Authorship & Contributor Policy

Education, Innovation and Social Futures (EISF) is committed to transparent, accurate, and responsible attribution of authorship and scholarly contributions. Authorship should reflect meaningful intellectual contributions to the work and carries responsibility for the integrity of the published article.

Criteria for Authorship

Individuals listed as authors should have made substantial scholarly contributions to the work. Authors should normally have contributed significantly to one or more aspects of the study, such as its conception or design, data collection, analysis, interpretation, or development of the manuscript.

All authors should:

  • make a substantial contribution to the scholarly work;
  • participate in drafting the manuscript or critically revising it for important intellectual content;
  • approve the final version submitted for publication; and
  • accept responsibility for their contributions and the integrity of the published work.

Individuals who do not meet appropriate authorship criteria should not be listed as authors.

Contributor Roles

EISF encourages transparent reporting of individual author contributions. Where appropriate, authors should describe contributions to activities such as:

  • conceptualisation;
  • methodology;
  • data collection or investigation;
  • formal analysis;
  • interpretation;
  • software or technical work;
  • writing of the original draft;
  • review and editing;
  • supervision;
  • project administration; and
  • funding acquisition.

Contribution statements should accurately reflect the work undertaken by each author.

Corresponding Author

The corresponding author is responsible for communication with the journal during submission, peer review, publication, and, where necessary, after publication.

The corresponding author should ensure that all listed authors have approved the manuscript, agreed to its submission, and are informed of significant editorial decisions.

Author Order

The order of authors should be agreed upon collectively by the authors before submission. EISF does not determine author order and expects authors to resolve authorship arrangements responsibly within the research team.

Changes to Authorship

Requests to add, remove, or rearrange authors after submission must be clearly explained and should be agreed upon by all affected authors.

The editorial team may request written confirmation from all authors before approving an authorship change. Requests made after acceptance or publication will be considered carefully and may require formal correction of the scholarly record.

Guest, Gift and Honorary Authorship

Individuals must not be listed as authors solely because of seniority, institutional position, supervision, funding support, professional relationship, or other status where they have not made an appropriate scholarly contribution.

Guest, gift, and honorary authorship are not acceptable.

Ghost Authorship

Individuals who have made substantial contributions that meet authorship criteria should not be intentionally omitted from the author list.

Relevant contributions from individuals who do not qualify for authorship should be transparently acknowledged where appropriate.

Acknowledgements

Individuals who contributed to the work but do not meet authorship criteria may be recognised in an acknowledgement section, subject to appropriate permission where necessary.

Examples may include administrative assistance, technical support, language assistance, or other contributions that do not justify authorship.

Use of Artificial Intelligence

Generative AI systems and AI-assisted technologies cannot be listed as authors because they cannot assume responsibility, provide approval, manage conflicts of interest, or be accountable for the integrity of scholarly work.

Any material use of AI-assisted technologies should be disclosed in accordance with the journal's Generative AI & AI-Assisted Technologies Policy.

Authorship Disputes

EISF does not normally adjudicate disputes concerning authorship or contribution. Where a dispute cannot be resolved among the authors, the journal may request clarification or appropriate institutional involvement before continuing editorial processing.

The journal may suspend consideration of a manuscript while a significant authorship dispute remains unresolved.

Author Accountability

All authors share responsibility for ensuring that the manuscript is accurate, ethically conducted, appropriately documented, and consistent with the journal's publication and research-integrity requirements.