In June 2017, there was a total number of 442 active journals on the Portal of scientific journals of Croatia (HRČAK). According to the number of journals included, Hrčak is unique in European extent and in the decade of its existence it has significantly contributed to the visibility and promotion of Croatian scientific and professional journals. Throughout the Hrčak project the procedure of publishing the digital versions of journals was simplified for the journal editors, and unobstructed easy access, viewing and search using unique interface was enabled for the users.
The information about the status and attendance of journals, classifying criteria and registration of new journals are at disposition for the journal editors. An Open access publishing statement is also available for journal editors to create for each journal accessible on the portal. Journal editors are not recommended to create a Publication Ethics and Publication Malpractice Statement.
The aim of this work is to explore how much attention journal editors give to the matters of ethics and self-awareness in the publishing field. In which way is the politics of ethics defined, which guidelines are taken into account during the process of creation Publication Ethics and Publication Malpractice Statement, are the statements accordant to the international statements and recommendations.
Does the number of publishing offices of journals who indicate ethics matters differ depending on the field of science?
In the end, are the instructions for the creation of the Publication Ethics and Publication Malpractice Statement necessary on the Hrčak portal, as well as the Open access statements?
The research has shown that all journal editors from all scientific fields on Hrčak portal have equally represented Publication Ethics and Publication Malpractice Statement. Minor deviations have been noticed in biotechnical sciences journals, biomedicine and medicine journals. If the point of view is changed and we observe them as STEM and DH fields, we can notice a bigger percentage of statements, according to the number of journals presented, in the field of social sciences and humanities. The statements are differently defined, but are mostly guided by the COPE instructions.