Blinded or open review?

Ana Marušić

editor in chief, Journal of Global Healtheditor emerita, Croatian Medical Journal

University of Split School of Medicine, Split, Croatia

Workshop: Editorial Process

Peer review: Inside the black box

AcknowledgmentSubmission

Editor’s evaluation Final decisionRejection

Author: revisionAcceptanceReview process:

Reviewer 1Reviewer 2Reviewer 3….….

resubmission …

Courtesy of A. Flannagin, JAMA

Three types of peer review

• Double Blind review– Author identifying information removed from manuscript;

authors and reviewers’ identities blinded• Blind (Anonymous) review– Reviewers know authors’ names and affiliations, but

reviewers do not sign reviews and reviewer identities are not made known to authors

• Open review– Reviewers sign their reviews; both author and reviewer

identities are known to each other

Types of peer review

• Double blind review is commonly used by psychology, nursing, and some pharmacy journals

• Double blind review is used by journals in some narrow specialties, journals in some smaller countries

• Blind (anonymous) review is commonly used by many journals in medicine and other sciences

• Few journals are using open review – for now? (BMJ, PLoS journals, Nature experiment)

There is no single standard for the peer review process

• But there are generally accepted norms and conventions– internal review by editor(s) plus review by external

experts = “peers” – 1 to 3 reviewers– reviewers selected from small panel or board and/or

reviewers selected from large database/community– reviewers asked to return reviews within stated period

of time

Usual practices: ALPSP 2000 survey

• 200 journals, 40% from biomedicine• 60% traditional• 40% double blind• A few journal have open peer review (BMJ,

JAMA, BMC)

Reviewers suggested by authors?

BMC Med. 2006 May 30;4:13.Are reviewers suggested by authors as good as those chosen by

editors? Results of a rater-blinded, retrospective study.Wager E, Parkin EC, Tamber PS.

CONCLUSION:• Author-nominated reviewers produced reviews of similar

quality to editor-chosen reviewers but were more likely to recommend acceptance during the initial stages of peer review.

JAMA. 2006 Jan 18;295(3):314-7.Differences in review quality and recommendations for publication

between peer reviewers suggested by authorsor by editors.Schroter S, Tite L, Hutchings A, Black N.

CONCLUSION:• Author- and editor-suggested reviewers did not differ in the

quality of their reviews, but author-suggested reviewers tended to make more favorable recommendations for publication. Editors can be confident that reviewers suggested by authors will complete adequate reviews of manuscripts, but should be cautious about relying on their recommendations for publication.

Reviewers suggested by authors?

PLoS One. 2010 Oct 14;5(10):e13345.Do author-suggested reviewers rate submissions more favorably than editor-

suggested reviewers? A study on atmospheric chemistry and physics.Bornmann L, Daniel HD.

CONCLUSION:• Our results agree with those from other studies that editor-

suggested reviewers rated manuscripts between 30% and 42% less favorably than author-suggested reviewers. Against this backdrop journal editors should consider either doing without the use of author-suggested reviewers or, if they are used, bringing in more than one editor-suggested reviewer for the review process (so that the review by author-suggested reviewers can be put in perspective).

Reviewers suggested by authors?

J Am Soc Nephrol. 2011 Sep;22(9):1598-602. Epub 2011 Aug 18.Effect of recommendations from reviewers suggested or excluded by authors.Moore JL, Neilson EG, Siegel V;

Associate Editors at Journal of American Society of Nephrology.

CONCLUSION:• Author-suggested reviewers, as a group, make more positive recommendations

than editor-suggested reviewers• Author-excluded reviewers impart significantly more negative recommendations

than other reviewers of the same manuscript• Editorial decisions on manuscripts reviewed by author-suggested or author-

excluded reviewers do not differ from those decisions on manuscripts assigned but not reviewed by them

• JASN's policy of editors making decisions independent from individual reviewer recommendations minimizes the effect of selection bias on publication decisions.

Reviewers suggested by authors?

Conflict of interest – publishing in own journal

Who should review?Who should decide?

Reviewing submissions from editors?

Example: Editor El Naschie published over 300 single-authored articles in Chaos, Solitons & Fractals attributed to him (e.g. 5 of his own papers in the same issue of the journal)

Editor retired, the journal put a stop to submissions and later resumed publishing with clear policy for editorial submissions.

7% editors published >5 original research papers in their own journal

Only one journal had a published policy on editorial submissionsOnly 8.6% journals had reference to the guidelines of any

professional or publishing association or organization.

Obrigada!

ana.marusic@mefst.hr

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