Architecture Papers of the Faculty of Architecture and Design STU

PEER REVIEW POLICY

Review of Articles

All submissions implying that the work is the author's own contribution, have not been published previously, and are not under consideration elsewhere, are subject to a double-blind review, also known as double-anonymised review. (Before the release of issue 1/2026, single-blind or single-anonymised reviews applied to previous issues). Reviewers cannot contact the author(s) of the article that they are reviewing regarding the review process. Authors cannot be provided with any information on the reviewers that would disclose their identity.

The reviews assess content, scientific and research knowledge, originality, rigorous methods, quality and suitability of the image material, text structure and style, referencing, comprehensibility, length, keywords, and overall contribution of each article to the field and scope defined by the journal. All manuscripts should include an Abstract, Keywords, Introduction, Methods, Results, Discussion, and Conclusions. All reviews are independent field-expert assessments. Reviewers should draw attention to relevant published articles that are not cited. All reviewers are required to submit their reviews electronically via Editorial Manager (since 22 August 2022).

New submissions are initially assessed by the Editor-in-Chief or assigned Journal Editor (hereafter also referred to as the “editors”) to assess suitability and match the current focus of the journal and completeness of the requirements for publication. The initial desk-check usually lasts no more than one week. Then there are normally three (3) reviews for each submission (as a minimum), submitted through the Editorial Manager. When submitting their manuscripts, authors must suggest a minimum of three potential reviewers (with institutional email addresses) who have no conflict of interest with the research. The editors can make use of these suggestions. They carefully select and verify multiple reviewers proposed by the system, while choosing reviewers/securing reviewers' expertise solely from the field of interest/inquiry, securing/enhancing regional and institutional diversity, and respecting their current workload. Since 2023, the journal's Editorial Board Members are not allowed to act as reviewers for the journal. In case of any reviewer-related issues, the whole Editorial Board is asked to provide their individual recommendations.

The first round of peer review typically concludes within 3–4 weeks. In justified cases, this time is adjusted per case individually by editors. Reviewers can suggest accepting, making a minor or major revision, or rejecting a paper. The editors make sure the reviews meet the journal standards before they are sent to the authors. Based on the reviews, the editors reserve the right to reject the paper or request the authors to adjust it. Decisions by editors are made based on all the information provided in the reviews. If a revision is suggested or requested, authors are asked to explain how the suggestions of reviewers have been incorporated upon the revised submission, as well as a rebuttal if some of the reviewers' comments cannot be revised. Authors are given a reasonable amount of time to revise the paper, based on the extent of necessary changes. In case of major changes, the paper is returned to reviewers – if possible, to the original ones.

Authors are always informed promptly of each decision made, of reasoned, requested or recommended modifications, and of additional explanations needed. The progress or current status of the manuscript can also be checked in the author's account in the Editorial Manager submission system. After the texts have been reviewed, the comments of the reviewers must be considered and incorporated into the text without unnecessary delays. In particular cases (for instance, when the revision involves substantial changes), the editors may request additional reviews, normally by the original reviewers if they had agreed to review a revision. The final decision is usually provided no later than a month from the revised submission. The author(s) of the article have the right to withdraw their contribution at any time.

Decisions on any papers submitted by editors of this journal are handled independently. The in-house reviewing is considered to be a form of conflict of interest (explained in more detail below) to decide on or review the work of their colleagues. The peer-review process for the journal's special issues follows the same process as outlined above for regular submissions, with the exception that a guest editor may send the submissions out to the reviewers and may recommend a decision to the journal editor. Guest editors are primarily nominated and approved by the editor-in-chief, with the Editorial board possibly involved in consultation. Proposals and recommendations regarding special issues and guest editors can be sent to the journal office in writing. All potential guest editors and proposed journal issue topics are reviewed and vetted by the editor-in-chief to ensure they are actual, relevant for the journal's scope, reputable and free of conflicts of interest. Guest editors are typically expected to be eminent researchers in the field.

In this case, the editor-in-chief is completely excluded from the process if they submit a paper to their journal. It means that they have no access to the submission system for their paper and cannot see who the reviewers are. A deputy editor or the executive editor takes over the entire decision-making process in such cases. The published paper must include a disclosure statement explaining that the editor-in-chief was not involved in the peer review or the final decision. Submissions authored by editors will be assigned to at least three independent outside reviewers. Decisions will be made by other Editorial Board Members who do not have a conflict of interest with the author. Journal staff are not involved in the processing of their own/institutional work submitted to the ALFA journal.

In general, the journal editor oversees the entire process in order to ensure high standards of publishing ethics and responsiveness, and is responsible for the pre-submission and final decision regarding the acceptance or rejection of articles.

Since 2024, the journal has published a list of reviewers for the published papers as a part of the final issue of each year solely at the official journal webpage. Only the names of reviewers who had agreed to be listed are made available. The list is in alphabetical order and contains only names with academic titles, with no information on who reviewed which articles.

Conflict of Interest

A Conflict of Interest exists if a person or institution has a direct personal or financial relationship which has the potential to compromise or in any way interfere with professional objectivity or judgment in issues related to the research objectives in any form. The Conflict of Interest is actual if a relationship exists, or apparent if the possibility for a relationship could be inferred. In either case, it is the responsibility of the journal editors, authors, and reviewers to declare Conflicts of Interest, actual or apparent, so that an appropriate restrictive action is taken. If no conflicts exist, the authors should state: “The

A reviewer is entrusted to provide an unbiased assessment of the scientific merit of a manuscript under review. Any situation or relationship that could bias or be construed to bias this assessment must be reported to the editors. These include personal relations to the authors, concurrent competitive research on the same subject in the manuscript, or professional or financial ties to an organisation with interests in the subject under review. In such cases where an actual or apparent Conflict of Interest is disclosed, the use of a review provided or requested is at the discretion of the editors.

Use of Artificial Intelligence

Reviewers conducting peer reviews for Architecture Papers of the Faculty of Architecture and Design STU may not share information from an article with public artificial intelligence (AI) platforms for AI generation of text for the reviewer's report. All reviewers conducting peer reviews are required to provide substantive feedback, writing original review comments for the author's and editor's consideration.