AgNet 20 January 2004

January 5, 2004, Canadian Food Inspection Agency

What is peer review?

When an editor of a scientific journal asks for a peer review of a scientific paper or study, the author's peers-specialists who are in the same area of study as the author-review the document to see whether or not it meets standards for publication in a scientific journal. In this way, the scientific community maintains the standard of research that is published. In newspaper or magazine publishing, only the editor (or a group of editors) decides what is published, while in the science world many experts can decide if something is good enough to publish.

Why do scientists care about peer review?

Peer review helps scientists and other readers distinguish between reputable scholarly work and work that is flawed or not of high quality. The peer review process means that work isn't published based on any particular editor's preferences, but only on the merit of its contents.

In the scientific field, as in all areas of scholarly study, there is a hierarchy among journals. This means that papers published in the top journals carry more weight and are considered more valuable than papers published in journals that are known to have less demanding standards.

Another reason for using peer review is to give the author critical feedback on his or her work. Reviewers (also called "referees" ) help authors identify flaws in their papers that the authors may not have noticed.

What do reviewers look for?

When assessing a paper, reviewers look at:

•  the methodology the author used

•  the paper's usefulness (is it needed now or are there enough papers on this subject already?)

•  the relevance of the topic

•  the paper's conclusions

Reviewers not only check the work for technical accuracy, they offer the author comments and constructive suggestions for improving the paper. This includes a critique on how the paper is structured and how easily it reads.

How does peer review work?

After a journal editor receives a paper, he or she decides if the paper meets the standards of the journal. If so, the editor picks one or two reviewers from a pre-selected review board. The reviewers read the paper and make recommendations about whether the editor should accept the paper, reject it, or ask for revisions. Usually the reviewers ask for revision.

The paper is not published until the revisions are done to the satisfaction of the editor and the reviewers.

Who are the reviewers?

The reviewers-other scholars who are experts in the same area as the author of the paper they are reviewing-include researchers, professors, and authors. The review process is anonymous (often called "blind" ), as the author's name doesn't appear on the paper. In this way, reviewers can't accept or reject a paper based on who wrote it-they have to assess it solely on its quality. Similarly, the author also doesn't know who the reviewers are, although he or she likely knows who is on the review board.

An editor may also request a scholar to make recommendations on the paper even if the reviewer is not on the pre-selected review board.

Is the peer review system the best way to guarantee scientific quality?

Scholars agree that the peer review system has its flaws-such as taking a long time to get a paper published. But, as many scholars point out, no one has come up with an alternative, especially one that is effective at maintaining the quality of scientists' published work.