The DOI matches its Crossref record; 4 of the 4 references it cites were found in a registry or an index; none of the 7 sources its claims cite is checked for support yet.
Chatbots, generative AI, and scholarly manuscripts: WAME recommendations on chatbots and generative artificial intelligence in relation to scholarly publications
Open accessAbstract
This statement revises our earlier “WAME Recommendations on ChatGPT and Chatbots in Relation to Scholarly Publications” (January 20, 2023). The revision reflects the proliferation of chatbots and their expanding use in scholarly publishing over the last few months, as well as emerging concerns regarding lack of authenticity of content when using chatbots. These recommendations are intended to inform editors and help them develop policies for the use of chatbots in papers published in their journals. They aim to help authors and reviewers understand how best to attribute the use of chatbots in their work and to address the need for all journal editors to have access to manuscript screening tools. In this rapidly evolving field, we will continue to modify these recommendations as the software and its applications develop.
Overview
AI snapshot
Written from the paper’s full text.
TL;DR
This WAME statement revises earlier recommendations on chatbots and generative AI in scholarly publishing, adding guidance for authors, editors, and reviewers. It holds that chatbots cannot be authors, that their use must be transparently disclosed, and that humans remain responsible for accuracy, attribution, and confidentiality.
Key findings
- Chatbots cannot be authors: they do not meet ICMJE authorship criteria, cannot give final approval, cannot understand conflict-of-interest statements, and have no legal standing to sign statements.
- Authors must disclose chatbot use and provide information about how it was used; for drafting new text, prompts should be specified in acknowledgments, and for analytical work, reporting should appear in the Abstract and Methods with the full prompt, query time/date, AI tool, and version.
- Authors are responsible for chatbot-generated material, including accuracy, absence of plagiarism, balanced views, and appropriate attribution of all sources.
- Editors and peer reviewers must specify any chatbot use in manuscript evaluation, reviews, and correspondence; editors also need appropriate AI-detection tools, available regardless of ability to pay.
Methods
- Design: a consensus/recommendation statement revising the earlier “WAME Recommendations on ChatGPT and Chatbots in Relation to Scholarly Publications” (January 20, 2023).
- Data or sample: Not stated in the paper; the statement draws on cited literature, ICMJE criteria, and emerging concerns rather than an empirical sample.
- Main analysis: narrative development of five principal recommendations tailored to different uses of chatbots in scholarly publishing, including word-processing tasks, generation of ideas/text, and substantive research.
Limitations
- Stated: the field is rapidly evolving, and the authors will continue to modify the recommendations as software and applications develop.
- Evident from the text: the recommendations are consensus-based and not empirically tested; no data, sample, or formal analysis is reported.
Model-written summary. Check it against the paper before relying on it.
Integrity signals
Registry
Cites
Statistics
Verification
Claims the paper makes
5 Not checked yet · 4 Own interpretation · 1 No full text of the sources
- It may state two separate claims as one. 6
- Probably not a substantial claim. 8
A conclusion the paper draws from its own results — it cites no other source for it, so there is none to check. The quote shows it is in the paper.
In the paper
“Therefore, scholarly content that is generated or edited using AI would be retained and as a result, could potentially appear in future responses, further increasing the risk of inadvertent plagiarism on the part of the user and any future users of the technology.”
§ Chatbots, generative AI, and scholarly manuscripts: WAME recommendations on chatbots and generative artificial intelligence in relation to scholarly publications > Introduction
hedgeddirect- Asserted: passes — The authors put it forward as true.
- Checkable: passes — It can be checked against evidence.
- Load-bearing: passes — The paper’s conclusions depend on it.
- Based: passes — The paper gives a reason why it holds.
It may state two separate claims as one.
A conclusion the paper draws from its own results — it cites no other source for it, so there is none to check. The quote shows it is in the paper.
In the paper
“Otherwise, it is potentially scientific misconduct to offer such material for publication, irrespective of how it was written.”
§ Chatbots, generative AI, and scholarly manuscripts: WAME recommendations on chatbots and generative artificial intelligence in relation to scholarly publications > WAME recommendations on chatbots and generative artificial intelligence in relation to scholarly publication > WAME Recommendation 3
hedgedconditional- Asserted: passes — The authors put it forward as true.
- Checkable: fails — It may be too vague to check against evidence.
- Load-bearing: passes — The paper’s conclusions depend on it.
- Based: passes — The paper gives a reason why it holds.
Probably not a substantial claim. It may be too vague to check against evidence.
In the paper
“Chatbots retain the information supplied to them, including content and prompts, and may use this information in future responses 8 .”
§ Chatbots, generative AI, and scholarly manuscripts: WAME recommendations on chatbots and generative artificial intelligence in relation to scholarly publications > Introduction
What the sources say
- Not checked yetcites [8] Thorbecke C Don't tell anything to a chatbot you want to keep private CNN Business 2023 https://www.cnn.com/2023/04/06/tech/chatgpt-ai-privacy-concerns/index.html May 27, 2023
hedgedconditional- Asserted: passes — The authors put it forward as true.
- Checkable: passes — It can be checked against evidence.
- Load-bearing: passes — The paper’s conclusions depend on it.
- Based: passes — The paper gives a reason why it holds.
It may state two separate claims as one.
None of the sources cited for this claim have been checked yet.
In the paper
“This is consistent with the ICMJE recommendation of acknowledging writing assistance 11 and providing in the Methods detailed information about how the study was conducted and the results generated 12 .”
§ Chatbots, generative AI, and scholarly manuscripts: WAME recommendations on chatbots and generative artificial intelligence in relation to scholarly publications > WAME recommendations on chatbots and generative artificial intelligence in relation to scholarly publication > WAME Recommendation 2
What the sources say
- Not checked yetcites [11] ICMJE Defining the Role of Authors and Contributors. Non-Author Contributors ICMJE 2023 https://www.icmje.org/recommendations/browse/roles-and-responsibilities/defining-the-role-of-authors-and-contributors.html May 27, 2023
- Not matchedcites [12] ICMJE Preparing a Manuscript for Submission to a Medical Journal. Methods ICMJE 2023 https://www.icmje.org/recommendations/browse/manuscript-preparation/preparing-for-submission.html#d May 27, 2023
Couldn’t be matched to a paper in Crossref, so it can’t be checked.
plain- Asserted: passes — The authors put it forward as true.
- Checkable: passes — It can be checked against evidence.
- Load-bearing: fails — The paper’s conclusions may not depend on it.
- Based: passes — The paper gives a reason why it holds.
Probably not a substantial claim. The paper’s conclusions may not depend on it. It may state two separate claims as one.
In the paper
“Chatbots are activated by a plain-language instruction, or “prompt,” provided by the user. They generate responses using statistical and probability-based language models 5 .”
§ Chatbots, generative AI, and scholarly manuscripts: WAME recommendations on chatbots and generative artificial intelligence in relation to scholarly publications > Introduction
What the sources say
- Not checked — no full text of the sourcecites [5] Wun STY He SZ Liu JP Sun SQ Liu K Han QL Tang Y A brief overview of ChatGPT The history, status quo and potential future development IEEE/CAA J Autom Sinica 2023 10 5 1122 1136 10.1109/JAS.2023.123618 source
plaindirect- Asserted: passes — The authors put it forward as true.
- Checkable: passes — It can be checked against evidence.
- Load-bearing: fails — The paper’s conclusions may not depend on it.
- Based: passes — The paper gives a reason why it holds.
Probably not a substantial claim. The paper’s conclusions may not depend on it. It may state two separate claims as one.
In the paper
“New legal issues have also arisen in connection with chatbots and generative AI 7 .”
§ Chatbots, generative AI, and scholarly manuscripts: WAME recommendations on chatbots and generative artificial intelligence in relation to scholarly publications > Introduction
What the sources say
- Not checked yetcites [7] Appel G Neelbauer J Schweidel DA Generative AI has an intellectual property problem 2023 Harvard Business Review https://hbr.org/2023/04/generative-ai-has-an-intellectual-property-problem May 27, 2023
plaincorrelational- Asserted: passes — The authors put it forward as true.
- Checkable: passes — It can be checked against evidence.
- Load-bearing: fails — The paper’s conclusions may not depend on it.
- Based: passes — The paper gives a reason why it holds.
Probably not a substantial claim. The paper’s conclusions may not depend on it.
A conclusion the paper draws from its own results — it cites no other source for it, so there is none to check. The quote shows it is in the paper.
In the paper
“They should be aware that chatbots retain the prompts fed to them, including manuscript content, and supplying an author's manuscript to a chatbot breaches confidentiality of the submitted manuscript.”
§ Chatbots, generative AI, and scholarly manuscripts: WAME recommendations on chatbots and generative artificial intelligence in relation to scholarly publications > WAME recommendations on chatbots and generative artificial intelligence in relation to scholarly publication > WAME Recommendation 4
plaindirect- Asserted: passes — The authors put it forward as true.
- Checkable: passes — It can be checked against evidence.
- Load-bearing: passes — The paper’s conclusions depend on it.
- Based: fails — The paper may give no reason why it holds.
Probably not a substantial claim. The paper may give no reason why it holds. It may state two separate claims as one.
In the paper
“Consequently, there are concerns about the effects of chatbots on knowledge creation and dissemination - including their potential to spread and amplify mis- and disinformation 6 - and their broader impact on jobs and the economy, as well as the health of individuals and populations.”
§ Chatbots, generative AI, and scholarly manuscripts: WAME recommendations on chatbots and generative artificial intelligence in relation to scholarly publications > Introduction
What the sources say
- Not checked yetcites [6] Bhuiyan J OpenAI CEO calls for laws to mitigate 'risks of increasingly powerful' AI The Guardian 2023 https://www.theguardian.com/technology/2023/may/16/ceo-openai-chatgpt-ai-tech-regulations May 27, 2023
plainconditional- Asserted: passes — The authors put it forward as true.
- Checkable: passes — It can be checked against evidence.
- Load-bearing: passes — The paper’s conclusions depend on it.
- Based: passes — The paper gives a reason why it holds.
Probably not a substantial claim. It may state two separate claims as one.
A conclusion the paper draws from its own results — it cites no other source for it, so there is none to check. The quote shows it is in the paper.
In the paper
“Chatbots cannot be authors.”
§ Chatbots, generative AI, and scholarly manuscripts: WAME recommendations on chatbots and generative artificial intelligence in relation to scholarly publications > WAME recommendations on chatbots and generative artificial intelligence in relation to scholarly publication > WAME Recommendation 1
plain- Asserted: passes — The authors put it forward as true.
- Checkable: fails — It may be too vague to check against evidence.
- Load-bearing: passes — The paper’s conclusions depend on it.
- Based: passes — The paper gives a reason why it holds.
Probably not a substantial claim. It may be too vague to check against evidence.
- Rests on an assumption: The legal status of an author differs from country to country but under most jurisdictions, an author must be a legal person.
In the paper
“Chatbots do not meet the International Committee of Medical Journal Editors (ICMJE) authorship criteria, particularly that of being able to give “final approval of the version to be published” and “to be accountable for all aspects of the work in ensuring that questions related to the accuracy or integrity of any part of the work are appropriately investigated and resolved” 10 .”
§ Chatbots, generative AI, and scholarly manuscripts: WAME recommendations on chatbots and generative artificial intelligence in relation to scholarly publications > WAME recommendations on chatbots and generative artificial intelligence in relation to scholarly publication > WAME Recommendation 1
What the sources say
- Not checked yetcites [10] ICMJE Defining the role of authors and contributors. 2. Who Is an Author? ICMJE 2023 https://www.icmje.org/recommendations/browse/roles-and-responsibilities/defining-the-role-of-authors-and-contributors.html May 27, 2023
plain- Asserted: passes — The authors put it forward as true.
- Checkable: passes — It can be checked against evidence.
- Load-bearing: passes — The paper’s conclusions depend on it.
- Based: passes — The paper gives a reason why it holds.
Probably not a substantial claim.
The paper relies on this without support.
No AI tool can understand a conflict-of-interest statement and does not have the legal standing to sign a statement.
“No AI tool can “understand” a conflict-of-interest statement and does not have the legal standing to sign a statement.”
The paper relies on this without support.
Chatbots have no affiliation independent of their developers.
“Chatbots have no affiliation independent of their developers.”
The paper relies on this without support.
Journals have begun to publish articles in which chatbots such as Bard, Bing and ChatGPT have been used, with some journals listing chatbots as co-authors.
“Journals have begun to publish articles in which chatbots such as Bard, Bing and ChatGPT have been used, with some journals listing chatbots as co-authors.”
The paper relies on this without support.
The legal status of an author differs from country to country but under most jurisdictions, an author must be a legal person.
“The legal status of an author differs from country to country but under most jurisdictions, an author must be a legal person.”
The paper relies on this without support.
Chatbot output currently carries the risk of including biases, distortions, irrelevancies, misrepresentations, and plagiarism, many caused by algorithms and training materials.
“For example, chatbot output currently carries the risk of including biases, distortions, irrelevancies, misrepresentations, and plagiarism - many of which are caused by the algorithms governing its generation and heavily dependent on the contents of the materials used in its training.”
The paper relies on this without support.
A chatbot may be designed to omit sources that oppose viewpoints expressed in its output.
“Since a chatbot may be designed to omit sources that oppose viewpoints expressed in its output, it is the authors’ responsibility to find, review and include such counterviews in their articles.”
The paper relies on this without support.
Many medical journal editors use manuscript evaluation approaches that were not designed to deal with AI innovations and industries, including manipulated plagiarized text and images and papermill-generated documents.
“Many medical journal editors use manuscript evaluation approaches that were not designed to deal with AI innovations and industries, including manipulated plagiarized text and images and papermill-generated documents.”
The paper relies on this without support.
Medical journal editors have already been at a disadvantage when trying to differentiate the legitimate from the fabricated, and chatbots take this challenge to a new level.
“They have already been at a disadvantage when trying to differentiate the legitimate from the fabricated, and chatbots take this challenge to a new level.”
The paper relies on this without support.
It is of particular importance to editors of medical journals where the adverse consequences of misinformation include potential harms to people.
“This is of particular importance to editors of medical journals where the adverse consequences of misinformation include potential harms to people.”
The paper relies on this without support.
Currently, individuals in scholarly publishing may use chatbots for simple word-processing tasks, generation of ideas and text, and substantive research.
“Currently, individuals in scholarly publishing may use chatbots for: 1) simple word-processing tasks (analogous to, and an extension of, word-processing and grammar-checking software), 2) the generation of ideas and text, and 3) substantive research.”
Claims other papers make about this one
Each is checked against this paper’s own text: does it say what the citing paper says it does?
In the citing paper
“Another core principle reflected in these statements is that, despite their ability to generate novel and new text, generative AI tools do not meet the generally agreed standards of authorship of academic research [7, 9, 11, 12].”
From Artificial intelligence-assisted academic writing: recommendations for ethical use (2025) · cites this paper as [11]
In the citing paper
“Further, and especially relevant to the work of academic writers in healthcare simulation, the International Committee of Medical Journal Editors [10], JAMA Network Journals [7], and the World Association of Medical Editors [11] have all issued specific guidelines on the use of generative AI.”
From Artificial intelligence-assisted academic writing: recommendations for ethical use (2025) · cites this paper as [11]
In the citing paper
“Firstly, and perhaps most importantly, transparency about the use of generative AI tools in the academic writing process is a cornerstone of academic integrity [7, 9, 11].”
From Artificial intelligence-assisted academic writing: recommendations for ethical use (2025) · cites this paper as [11]
Citations
Cites
A Brief Overview of ChatGPT: The History, Status Quo and Potential Future Development
Wu, T., He, S., Liu, J., Sun, S., Liu, K., Han, Q.-L., & Tang, Y. (2023) · IEEE/CAA Journal of Automatica Sinica · doi:10.1109/jas.2023.123618 · Cited by 1,452
A Review on Generative Adversarial Networks: Algorithms, Theory, and Applications
Gui, J., Sun, Z., Wen, Y., Tao, D., & Ye, J. (2023) · IEEE Transactions on Knowledge and Data Engineering · doi:10.1109/tkde.2021.3130191 · Cited by 1,231
Zhou, Q.-H. (2015) · Chinese Nursing Research · doi:10.1016/j.cnre.2016.01.001 · Cited by 738
A Survey of Unsupervised Generative Models for Exploratory Data Analysis and Representation Learning
Abukmeil, M., Ferrari, S., Genovese, A., Piuri, V., & Scotti, F. (2021) · ACM Computing Surveys · doi:10.1145/3450963 · Cited by 124
Research works printed but not linked: 2
- Methods. Preparing a Manuscript for Submission to a Medical Journal. ICMJE. https://www.icmje.org/recommendations/browse/manuscript-preparation/preparing-for-submission.html#d Accessed May 27, 2023.
- Plagiarism. Oxford Reference, https://www.oxfordreference.com/display/10.1093/oi/authority.20110803100329803;jsessionid=D1759DA0FD79ACB96407CDB4B7BC8FA0 Accessed May 27, 2023. · DOI
Cited by
Sorted by citations
Ethical Considerations of Using ChatGPT in Health Care
Wang, C., Liu, S., Yang, H., Guo, J., Wu, Y., & Liu, J. (2023) · Journal of Medical Internet Research · doi:10.2196/48009 · Cited by 541
ChatGPT for tourism: applications, benefits and risks
Carvalho, I., & Ivanov, S. H. (2023) · Tourism Review · doi:10.1108/tr-02-2023-0088 · Cited by 609
Flanagin, A., Bibbins-Domingo, K., Berkwits, M., & Christiansen, S. L. (2023) · JAMA · doi:10.1001/jama.2023.1344 · Cited by 420
The ethics of disclosing the use of artificial intelligence tools in writing scholarly manuscripts
Hosseini, M., Resnik, D. B., & Holmes, K. (2023) · Research Ethics · doi:10.1177/17470161231180449 · Cited by 341
Ganjavi, C., Eppler, M. B., Pekcan, A., Biedermann, B., Abreu, A., Collins, G. S., Gill, I. S., & Cacciamani, G. E. (2024) · BMJ · doi:10.1136/bmj-2023-077192 · Cited by 266
Metadata
- Authors
- Zielinski, C., Winker, M. A., Aggarwal, R., Ferris, L. E., Heinemann, M., Lapeña Jr, J. F., Pai, S. A., Ing, E., Citrome, L., Alam, M., Voight, M., & Habibzadeh, F.
- Affiliations
- University of Winchester (GB)
- Jawaharlal Institute of Post Graduate Medical Education and Research (IN)
- University of Toronto (CA)
- University Medical Center of the Johannes Gutenberg University Mainz (DE)
- University of Alberta (CA)
- New York Medical College (US)
- Northwestern University (US)
- Belmont University (US)
- Lancet Laboratories (ZA)
- Corresponding author
- Zielinski, Chris
- ORCID
- Venue
- Colombia Medica
- Publisher
- Universidad del Valle
- Published
- 2023-12-01
- Volume
- 54
- Issue
- 3
- Pages
- e1015868
- ISSN
- 0120-8322 (ISSN-L)
- 1657-9534
- PMC
- PMC10712422
- OpenAlex
- W4389235056
- Cited by
- 167
- References
- 4
- Citations by year
- 2026: 64 · 2025: 41 · 2024: 41 · 2023: 21
- Type
- journal article
- Language
- en
- Open access
- diamond
- doi.org
- Licence
- Locations
- Colombia medica (publishedVersion, cc-by-nc)
- PubMed Central (publishedVersion, cc-by-nc-nd)
- PubMed (publishedVersion)
- Touro Scholar (Touro College) (submittedVersion)
- Topics
- Social Sciences › Education › Academic integrity and plagiarism
- Social Sciences › Library and Information Sciences › Publishing and Scholarly Communication
- Social Sciences › Library and Information Sciences › Academic Writing and Publishing
- Keywords
- chatbots, generative AI, scholarly publishing, ChatGPT, journal editorial policy, content authenticity, peer review
- MeSH terms
- Artificial Intelligence, Humans, Publishing
About these checks
Registry, retraction, Cites and statistics results are computed, not judged, with one exception: a printed reference that no index lists is read once by a model before it counts as a citation error. Claims are extracted by a model and kept only when their quote appears verbatim in the text; each cited source is then checked, with a model’s help, for whether it says what the claim relies on. Those verdicts can be wrong — read the claim’s quote and the cited source before relying on one.
A language model drew the claims from the paper on 2026-10-29, under version 3 of the claim definition (model deepseek-v4.1-flash, prompt extract-v3).
A second model labelled each claim on 2026-10-29 (model jev-1.13-20260917, definition revision gold-guideline-v0.2).
Statistics and arithmetic are recomputed, not judged.
Confidence bands are shown only for fields calibrated on our annotated test set. None is calibrated yet, so no band is shown.
What counts as a claim ›How we measure confidence ›How we check this ›
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