Paper Refereeing Code of Ethics

1. The fairness, promptness, and quality of paper refereeing are directly related with the reputation of the Association, and therefore, refereeing and paper approval/denial must be conducted with the following in mind at all times.


2. Even if the content asserted by the paper contends against the standpoint and/or perspective of the referee, the content must be endorsed if the conclusion can be said to have been validly derived from the provided conditions, data, etc.


3. The referee should be aware that they may have incomplete knowledge, and read papers with the principle of “giving the benefit of the doubt.”


4. When commenting on a paper, always do so with the intent of helping the author improve the paper as well as to become a better researcher.


5. Mathematical and logical papers are not the only ones that are scientifically or academically valuable. In fact, some papers with mathematical or logical descriptions may appear to be solid, but have little substance in actuality. Therefore, papers must be judged on the novelty of their content. Even papers using existing methodology may yield new data, software, or systems, and if such results are valuable, they should be evaluated as such.


6. The referee must be aware that prompt refereeing is one of his/her responsibilities. The Association receives papers from some researchers that conduct their research day and night in order to submit their paper, earn their doctorate, and join the ranks of researchers. When refereeing, the referee must keep in mind that one of the goals of this Association is to increase the number of researchers of natural language processing and to further cultivate this research field, and that fair and prompt refereeing contributes to achieving this goal.