. The final decision is made by editors based on the reports of plagiarism. Manuscripts may be asked to be edited by the authors, or they may be removed from consideration altogether. The writers bear full responsibility for any plagiarism in their manuscripts. The editorial staff will determine whether to reject the article from the Identification & Dealing with Research Misconduct desk or accept it and move on to the next round of peer review based on the degree of plagiarism.

Plagiarism is the act of rewriting someone else's ideas, beliefs, or declarations without explicitly citing the original source's author. In scientific writing, it is considered unethical. Any text that includes someone else's opinions, ideas, or research should be clearly credited, and any image, figure, or graphic that is taken from another source and reproduced needs to have the owner of the copyright's consent. Manuscripts containing plagiarism of any kind will not be accepted by the AJHS editorial board.

When plagiarism is found, the editor will alert the author to the potential repercussions and request a revision of the document that replaces the copied text with original material. The editorial board will act based on the content if the authors don't make the necessary corrections under the following guidelines. 

Plagiarism Offense Type I (small Offense): An article is considered to have a small plagiarism offense if any part of it (less than two whole paragraphs or less than 15% of the entire material) contains plagiarism without substantial information or insight. Penalties: The author(s) receives a final warning that carries the potential for type II and type III offense penalties. They are also requested to resubmit the paper after revising any copied text and properly citing the source work.

Plagiarism Offense Type II (Intermediate Offense): An article is considered to have intermediate plagiarism if a substantial portion of it (more than two complete paragraphs or less than 25% of the entire material) is plagiarized without important information or concept. Penalties: The paper is rejected upon submission, and the author(s) will not be permitted to resubmit the work for a minimum of one year.

Plagiarism Offense Type III (serious Offense): An article is considered to have a serious plagiarism offense if it contains significant facts or ideas that have been plagiarized, accounting for more than 25% of the article's overall content.