Towards improving peer review: Crowd-sourced insights from Twitter

Abstract

Peer review is an essential part of academic publishing, yet many authors, reviewers, and editors have reportedly encountered problems with the review process. Some scholars view peer-review as a necessary process for the advancement of science, while other scholars argue that for many publishers and journals, both authors and reviewers are being exploited. The aim of this commentary is two-fold. First, to provide a narrative review of current perspectives and available research on the peer-review process to date, and second, to summarise potential solutions elicited from scholars on Twitter. A review of the literature identified several problems with peer-review including publication delays, an over reliance on a narrow pool of reviewers, threats to anonymity, perceived exploitation, as well as overworked editors. Recommendations to redress these issues that emerged from scholars on Twitter suggested publishers, journals, their editors and associate editors, universities, individual academics and their communities all have a role to play towards creating an equitable and fair system. This commentary aims to ignite conversations about improving the peer-review process.

‘Great work folks!’: establishing interpersonal communication in transparent peer reviews of research articles

“…The findings of this study, however, are promising in that a great number of politeness strategies were found to have been employed by reviewers not just for establishing a healthier communication with authors but also for sounding more encouraging and constructive. Thus, if the peer review process faces relative systemic challenges (Allen et al, 2022), bringing transparency via TPRs as adopted by some publishers could remarkably offer systemic solutions, open up new opportunities for the parties involved and reduce the level of unprofessionalism in reviewers' comments as postulated in previous research. we hope that the findings of our study will provide educational insights for researchers, especially novice ones who are less familiar with the "institutionalized process" (Gonzalez et al, 2022, p. 1) of peer review.…”

Evolution of Peer Review in Scientific Communication

“…However, this is just the tip of the iceberg. Allen et al (2022) highlighted the issue of the "black box": the anonymity of traditional peer review should maintain honesty and ethical norms, but it also can stifle discussion, generate biases, and reduce the overall effectiveness of peer review. In fact, the function of being the "supreme judge" in deciding what is "good" and "bad" science is taken on by peer review, defending the dominant scientific paradigm and stifling the emergence of new ideas that always arise on the periphery.…”

Empirical analysis of factors influencing delay in article acceptance in accounting journals

“…The speed of the publication process is crucial in science, especially in fields and subjects where timeliness and updates are important (Cooke et al, 2016). Moreover, publication delays may have dramatic consequences for the advancement of researchers' academic careers (Allen et al, 2022; Coronel, 2020; Street & Ward, 2019). Luwel and van Wijk (cited in Shen et al (2015)) found that journals have significantly reduced the time between processing manuscripts and making articles immediately available through quick editing procedures and early access availability, or preview of accepted articles, which promotes article dissemination after acceptance.…”

“…The speed of the publication process is crucial in science, especially in fields and subjects where timeliness and updates are important (Cooke et al, 2016). Moreover, publication delays may have dramatic consequences for the advancement of researchers' academic careers (Allen et al, 2022;Coronel, 2020;Street & Ward, 2019).…”