Readers play an important role in advancing scientific knowledge by accessing, evaluating, applying and responsibly communicating published research. Critical engagement by researchers, practitioners, educators, policymakers, students and other readers supports evidence-based decision-making and helps maintain the accuracy and integrity of the scholarly record. 
ARCC encourages readers to use published research responsibly, provide constructive scholarly feedback and notify the Editorial Office when they identify a significant error, ethical concern or accessibility problem.

Articles published in ARCC Journals are made freely available online in accordance with the ARCC Open Access Policy. Readers do not pay subscription or article-access charges to read or download Open Access articles from the ARCC website. 
The copyright holder, applicable licence and reuse conditions should be displayed with each article. Third-party material contained within an article may be subject to separate rights or restrictions, which should be identified in the article or accompanying credit line. 

Readers may: 

• Access and download published articles in accordance with the journal's access arrangements. 

• Cite and reference published work accurately. 

• Share or reuse content where permitted by the applicable licence. 

• Contact the Editorial Office with questions concerning corrections, article status, ethics, permissions or accessibility. 

• Submit constructive feedback or an evidence-based post-publication critique. 

• Expect material corrections, expressions of concern, retractions or other publication notices to be transparently linked to the affected article. 

Readers should: 

• Provide accurate attribution to the authors, article and journal. 

• Comply with the copyright, licence and third-party rights displayed with the article. 

• Indicate where content has been adapted or modified when required by the licence. 

• Represent findings, limitations and conclusions accurately and in context. 

• Avoid presenting preliminary, corrected, retracted or disputed findings as established evidence. 

• Check the article page for corrections, expressions of concern, retractions or updated versions before relying on or reusing the work. 

• Respect participant privacy, confidential information and other legal or ethical restrictions contained in the publication. 

• Avoid implying that the authors, journal or ARCC endorse a reader's adaptation, product, service or interpretation unless written permission has been granted. 

Publication and peer review support scholarly quality control but do not guarantee that an article is free from error or that its findings apply in every context. Readers are encouraged to consider: 

• The research question, objectives and relevance to the field. 

• The appropriateness of the study design, sampling, methods and analysis. 

• The completeness and transparency of the reported data and results. 

• The strength of the evidence supporting the conclusions. 

• Study limitations, uncertainty, potential bias and conflicts of interest. 

• The availability of underlying data, protocols, registrations or supplementary material. 

• Whether the findings are consistent with or differ from the wider body of evidence. 

• The practical, ethical and policy context in which the findings may be applied. 

ARCC supports constructive post-publication discussion. Readers may submit an evidence-based critique, comment, letter to the editor or request for clarification concerning an article published by an ARCC journal. 

Submissions should identify the article, describe the issue clearly and provide relevant evidence or references. Correspondence must be scholarly, specific and respectful and must not contain defamatory, discriminatory, abusive or confidential material. 

ARCC may invite the original authors to respond and may obtain editorial or independent expert assessment. A critique or response may be revised, peer reviewed and, where accepted, published or linked to the original article according to the applicable journal procedure. 

Where the concern indicates that a correction, expression of concern, retraction or other formal action may be more appropriate than correspondence, the matter will be handled under the ARCC Publication Ethics Policy.

Readers are encouraged to contact the ARCC Editorial Office when they identify a credible concern relating to submitted or published content. 

Concerns may include: 

• A significant factual, methodological, statistical or reporting error. 

• Plagiarism, duplicate or redundant publication. 

• Data fabrication, falsification or unexplained data irregularities. 

• Misleading image manipulation or figure duplication. 

• Undisclosed conflicts of interest or funding. 

• Authorship or contributor concerns. 

• Missing or inadequate human or animal ethics approval, consent or participant-protection information. 

• Citation or peer review manipulation, fraudulent identities, paper-mill activity or AI-generated fraudulent content. 

• A legal, privacy, safety or copyright concern.
  
   Information To Include :

• Where possible, a report should include: 

• The article title, journal name, DOI or permanent link. 

• A clear description of the concern and the part of the article involved. 

• Supporting documents, data, images, references or other evidence that can lawfully be shared. 

• Any relevant personal or professional conflict of interest. 

• Contact information so that the Editorial Office can request clarification, unless anonymity is reasonably necessary. 

• ARCC will assess concerns in good faith and as confidentially as reasonably possible. Raising a concern does not by itself establish misconduct. Research-conduct allegations may be referred to an author's institution, funder, regulator or another competent authority, while ARCC remains responsible for decisions concerning the published record.

ARCC uses post-publication notices to maintain the accuracy and integrity of the scholarly record. 

• Correction, corrigendum or erratum: used to address an error that requires a transparent amendment but does not necessarily invalidate the article's principal findings. 

• Expression of Concern: used where serious concerns exist but an investigation remains incomplete or inconclusive. 

• Retraction: used where findings are unreliable, serious misconduct or ethical failure is established, or the article should no longer form part of the reliable scholarly record. 

• Removal: reserved for exceptional legal, privacy, safety or other circumstances in which continued availability of the content would create a serious risk. 

• Updated version or replacement: used only where permitted by policy and accompanied by a transparent version history or notice. 

Substantive changes should not be made silently. Notices should explain the reason for the action, remain permanently linked to the article and be reflected in relevant article metadata where technically possible.

Readers may use ARCC content only as permitted by the copyright and licence displayed with the article. Appropriate citation or acknowledgement is always required, but attribution alone does not authorise a use that falls outside the applicable licence or third-party rights. 

Where an intended use is not covered by the article licence, or where separately credited third-party material is involved, the reader must obtain permission from the appropriate rights holder. 

Readers should consult the ARCC Open Access Policy and Copyright and Licensing Policy for further information.

Readers may provide feedback concerning: 

• Published articles and post-publication notices. 

• Journal policies and editorial procedures. 

• Website usability, broken links, missing files or inaccurate metadata. 

• Accessibility barriers affecting article HTML, PDF files or other website content. 

• Permissions, licensing or article-access questions. 

ARCC will use relevant feedback to improve its editorial information, digital services and accessibility. Technical or accessibility reports should identify the page, article or file involved and describe the problem as specifically as possible. 

Published articles communicate the research, analysis and views of their authors. Publication by ARCC does not constitute endorsement of every conclusion, product, method, policy position or external website mentioned in an article. 

Readers should exercise appropriate scholarly and professional judgement when interpreting or applying published information and should consult qualified professional guidance where the subject matter requires it. Any separate legal disclaimer used by ARCC should be reviewed and approved independently of this reader policy.

• Open Access Policy. 

• Copyright and Licensing Policy. 

• Publication Ethics Policy. 

• Peer Review Process. 

• Author Guidelines. 

• Role of Authors. 

• Role of Editors. 

• Role of Reviewers. 

• Article Processing Charges Policy. 

For corrections, ethical concerns, post-publication correspondence, permissions, accessibility feedback or other publication-related questions, readers should contact the ARCC Editorial Office through the official support channels available on the ARCC Journals website.

ARCC periodically reviews and updates this page to reflect changes in publication ethics, Open Access and licensing practices, post-publication procedures, accessibility requirements and internationally recognised scholarly publishing practices. Readers should consult the current online version for the latest information. 

Last reviewed: June 2026