Article Correction, Withdrawal, Retraction, and Removal

Article Correction: A corrigendum may be published to correct an error or omission introduced by the authors that does not materially affect the article’s integrity, validity, or principal findings. The corrigendum must be prepared with the knowledge and agreement of all authors. An erratum may be issued by the journal to correct an error introduced during editing, production, or publication. All corrections will be linked to the original article, and the original article may also be updated with a clear notice and date of correction.

Article Withdrawal: An accepted article or article in press may be withdrawn before final publication because of significant errors, accidental duplicate submission or publication, violations of journal policy, ethical concerns, or editorial or production errors. When an article is withdrawn, its content may be replaced with a withdrawal notice explaining the reason for the action and, where appropriate, linking to the relevant journal policy. Withdrawal decisions are made by the Editor-in-Chief and Editorial Board in accordance with applicable publication-ethics guidance.

Article Retraction: A published article may be retracted when its findings are unreliable because of significant error, fabrication, falsification, plagiarism, unauthorized use of data or copyrighted material, duplicate publication, manipulated peer review, serious ethical violations, or other forms of research or publication misconduct. A retraction notice will state the reason for the retraction, identify who initiated it, and link to the original article. The original article will normally remain accessible as part of the scholarly record but will be clearly and prominently marked as “Retracted.”

Article Removal: Removal of a published article from the journal’s online archive will be considered only in exceptional circumstances, such as when the article contains defamatory or unlawful material, is subject to a court order, infringes legal rights, violates participant privacy, or presents a serious and immediate risk to public health or safety. The article’s bibliographic metadata will ordinarily be retained, while its full text will be replaced with a notice explaining that the content has been removed for legal or other compelling reasons.

These measures are applied in accordance with the journal’s publication-ethics policies and relevant guidance from the Committee on Publication Ethics (COPE). Their purpose is to correct the scholarly record transparently while preserving its integrity, accuracy, and accessibility.