Research Ethics, Transparency, and Open Science

(revised September 24, 2026)

The Journal of Consumer Research requires research integrity and the ethical conduct of research. The Journal embraces the principles of research transparency and open science by requiring detailed information about data collection and analysis processes as well as the collaborative sharing of research materials, methods, data, and code for data collection, data preparation, and/or data analysis.

JCR’s policies and guidelines are informed by the international organization COPE (Committee on Publication Ethics). See the COPE website for more information on research integrity.

Safeguarding Participants’ Rights

All primary research using human data should indicate how participants’ rights were safeguarded (i.e., by IRB/ethics committee approval or national policy for safeguarding participants’ rights).

Research Method Transparency

The text of the manuscript must fully disclose and explain the methods for data collection and analysis used in the project. This includes disclosing use of AI in the project, as per Oxford University Press and JCR’s AI Use and Disclosure policy.

a) Experimental data: All experimental conditions, including the control groups and factors that were part of the original design, should be described. Pertinent details about the procedure (e.g., session size, task sequence, filler task) should be provided.

b) Secondary / observational data: All source(s) and time periods involved must be indicated. If automated digital data capture is employed, procedures should be rendered as transparent as possible.

c) Qualitative data: The research approach, evolution of the data collection, and specific details about how the data was collected should all be described.

In addition to the above, relevant additional information should be included in manuscript appendices or web appendices, and data and materials shared as per the following sections.

Sharing Data

In the spirit of open science, JCR requires, by default, that anonymized data be made available to the review team and, once the manuscript is accepted, to readers. The preferred method to share data is via a third-party repository (e.g., Dataverse).

The Journal recognizes that in some cases, data cannot be made available for legal, ethical, privacy, or other reasons. For example, qualitative data often cannot be de-identified without changing the meaning of the text or without creating undue burden on the authors because of the detailed life stories, events, and locations typically captured in such data. Sometimes even anonymized data cannot be posted because doing so would allow readers to interpolate respondents’ identities. In other instances, data sharing may be restricted by non-disclosure agreements regarding proprietary information or by the significant time and capital invested in developing unique (secondary) datasets that might be used for additional manuscripts.

All authors are required to include a data and materials availability statement in their manuscript (including in the original submission) that provides information on data availability and access. This statement should outline where the data can be found (by including a link to the data) or, if data cannot be made publicly available, explain why the data cannot be made available.[1] Transparency about why data cannot be made available allows the review team to weigh the appropriateness of the explanation.

Sharing Study Materials

Along with the data, authors are required to publicly post or share, in the body of the manuscript appendices, or supplementary materials, all stimuli, measures, interview protocols, and code used for data collection, data preparation, and/or data analysis. The location of these materials should also be disclosed in the data and materials availability statement. If specific materials cannot be posted (or if posting materials would place an unreasonable burden on the authors), the data and materials availability statement should explain why.

Preregistration

The Journal of Consumer Research does not require preregistration, but preregistration is encouraged for experiments that test specific hypotheses (i.e., non-exploratory studies). Links to preregistrations should be included in the manuscript.

Data Collection Statement

When submitting manuscripts for review, authors must provide a detailed data collection statement for the editors in the relevant field during Step 6 of the submission process. The statement includes information about who collected the data, how, when, and where data collection occurred, as well as how the data are stored. For field experiments, please indicate the name and location of the partner organization, the dates, any experimentation software used (e.g., for online A/B tests), and the name and email of a contact person. Data collection information is confidential and will not be shared with the reviewers.

Should the manuscript be accepted for publication, the authors will be asked to write a final version of the data collection statement for the published manuscript. This public statement would exclude any information that cannot be disclosed (e.g., due to an NDA).

Details are provided in Appendix A.

Data and Study Materials Maintenance Policy

Information described in the Sharing Data and Sharing Study Materials sections above should be kept accessible for at least seven (7) years after the date of publication. Thus, any links to data and study materials in the external repository should remain “live” for at least seven years.

Plagiarism Check

The editorial office runs a plagiarism check on every submission using iThenticate. JCR considers “self-plagiarism” (instances in which authors borrow extensive material from their own previously published work without the proper citation or quotation) a form of plagiarism.

Author Misconduct Policy

Should there be suspicion of author misconduct, the Journal will follow the procedures outlined in our Policy and Procedures Regarding Author Misconduct. All submitting authors must acknowledge that they have read the policy and must agree to the terms.

Appendix A: Data Collection Statement

When submitting manuscripts for review, authors must include a confidential data collection statement for the editors in the relevant field during Step 6 of the submission process. This information is not visible to the reviewers during the anonymous review process but will be included in the final publication should the manuscript be accepted. Provide the following information for each study:

  1. Where the data were collected
  2. When the data were collected
  3. Who collected the data
  4. Who analyzed the data
  5. Where the data are currently stored

See our sample data collection statements and review the following general guidance for adherence to this requirement:

  • Do not include the data collection statement in the manuscript file during the review process. (but do include the data and materials availability statement in the manuscript).
  • Be as detailed and specific as possible:
    • Include university and place names and other identifying details (the data collection statement will not be shared with reviewers).
    • If a research assistant or lab manager collected data under the supervision of one of the authors, state this (although you are not required to provide their names).
    • If data were not obtained in a physical location such as a university lab or field interviews, state how they were obtained (e.g., MTurk, Prolific, public source, private company, web crawler).
    • If data were obtained from a third-party source, state the source.
    • If you are unable to reveal the source of your data, describe it (e.g., a large grocery retailer) and state why you are unable to share the name of the source (e.g., the data is proprietary and you have signed an NDA).
    • If you are unable to specify the location of data collection (e.g., you conducted qualitative interviews and your IRB prohibits you from disclosing this or it would violate the confidentiality), briefly state why you cannot provide this information.
    • State the external repository, university server, or private directory where the data are stored, if applicable.
  • Write in the third person (e.g., “The authors jointly analyzed the data.”)
  • If no data were collected, state this in the text field (e.g., “This is a conceptual manuscript and no data were collected.”).
  • This information must be provided with each revision (and updated if necessary) and must also be included in the final accepted version of the manuscript for publication.
Sample Data Collection Statements

Sample 1

The first author supervised the collection of data for the first study by research assistants at the University of Chicago Decision Research Lab in the autumn of 2011. The first and second authors jointly analyzed these data. The first and second authors jointly managed the collection of data for study 2 using the Qualtrics panel described in the methods section in the spring of 2012. These data were analyzed jointly by all three authors with support of a statistical staff member at the University of Chicago. The data are currently stored in a project directory on the Open Science Framework.

Sample 2

The first author conducted all of the in-person fieldwork herself from autumn of 2007 until spring of 2009 in collective exercise communities in a large city in France. The location, communities, and personal identifiers are not disclosed due to confidentiality and field ethics. The second author acted as confidante throughout the process and visited the field site twice. Both authors conducted the online fieldwork independently and equally as active social media participants on Facebook and Reddit groups that focused on communal exercise. Specific groups and personal identifiers are not disclosed due to confidentiality and field ethics. Data were discussed and analyzed on multiple occasions by both authors using the first author’s field notes, photographs, video, and artifacts, and both authors’ online notes, screen captures, and text files. The final ethnography was jointly authored. All notes, images, and data are currently stored in a password-protected project folder on a server at the first author’s university.

[1] If the data cannot be made publicly available but can be made available to the review team, the statement should explain this and outline how the data is shared with the review team (in this case, the authors can remove the information about where the data can be found once the article is accepted for publication).

Please direct all comments regarding JCR‘s research ethics policies to the Policy Board.