Articles for publication in the Polish Libraries may be submitted to the executive editor of the journal: s.zuchowski@bn.org.pl. The deadline for submitting texts for publication in Polish Libraries vol. 10/2022 is April 30th, 2022.
Only original, previously unpublished research articles are accepted (academic reviews included). They should be formatted according to the guidelines of the journal and contain an abstract (summary) and keywords.
If needed, the article may be subject to a preliminary internal peer review by an expert from the National Library of Poland.
The manuscript is tested with the use of anti-plagiarism software (Antyplagiat) to avoid ghostwriting and guest authorship and to verify the originality of the article.
If the result of the initial assessment is positive, the manuscript is subject to external double-blind peer reviews by two experts. They are neither employed by the published nor members of the Advisory Board of the journal. Whenever possible, an article gets at least one review from a scholar affiliated to a foreign research institution.
The reviewers do not know the identity of the author(s) and vice versa. Passages from the article that might reveal the identity of the author(s) are temporally removed from the text for the reviewing process and reinstated afterwards.
The reviewers are supposed to disclose any potential competing interests before agreeing to review a submission.
The reviews are submitted in writing with the use of a standardized review form provided by the editor.
Two external peer reviewers evaluate the academic worth of the text in six categories (references, significance, methodology, clarity, coherence, conclusions) on a scale from 1 (worst) to 5 (best), and conclude by choosing one of the three options, stating that the article: a) may be published as it is; b) may be published provided that the changes suggested by the reviewer should be introduced; c) may not be published.
The editor removes the reviewers’ names from the reviews and communicates their results to the author(s).
If both reviews are negative (c), the article is rejected.
If both reviews are unconditionally positive (a), the article is accepted with no need for further modifications by the author.
If one or both of the reviews are conditionally positive (c), the article is only accepted after the author has improved the text as suggested by the reviewer(s).
If one of the reviews is unconditionally positive (a) or conditionally positive (b), while the other one is negative (c), the editorial board may either reject the article or subject it to a supplementary double-blind peer review by a third expert (following the rules described above).
Upon completion of the reviewing process, the editor eventually confirms that the article meets all the requirements of the reviewers and may undergo the rest of the publishing process (editing, authorization, typesetting, proofreading etc.).
The reviewers’ names are only made known after the publication of the issue of the journal they have reviewed articles for. They are added en bloc to the list of reviewers, without linking their names to specific articles.
