TR Index adopts the Committee on Publication Ethics’ (COPE) “Code of Conduct and Best Practice Guidelines for Journal Editors” and “Code of Conduct for Journal Publishers” to provide ethical assurance in scientific periodical publishing. In accordance with the TR Index criteria, journals are expected to comply with international standards with COPE, and editors are expected to ensure that each study is approved by the relevant boards and commissions prior to the study and to request documents.

In this context, as of 2020, 

(i) Ethics committee approval must be obtained for research in all disciplines that require ethics committee approval, and this approval must be stated and documented in the article. 

(ii) In studies requiring ethics committee approval, information about the permission (name of the committee, date and number) should be included in the methodology section and on one of the first/last pages of the article; in case reports, information on the signature of the informed consent form should be included in the article.

The studies requiring Ethics Committee approval are as follows:

1) All kinds of research conducted with qualitative or quantitative approaches that require data collection from participants using survey, interview, focus group study, observation, experiment, interview techniques

2) Use of humans and animals (including materials/data) for experimental or other scientific purposes,

3) Clinical trials on humans,

4) Research on animals,

5) Retrospective studies in accordance with the law on the protection of personal data,

Also;

In case reports, it is necessary to indicate that the “informed consent form” has been attained, to obtain and indicate permission from the owners for the use of scales, questionnaires, photographs belonging to others, and to indicate that copyright regulations are complied with the intellectual and artistic works used. 

For any research conducted within the above scope, the Ethics Committee Decision must be uploaded to the system in pdf format with the manuscript. In addition, it is mandatory to include the Ethics Committee Decision information in the manuscript (from which institution, on which date and with which decision or number the permission was obtained).