Peer Review Process

  1. Journal of Health and Behavioral Science (JHBS) employs a double-blind review method, namely that both reviewers and author(s) identities will be concealed from each other.
  2. Initial Screening. All submitted manuscripts will be screened by the Chief Editor to determine whether the manuscript abides by the focus and scope of JHBS. Manuscripts that do not meet the basic requirements will be rejected without further review.
  3. If the manuscript meets these two criteria, it is checked for plagiarism or duplicate publication. After confirming its result, it is forwarded to two investigators in the field with relevant knowledge.
  4. Peer-review. All manuscripts that pass the initial screening stage, will be distributed to two experts in the relevant field to undergo a double-blind peer-review.
  5. First Decision. A decision on a peer-reviewed manuscript will be given once both reviewers have submitted their review reports. In the event that both reviewers have differing opinions about the manuscript, the final decision will be handed over to the Chief Editor. At this stage, the author(s) will receive at least one of this decision: accepted; revision required; or rejected.
  6. Revision Stage. Manuscripts that have been recommended for revision will be returned to the submitting author. Author(s) will have up to 1 month to revise the manuscripts. The revision process will be limited to a maximum of two rounds.
  7. Final Decision. If the author(s) fail to meet the revision requirements after the second round, the manuscript will be rejected. All accepted manuscripts will go through the final editing and layout process.
  8. Withdrawal of Manuscripts. Author is not allowed to withdraw submitted manuscripts, because the withdrawal is waste of valuable resources. Editors and referees of JHBS had spent a great deal of time and efforts processing submitted manuscript. Thus, in case of manuscript withdrawal, JHBS applies the following rules.

    • If author still requests withdrawal of his/her manuscript when the manuscript is still in the peer-reviewing process, author will be fined by paying IDR 100.000 per manuscript as withdrawal penalty.
    • If author requests withdrawal of his/her manuscript after the manuscript is accepted for publication, author will be fined by paying IDR 250.000 per manuscript and blacklisted from publication at JHBS for 2 years.
    • Withdrawal of manuscript is only allowed after withdrawal penalty has been fully paid to JHBS.
    • If author doesn't agree to pay the penalty, the author and his/her affiliation will be blacklisted for publication in JHBS. Even, his/her previously published articles will be taken off our online system.

    Please note that it is very unethical to withdraw a submitted manuscript from one journal if accepted by another journal. As JHBS continuously attempts to promote scientific publishing with integrity in Indonesia, we hope that you will carefully consider the consequences before conducting unethical publishing practice.