Article Withdrawn

Article Retraction, Withdrawal, Removal, and Replacement Policy

Higher Education Spiritual Pedagogies (HESP) is dedicated to preserving the integrity, credibility, and transparency of scholarly publication. The responsibility for determining whether a manuscript should be published rests entirely with the Editor-in-Chief and the editorial team, guided by the journal’s editorial policies, peer-review process, ethical standards, and applicable legal regulations concerning copyright, plagiarism, and academic misconduct.

As part of its commitment to maintaining an accurate and reliable scholarly record, HESP considers all published articles as permanent academic documents. Nevertheless, under exceptional circumstances, an article may require retraction, withdrawal, removal, or replacement in accordance with international publication ethics standards and the principles established by the Committee on Publication Ethics (COPE).

Article Retraction

A published article may be retracted when substantial evidence indicates serious ethical violations or critical errors that compromise the validity and integrity of the research. Such circumstances may include plagiarism, data fabrication or falsification, duplicate publication, unethical research conduct, false authorship claims, or significant methodological errors.

Retraction can be initiated by the authors, editors, or publisher following an appropriate ethical investigation. In such cases, HESP will publish an official retraction notice explaining the reasons for the retraction and identifying the party initiating the action. The original article will remain accessible as part of the academic record but will be clearly labeled as “Retracted.”

Article Withdrawal

Article withdrawal applies to manuscripts that have been accepted or published online in early view form but have not yet been formally assigned to a journal issue. Withdrawal is permitted only in exceptional situations, such as accidental duplicate submission, major technical errors, copyright violations, ethical concerns, or legal disputes.

When an article is withdrawn, the manuscript content may be removed from the journal platform and replaced with a withdrawal notice stating that the article has been withdrawn in accordance with the journal’s publication ethics policy.

Article Removal

In rare and exceptional cases, HESP reserves the right to remove a published article from its online platform if the content is found to violate legal rights, contain defamatory statements, breach privacy or copyright regulations, or pose a serious risk to public safety if implemented or interpreted incorrectly.

Under such circumstances, the article metadata, including the title and author information, will remain available to preserve the integrity of the scholarly archive, while the full text will be replaced with a statement explaining the reason for removal.

Article Replacement

If a published article contains significant inaccuracies or misleading information that could negatively affect readers or future research, the authors may request a corrected replacement version. Following editorial evaluation, the journal may publish the revised article together with a transparent explanation of the corrections and publication history.

Ethical Commitment

HESP is committed to promoting ethical publication practices and maintaining trust in academic scholarship. The journal encourages authors, reviewers, editors, and readers to report suspected ethical misconduct, plagiarism, or publication malpractice to ensure the quality, accountability, and integrity of all published works.