Peer Review Process

Desultanah: Journal of Education and Social Sciences employs a double-blind peer review process to ensure the integrity, impartiality, and academic quality of all submitted manuscripts. Both the identity of the reviewers and the authors are concealed throughout the review process.

1. Initial Screening

Upon submission, each manuscript is evaluated by the Editor-in-Chief or Managing Editor to assess its alignment with the journal's scope, originality, and adherence to submission guidelines. Manuscripts that do not meet basic requirements may be desk-rejected without external review.

2. Plagiarism Check

All submissions are subjected to plagiarism detection using reliable software tools. Manuscripts with significant similarity or overlap with previously published works will be returned to the author for correction or rejected outright, depending on severity.

3. Reviewer Assignment

Eligible manuscripts are forwarded to two independent reviewers who are experts in the relevant field. The reviewers are selected based on their academic credentials, subject expertise, and absence of conflict of interest. The journal maintains a database of qualified national and international reviewers.

4. Review Guidelines and Criteria

Reviewers are asked to assess the manuscript based on the following criteria:

  • Originality and scholarly contribution

  • Theoretical framework and conceptual clarity

  • Methodological rigor and data validity

  • Quality of analysis and interpretation

  • Structure, coherence, and clarity of writing

  • Relevance to the scope of the journal

  • Ethical soundness of the research

Reviewers provide written comments and recommendations using one of the following categories:

  • Accept as is

  • Accept with minor revisions

  • Revise and resubmit (major revisions required)

  • Reject

5. Editorial Decision

The final decision is made by the Editor-in-Chief or a designated member of the editorial board, based on the reviewers’ reports. Authors will be notified of the decision along with anonymized reviewer comments to guide potential revisions.

6. Revision Process

Authors who are invited to revise their manuscripts must submit a revised version along with a detailed response letter that addresses each reviewer comment point by point. The revised manuscript may be sent back to the original reviewers for re-evaluation, especially in cases of major revisions.

7. Final Acceptance and Proofreading

Once accepted, the manuscript undergoes copyediting and formatting. Authors are given the opportunity to review page proofs before publication to ensure accuracy. Only minor textual corrections are permitted at this stage.

8. Publication

The final version of the manuscript is published online as part of the journal’s regular issue. All articles are published under an open access license and are assigned a unique DOI to ensure global discoverability and citation.

Double-Blind Review Policy

  • Authors must ensure that their manuscript does not contain any identifying information (names, affiliations, self-citations).

  • Reviewers must not attempt to identify the authors and must declare any potential conflicts of interest if they suspect the authors’ identity.

This peer review process is designed to uphold the principles of fairness, academic rigor, and transparency, in accordance with the ethical standards recommended by the Committee on Publication Ethics (COPE).