Privacy
Learning Communities — International Journal of Learning in Social Contexts respects the privacy of authors, reviewers, editors, readers, and other users of the journal website. The journal is committed to handling personal information responsibly, securely, transparently, and only for legitimate scholarly publishing and administrative purposes.
This Privacy Statement explains what information may be collected through the journal website and submission system, how that information may be used, when it may be shared, and the choices available to users regarding their personal data.
Information We May Collect
The journal may collect personal information that users voluntarily provide when registering on the journal website, submitting a manuscript, participating in peer review, communicating with the editorial office, or otherwise interacting with journal services.
Such information may include:
- Name and title
- Email address
- Institutional affiliation
- Department or organization
- Country or geographic information
- ORCID iD or other researcher identifiers
- Academic interests and areas of expertise
- Biographical information supplied by the user
- Postal address or contact information where required
- Username and account information
- Manuscript and submission information
- Reviewer reports and editorial correspondence
- Authorship, contributor, and funding information
- Conflict-of-interest declarations
- Research ethics and related documentation where applicable
Automatically Collected Information
When users access the journal website, certain technical information may be collected automatically by the website, hosting environment, journal management system, or associated services.
This information may include IP address, browser type, device type, operating system, referring pages, access dates and times, pages visited, session information, and other technical data required for website operation, security, troubleshooting, and statistical analysis.
Purpose of Collecting Personal Information
Personal information collected by the journal is used primarily for scholarly communication and journal publishing activities.
Information may be processed for purposes including:
- Creating and maintaining user accounts
- Receiving and managing manuscript submissions
- Conducting editorial assessment and peer review
- Communicating with authors, reviewers, editors, and readers
- Assigning reviewers and managing review activities
- Recording editorial decisions and publication history
- Publishing accepted articles and associated metadata
- Maintaining the scholarly record
- Supporting indexing, discovery, preservation, and archiving
- Managing corrections, retractions, complaints, appeals, and ethical investigations
- Protecting the security and integrity of the journal website
- Preventing misuse, fraud, spam, or unauthorized access
- Producing aggregated journal usage and operational statistics
- Meeting legal, ethical, contractual, or scholarly publishing obligations
Author Information
Information supplied by authors during manuscript submission may be used for editorial processing, peer review, production, publication, indexing, archiving, and scholarly communication.
Information associated with an accepted and published article, such as author names, affiliations, ORCID identifiers, correspondence details where provided for publication, acknowledgements, funding information, and conflict-of-interest statements, may become part of the permanent public scholarly record.
Reviewer Information
Information provided by reviewers is used to administer the peer-review process, identify suitable reviewers, maintain records of reviewing activity, and support the quality and integrity of editorial decision-making.
The journal follows a single-blind peer review process. Reviewer identities are not normally disclosed to authors as part of the review process.
Reviewer reports, identities, and related correspondence are treated as confidential editorial information except where disclosure is required by law, necessary for an ethical investigation, or authorized by the reviewer and the journal.
Editorial Information
Information relating to editors and editorial board members may be collected and used for journal administration, manuscript handling, professional communication, publication of editorial board information, and maintenance of the journal's scholarly operations.
Publicly Available Information
Certain information may be intentionally made publicly available as part of the journal's scholarly publishing activities. This may include author names, affiliations, article titles, abstracts, keywords, ORCID identifiers, citations, acknowledgements, funding information, and other publication metadata.
Information forming part of a published scholarly article or its associated metadata may remain publicly available as part of the permanent academic record, even if an author's account is later closed.
Cookies
The journal website may use cookies or similar technologies to support essential website functions, maintain user sessions, remember preferences, improve website performance, enhance security, and understand how the website is used.
Users may be able to manage or disable cookies through their web browser settings. However, disabling essential cookies may affect the functionality of the journal website or submission system.
Sharing of Personal Information
The journal does not sell personal information to third parties.
Personal information may be shared only where reasonably necessary for journal operations, scholarly publishing, technical services, legal compliance, research integrity, or preservation of the scholarly record.
Information may, where appropriate, be shared with:
- Editors and editorial staff
- Peer reviewers
- Authors and corresponding authors where necessary
- Journal administrators and authorized technical personnel
- Publishing and production service providers
- Indexing and abstracting services
- Digital preservation and archiving services
- DOI and metadata registration services
- Research integrity bodies or institutions where an investigation requires it
- Legal or regulatory authorities where disclosure is required by applicable law
Indexing and Metadata Distribution
Metadata relating to published articles may be distributed to indexing databases, library systems, search engines, repositories, citation services, DOI registration agencies, and scholarly discovery platforms in order to increase the visibility, accessibility, preservation, and discoverability of published research.
Once publication metadata has been distributed to external scholarly services, the journal may not be able to control how those independent services store, display, or preserve that information.
Third-Party Services
The journal may use third-party services for website hosting, email communication, analytics, manuscript processing, DOI registration, plagiarism screening, indexing, archiving, or other legitimate publishing functions.
Such service providers may process limited personal information where necessary to provide their services. Users should be aware that external websites and services may operate under their own privacy policies and terms.
External Links
The journal website may contain links to external websites, databases, repositories, indexing services, publishers, institutions, or other online resources.
Learning Communities — International Journal of Learning in Social Contexts is not responsible for the privacy practices, security, content, or policies of external websites. Users are encouraged to review the privacy policies of any external service they visit.
Data Security
The journal takes reasonable administrative, organizational, and technical measures to protect personal information against unauthorized access, accidental loss, misuse, alteration, disclosure, or destruction.
Access to non-public information is limited, where practicable, to individuals who require such access for legitimate journal administration, editorial processing, peer review, technical support, or related publishing activities.
Although reasonable safeguards are used, no internet-based service or electronic storage system can guarantee absolute security.
Data Retention
Personal and editorial information may be retained for as long as reasonably necessary to operate the journal, preserve the scholarly record, maintain the integrity of peer review, respond to ethical or legal matters, and meet legitimate publishing and archival requirements.
Certain information associated with manuscript submissions, editorial decisions, peer-review histories, published articles, corrections, retractions, or other parts of the scholarly record may need to be retained for an extended period or permanently where necessary for academic record-keeping and publication integrity.
User Accounts
Registered users are responsible for maintaining the confidentiality of their account credentials and for providing accurate information in their journal profiles.
Users should notify the journal if they believe their account has been accessed without authorization or if their personal information requires correction.
Rights Regarding Personal Information
Subject to applicable laws and legitimate scholarly publishing requirements, individuals may request access to, correction of, or updating of personal information held by the journal.
Where legally applicable, individuals may also have rights to request restriction of processing, object to certain forms of processing, request deletion of certain personal information, or obtain information about how their data is being used.
Some requests may be limited where information must be retained to preserve the integrity of the scholarly record, maintain peer-review confidentiality, satisfy legal obligations, investigate research misconduct, protect legitimate interests, or document editorial decisions.
Deletion of Personal Information
Requests for deletion of personal information will be considered in accordance with applicable requirements and the journal's legitimate publishing obligations.
Information forming part of a published article, publication metadata, citation record, correction, retraction, or other permanent scholarly record may not be removable solely on request because maintaining the integrity and continuity of the academic record is an important publishing responsibility.
Privacy of Research Participants
Authors are responsible for protecting the privacy and confidentiality of research participants. Personally identifiable information should not be published unless its inclusion is scientifically necessary and appropriate consent for publication has been obtained where required.
Authors should anonymize or de-identify participant information whenever appropriate and should comply with relevant institutional, ethical, and legal requirements governing personal or sensitive research data.
Children's Privacy
The journal website and manuscript submission services are intended primarily for researchers, academics, professionals, students, and other participants in scholarly communication. The journal does not intentionally seek to collect personal information from children through general website registration.
Research articles involving children as participants must comply with appropriate research ethics, consent, assent, privacy, and safeguarding requirements.
Email Communications
Users may receive email communications necessary for manuscript submission, editorial processing, peer review, account administration, publication, or other legitimate journal activities.
Promotional or informational communications, where used, should be sent in accordance with applicable requirements and user preferences.
Use of Artificial Intelligence and Personal Data
Personal, confidential, or unpublished manuscript information should not be entered into external artificial intelligence or generative AI systems where doing so could compromise confidentiality, privacy, copyright, intellectual property, or data protection.
Editors and reviewers are expected to protect confidential manuscript information when using digital or AI-assisted technologies. Any use of such technologies must remain consistent with the journal's publication ethics, confidentiality, and privacy requirements.
International Access and Data Processing
Because scholarly publishing operates internationally, information associated with manuscript processing, publication, indexing, archiving, or website operation may be accessed or processed in different countries.
Where applicable, the journal seeks to handle such information in a manner consistent with relevant privacy and data-protection requirements.
Changes to This Privacy Statement
The journal may revise this Privacy Statement periodically to reflect changes in publishing practices, technology, legal requirements, journal services, or data management procedures.
Updated versions will be published on the journal website. Continued use of the journal website following an update will be subject to the revised Privacy Statement.
Consent and Use of the Journal Website
By registering with the journal, submitting a manuscript, participating in peer review, or otherwise using journal services, users acknowledge that personal information may be processed as described in this Privacy Statement where such processing is necessary for legitimate journal and scholarly publishing activities.
Contact Regarding Privacy
Questions, concerns, or requests relating to privacy or personal information may be submitted to the journal through the contact information provided on the Learning Communities — International Journal of Learning in Social Contexts website.
