AI Usage Policy

CREATE: Contemporary Research in Education and Teaching recognizes that Generative Artificial Intelligence (AI) and other AI-assisted technologies can provide useful support in scholarly communication and manuscript preparation. At the same time, the journal recognizes that inappropriate or undisclosed use of AI may compromise academic integrity, authorship, confidentiality, research ethics, and the reliability of the scholarly record.

This policy provides guidance for authors, reviewers, editors, and other participants in the publication process regarding the responsible use of Generative AI and AI-assisted technologies (hereafter referred to as "AI Tools"). The policy is intended to promote transparency, accountability, human oversight, confidentiality, and research integrity.

CREATE: Contemporary Research in Education and Teaching will continue to monitor developments in AI technologies and scholarly publishing practices and may revise this policy when necessary to reflect emerging ethical, legal, and professional standards.

CREATE: Contemporary Research in Education and Teaching recognizes that AI Tools may assist authors in certain aspects of manuscript preparation. Authors may use AI Tools for appropriate purposes such as improving language and grammar, identifying spelling or punctuation errors, organizing ideas, assisting with preliminary literature exploration, summarizing information for further human verification, or improving the clarity and readability of text.

However, the use of AI Tools must not replace the author's intellectual contribution, critical thinking, scholarly judgment, research expertise, or responsibility for the manuscript. Authors remain responsible for independently evaluating, editing, verifying, and approving all content submitted to the journal.

AI-generated text, ideas, analyses, citations, or other outputs must not be incorporated into a manuscript without appropriate human verification. Authors must ensure that the final manuscript accurately represents their own scholarly contribution.

Authors are fully responsible and accountable for the entire content of their submitted manuscript, regardless of whether AI Tools were used during its preparation. This responsibility includes the following:

• Verification of Accuracy: Authors must carefully review and verify all AI-generated or AI-assisted outputs. Particular attention must be given to factual claims, interpretations, statistical information, citations, references, quotations, and other scholarly content because AI Tools may generate inaccurate, misleading, incomplete, or fabricated information.

• Original Scholarly Contribution: Authors must ensure that the manuscript reflects their own original analysis, interpretation, arguments, research findings, and intellectual contribution. AI Tools must not be used to generate or substitute for the core scholarly contribution of the authors.

• Human Oversight: Authors must maintain meaningful human oversight throughout the use of AI Tools and remain responsible for all decisions concerning the content, interpretation, and presentation of the manuscript.

• Transparency and Disclosure: Authors must transparently disclose substantive use of AI Tools when such use contributes to the preparation or development of the manuscript, in accordance with this policy.

• Data Security and Privacy: Authors must ensure that the use of AI Tools does not violate privacy, confidentiality, intellectual property rights, research-participant protections, contractual obligations, or other applicable legal and ethical requirements.

An AI Tool cannot be listed as an author or co-author of a manuscript submitted to CREATE: Contemporary Research in Education and Teaching. Authorship requires intellectual contribution, responsibility for the work, participation in the scholarly process, and the ability to approve the final manuscript and respond to questions concerning its accuracy and integrity.

Authors must ensure that all individuals listed as authors meet the journal's authorship requirements. The use of an AI Tool does not transfer or reduce the authors' responsibility for the manuscript.

Authors must disclose substantive use of AI Tools in manuscript preparation. Where required, the disclosure should be provided in a separate statement at the end of the manuscript, before the reference list, or through the appropriate declaration field in the submission system.

The disclosure should identify:

• the name of the AI Tool used, such as ChatGPT, Grammarly, or another AI-assisted application;

• the purpose for which the AI Tool was used, such as language improvement, translation, organization of content, or assistance with preliminary drafting;

• the general nature or extent of the AI assistance; and

• a statement confirming that the authors reviewed, verified, edited, and remain responsible for the final content.

Basic use of conventional tools for spelling, grammar, punctuation, or formatting correction generally does not require a separate AI disclosure when such tools do not generate substantive content. However, authors should disclose more extensive AI-assisted content generation or transformation when it materially contributes to the manuscript.

Authors must independently verify every reference, citation, quotation, DOI, bibliographic detail, and source suggested or generated by an AI Tool before including it in a manuscript. AI Tools may produce references that are incomplete, inaccurate, outdated, or entirely fabricated.

Authors remain responsible for ensuring that all references accurately support the claims for which they are cited and that the reference list complies with the journal's requirements.

Authors must clearly identify and appropriately disclose any AI-generated or AI-assisted visual material used in a manuscript. AI Tools must not be used to fabricate, manipulate, obscure, remove, or selectively alter research evidence, experimental results, photographs, figures, or other research data in a manner that could misrepresent the underlying evidence.

Where AI is itself part of the research design or methodology, such as AI-assisted imaging, computational analysis, image generation as an experimental intervention, or another legitimate research application, its use must be described clearly and reproducibly in the Methods section. Authors should identify the relevant tool, version where applicable, procedures, parameters, and other information necessary to understand or reproduce the use of AI.

A manuscript received for peer review is a confidential document. Reviewers must protect the confidentiality of manuscripts and all information associated with the review process.

Reviewers are strictly prohibited from uploading or entering a submitted manuscript, substantial portions of a manuscript, unpublished research data, figures, tables, reviewer reports, decision letters, or other confidential material into public or external AI Tools where confidentiality and data protection cannot be assured.

Peer review requires independent scholarly judgment. Reviewers are responsible for evaluating manuscripts critically and objectively based on their expertise. AI Tools must not replace the reviewer's own assessment of the manuscript.

Reviewers should not rely on AI-generated assessments as a substitute for their professional judgment, particularly in evaluating the validity of research methods, interpretation of findings, originality, ethical compliance, or scholarly contribution.

The reviewer remains fully responsible and accountable for the content and recommendations contained in the review report.

If a reviewer uses an AI-assisted tool for limited administrative or language-related purposes, the reviewer must ensure that such use does not compromise manuscript confidentiality, author privacy, intellectual property, or the integrity of the review process.

AI Tools must not be used to make the substantive recommendation regarding acceptance, revision, or rejection of a manuscript. The final assessment and recommendation must be based on the reviewer's own expert evaluation.

Editors must protect the confidentiality of submitted manuscripts and all information associated with the editorial process. Editors are strictly prohibited from uploading submitted manuscripts or confidential portions of manuscripts into AI Tools where the confidentiality and security of the material cannot be assured.

This confidentiality requirement also applies to reviewer reports, editorial correspondence, decision letters, unpublished research data, and other confidential information obtained during the editorial process.

Editorial evaluation and decision-making require human judgment and professional responsibility. Editors must not delegate substantive editorial decisions to AI Tools.

Editors are fully responsible for evaluating reviewer recommendations, assessing the scholarly and ethical quality of manuscripts, managing conflicts of interest, and making or communicating editorial decisions.

AI Tools must not determine whether a manuscript is accepted, rejected, or returned for revision. Any use of AI-assisted technologies by editors must remain subordinate to independent human editorial judgment.

If an editor becomes aware of a possible violation of this AI Usage Policy, including undisclosed substantive AI-generated content, inappropriate manipulation of research material, or unauthorized use of confidential manuscripts, the editor may request clarification or additional information from the relevant author, reviewer, or editorial participant.

Where appropriate, the matter may be referred to the Editor-in-Chief or Editorial Board for further consideration in accordance with the journal's publication ethics procedures.

The use of AI Tools must not compromise the integrity of research or the reliability of the scholarly record. Authors remain responsible for the authenticity and accuracy of research data, findings, analyses, interpretations, and conclusions.

AI Tools must not be used to fabricate or falsify data, manipulate research findings, create misleading evidence, generate fraudulent references, or conceal substantive intellectual contributions originating from other individuals.

Where AI is incorporated as an object, instrument, analytical method, or component of the research itself, the authors must provide sufficient methodological information to allow readers and other researchers to understand the role of AI in the study.

Transparency is a fundamental principle of responsible AI use in scholarly publishing. Authors, reviewers, and editors should be able to distinguish between legitimate assistance from AI Tools and substantive scholarly work performed by humans.

Disclosure of AI use does not transfer responsibility to the AI Tool. Human authors, reviewers, and editors remain accountable for their respective contributions and decisions throughout the publication process.

All users of AI Tools must consider applicable intellectual property, copyright, privacy, confidentiality, and data-protection requirements. Confidential or personally identifiable information should not be entered into an AI Tool unless the user has a legitimate basis and adequate safeguards for doing so.

Authors are responsible for ensuring that AI-assisted content does not improperly reproduce protected material or infringe the rights of third parties. The use of AI Tools must comply with applicable institutional, legal, and ethical requirements.

Where a potential violation of this policy is identified, the journal may conduct an appropriate editorial assessment. Depending on the nature and seriousness of the issue, the journal may request clarification, require correction or disclosure, return a manuscript for revision, reject a manuscript, or take appropriate post-publication action where necessary.

Serious cases involving research misconduct, fabrication, falsification, plagiarism, manipulation of scholarly materials, or significant breaches of confidentiality may be handled under the journal's broader publication ethics and misconduct procedures.

Because AI technologies and their applications in scholarly communication continue to evolve rapidly, CREATE: Contemporary Research in Education and Teaching will periodically review this policy and revise it when necessary.

Any revision will seek to balance the legitimate benefits of AI-assisted technologies with the fundamental principles of academic integrity, human accountability, confidentiality, transparency, intellectual property, research ethics, and the reliability of the scholarly record.

CREATE: Contemporary Research in Education and Teaching supports the responsible and transparent use of AI Tools while maintaining human responsibility as the central principle of scholarly publishing. AI may assist academic work, but it cannot replace human authorship, critical thinking, scholarly judgment, ethical responsibility, or accountability for the published record.