Archives des mots-clés : Peer Review

Peer review in megajournals compared with traditional scholarly journals: Does it make a difference?

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A megajournal is an open-access journal that publishes any manuscript that presents scientifically trustworthy empirical results, without asking about the potential scientific contribution prior to publication. Megajournals have rapidly increased their output and are currently publishing around 50,000 articles per year.

We report on a small pilot study in which we looked at the citation distributions for articles in megajournals compared with journals with traditional peer review, which also evaluate articles for contribution and novelty.We found that elite journals with very low acceptance rates have far fewer articles with no or few citations, but that the long tail of articles with two citations or less was actually bigger in a sample of selective traditional journals in comparison with megajournals.

This indicates the need for more systematic studies, because the results raise many questions as to how efficiently the current peer review system in reality fulfils its filtering function.

URL : http://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/10.1002/leap.1007/abstract

A new scholar’s perspective on open peer review

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This article argues that the pedagogical and scholarly benefits of open peer review far outweigh those of traditional double-blind peer review, but require a shift in our perspective of the function and value of peer review – from a gate-keeping process, toward a supportive, constructive process of collaboration between peers and mentors.

URL : http://dx.doi.org/10.1080/13562517.2015.1085857

For what it’s worth – the open peer review landscape

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Purpose

The purpose of this paper is twofold, first, to discuss the current and future issues around post-publication open peer review. Second, to highlight some of the main protagonists and platforms that encourages open peer review, pre-and post-publication.

Design/methodology/approach

The first part of the paper aims to discuss the facilitators and barriers that will enable and prevent academics engaging with the new and established platforms of scholarly communication and review. These issues are covered with the intention of proposing further dialogue within the academic community that ultimately address researchers’ concerns, whilst continuing to nurture a progressive approach to scholarly communication and review. The paper will continue to look at the prominent open post-publication platforms and tools and discuss whether in the future it will become a standard model.

Findings

 The paper identifies several problems, not exclusive to open peer review that could inhibit academics from being open with their reviews and comments of other’s research. Whilst identifies opportunities to be had by embracing a new era of academic openness.

Practical implications

 The paper summarises key platforms and arguments for open peer review and will be of interest to researchers in different disciplines as well as the wider academic community wanting to know more about scholarly communications and measurement.

Originality/value

 This paper looks at many of the new platforms that have been previously ignored and discusses issues relating to open peer review that have only been touched on in brief by other published research.

URL : http://dx.doi.org/10.1108/OIR-06-2015-0182

The quandary between communication and certification

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Purpose

The purpose of this paper is to understand individual academics’ perception, attitudes and participation in Open Access Publishing and open scholarship and revisit some principles and designs of openness in academic publishing from the perspective of creative end-users, which helps to increase the sustainability and efficiency of open models.

Design/methodology/approach

 This paper draws on a case study of China and empirical data collected through semi-structured interviews with a wide range of academics and stakeholders.

Findings

 A separation between the communication and certification functions of publishing is identified: open initiatives are valued for efficient and interactive communication while traditional publishing still dominates the legitimacy of research publications, which leads to the quandary of individual academics operating within the transitional landscape of scholarly communication.

Practical implications

Practical recommendations for sustainable and efficient openness are derived from discussions on the difficulties associated open/social certification and the shifting maxims that govern academics from “publish or perish” to “be visible or vanish”.

Originality/value

“Openness” is defined in broad sense integrating Open Access and open scholarship to comprehensively reflect individual academics’ views in the transitional landscape of academic publishing. The research findings suggest that new open approaches are needed to address the evolving tension and conflicts between communication and certification.

URL : http://dx.doi.org/10.1108/OIR-04-2015-0129

Open Access Publishing, academic research and scholarly communication

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Purpose

The purpose of this paper is to explore the difference between Open Access and accessibility, to argue that accessibility is the most crucial feature, and to suggest some ways in which Open Access militates against accessibility.

Design/methodology/approach

Analysis of best practice by journals and monograph publishers is used to highlight the degree to which accessibility is enhanced by input from readers and editors. The expense of this, both real and hidden, is shown to be compatible only with difficulty with publishing methods where keeping costs low is essential, and Open Access alternatives that make available manuscripts “as submitted” are shown to make available less accessible scholarship.

Findings

Scholarship is markedly improved by referees and editors; the emphasis needs to be put on making available the most accessible scholarship, not on making more scholarship available.

Practical implications

Journals and publishers should concentrate on, and research councils and similar bodies insist upon, ensuring high quality critical review and editing, not cost-free access.

Originality/value

The debate on Open Access has put its emphasis in the wrong place. Rather than easier access to more scholarship, increased resource devoted to pre-publication review, revision and editing is the most important development to ensure the greatest advances in research and scholarship.

URL : http://dx.doi.org/10.1108/OIR-03-2015-0083

Retrospective analysis of the quality of reports by author-suggested and non-author-suggested reviewers in journals operating on open or single-blind peer review models

Statut

Objectives

To assess whether reports from reviewers recommended by authors show a bias in quality and recommendation for editorial decision, compared with reviewers suggested by other parties, and whether reviewer reports for journals operating on open or single-blind peer review models differ with regard to report quality and reviewer recommendations.

Design

Retrospective analysis of the quality of reviewer reports using an established Review Quality Instrument, and analysis of reviewer recommendations and author satisfaction surveys.

Setting

BioMed Central biology and medical journals. BMC Infectious Diseases and BMC Microbiology are similar in size, rejection rates, impact factors and editorial processes, but the former uses open peer review while the latter uses single-blind peer review. The Journal of Inflammation has operated under both peer review models.

Sample

Two hundred reviewer reports submitted to BMC Infectious Diseases, 200 reviewer reports submitted to BMC Microbiology and 400 reviewer reports submitted to the Journal of Inflammation.

Results

For each journal, author-suggested reviewers provided reports of comparable quality to non-author-suggested reviewers, but were significantly more likely to recommend acceptance, irrespective of the peer review model (p<0.0001 for BMC Infectious Diseases, BMC Microbiology and the Journal of Inflammation). For BMC Infectious Diseases, the overall quality of reviewer reports measured by the Review Quality Instrument was 5% higher than for BMC Microbiology (p=0.042). For the Journal of Inflammation, the quality of reports was the same irrespective of the peer review model used.

Conclusions

Reviewers suggested by authors provide reports of comparable quality to non-author-suggested reviewers, but are significantly more likely to recommend acceptance. Open peer review reports for BMC Infectious Diseases were of higher quality than single-blind reports for BMC Microbiology. There was no difference in quality of peer review in the Journal of Inflammation under open peer review compared with single blind.

URL : Retrospective analysis of the quality of reports by author-suggested and non-author-suggested reviewers in journals operating on open or single-blind peer review models

DOI : 10.1136/bmjopen-2015-008707

Review times in peer review: quantitative analysis of editorial workflows

Statut

We examine selected aspects of peer review and suggest possible improvements. To this end, we analyse a dataset containing information about 300 papers submitted to the Biochemistry and Biotechnology section of the Journal of the Serbian Chemical Society. After separating the peer review process into stages that each review has to go through, we use a weighted directed graph to describe it in a probabilistic manner and test the impact of some modifications of the editorial policy on the efficiency of the whole process.

URL : http://arxiv.org/abs/1508.01134