The reviewer who feels unqualified to review the assigned manuscript or affirms that he or she cannot meet the deadline for completion of the review should immediately notify the editor and excuse himself or herself from the process of reviewing this manuscript.

The reviewer should inform the editor and recuse himself or herself from reviewing the manuscript if there is a conflict of interest. Specifically, the reviewer should recuse himself or herself from reviewing any manuscript authored or coauthored by a person with whom the reviewer has an obvious personal or academic relationship, if the relationship could introduce bias or the reasonable perception of bias.

The reviewer should treat the manuscript in a confidential manner. The manuscript should not be disclosed to or discussed with others except as authorized by the editor.

The reviewer should approach the peer-review job objectively. Personal criticism of the author is unacceptable.

The reviewer should not use for his or her own research any part of any data or work reported in submitted and as yet unpublished articles.

The reviewer should immediately notify the editor of any similarities between the manuscript under review and another paper either published or under consideration by another journal. The reviewer should immediately call to the editor’s attention a manuscript containing plagiarized material or falsified data.