Last fall, AEJMC members approved a resolution on Ethical Use of AI for Research, Teaching, and Professionalism (adopted October 6, 2025). To execute the resolution, AEJMC offers the following principles and guidelines for AI use in AEJMC journal submissions, conference papers, and reviews of manuscripts submitted to journals and conferences.
Definitions
§ AI – Digital tools using Artificial (i.e., non-human) Intelligence (whether generative, assistive, agentic, or some future form as-yet unnamed). For purposes of this policy, AI use includes both standalone AI tools and AI-enabled features embedded within commonly used software (e.g., document editors, data analysis programs, or file viewers).
§ Author – Any creator of content (whether textual, visual, audio) in any form (e.g., conference manuscript, journal article submission, chart, figure, photograph, video, review of other authors’ works, etc.). Includes all co-authors of specific content, even when singular form is used.
AEJMC Core Values
- Accountability
- Fidelity and truth-telling
- Justice
- Caring
Principles for AI Use
§ Disclosure – Author must disclose their use of AI, in any and all ways, including if such tools contribute to content development, analysis, or interpretation.
§ Transparency – Author must be fully transparent in their use of AI, including disclosure of tools, purposes, and the nature of assistance provided, whether AI is accessed through standalone platforms or embedded features within other software.
§ Replicability – Author’s transparent disclosures of AI use should be sufficiently detailed to permit replicability.
§ Assess-ability – Author’s transparent disclosures of AI use should be sufficiently detailed to permit others to fully assess the appropriateness, quality, and impact of such use.
§ Responsibility – Author retains responsibility for any unintended or unforeseen consequences that may result from their AI use (e.g., fabrication, falsification, plagiarism), regardless of whether AI use was direct or mediated through embedded software features.
Examples of AI Use Necessitating Disclosure & Considerations of Appropriateness
- Gathering and synthesizing previously published information, stopping short of using AI-enabled tools to draft large amounts of text
- Identifying patterns, trends, or gaps in existing bodies of literature for the purpose of informing research questions or study design
- Data coding or analysis (e.g., via an AI platform or tools positioned as AI within legacy data analytics software such as SPSS, R, SAS, Atlas.TI, QDA Miner)
- Creation of research instruments (e.g., photos and videos serving as experimental stimuli)
- Using AI to direct-translate large amounts of text from one language to another
Disallowed AI Use
- Uploading the unpublished work of other authors without prior permission in ways that expose the content to actual or potential training of AI tools
- Using AI-enabled tools or software features that expose the unpublished work of other authors to external systems or third-party processing without the authors’ prior permission, including when such features are embedded within commonly used software platforms
Policy Implementation
- · Conference and journal submission systems may require authors to affirm disclosure of AI use as part of the submission process (e.g., a checkbox).
- · Authors should disclose AI use in ways that maximize attention to the disclosure (e.g., in the manuscript’s methods section if AI used for data collection/analysis; in a footnote at the start of the abstract if AI used to meet abstract word-count limits, in a note at the bottom of a table or figure created using AI).
- · Failure to provide accurate disclosure may constitute a policy violation.
- · Authors are also strongly encouraged to consult the AI policies of publishers to whom they intend to submit their work.
Potential Consequences of AI Policy Violation
- Rejection and disqualification of author’s manuscript submission from AEJMC conference or AEJMC-affiliated journal
- Two-year suspension of author’s privilege to submit authored work to AEJMC conference or AEJMC-affiliated journal
- Accurate and limited responses to official employer queries, as recommended by AEJMC legal counsel
Additional Resources
§ AEJMC’s 2025 Resolution on AI
§ AEJMC Code of Ethics, Research
§ The APA’s guidelines
§ Taylor and Francis’ guidelines
§ Sage’s guidelines