Content Review Policy

Risk levels

Every article is assigned one of four risk levels before publication:

• Standard — general reflection, productivity systems, communication skills, and philosophical discussion, where getting a detail wrong has limited real-world consequence.
• Sensitive — topics like financial anxiety, burnout, loneliness, or relationship conflict, which require conservative language, stronger sourcing, and explicit limitations, but don't require a named specialist reviewer.
• Expert-review-required — mental-health conditions, medication, trauma, investment recommendations, tax interpretation, legal rights, and similar topics where an error carries real risk. We do not publish in this category without a genuinely qualified, named reviewer — a general disclaimer is not a substitute.
• Do-not-publish — personalised medical or investment instructions, guaranteed-outcome claims, dangerous self-treatment advice, or anything that would require us to misrepresent a claim as safe or proven when it isn't. We simply don't publish this material, regardless of demand.

Where this publication currently stands

As a new publication, Modern Self Journal does not yet have a roster of verified, credentialed reviewers for expert-review-required topics. Rather than publish that category with an inadequate review process, we're deliberately not covering it yet. Our current library sits in the standard and sensitive categories. This will expand once genuine expert review is in place — see our Ethics Policy for how we handle that transition honestly.

Field Notes are reviewed differently

Field Notes are personal experience and opinion, not verified claims, and are labelled as such rather than fact-checked the way a standard article is. See Fact-Checking Policy.