Desk rejection (also known as summary review, pre-review, editorial triage or similar terms) refers to rejection before a paper is sent out for peer review. This article discusses key reasons for desk rejection and also provides essential suggestions for avoiding it.

About 25%–60% of articles received by a journal are sent for peer review. As an author, how you can avoid or at least reduce your chance of rejection at this stage? This article discusses some common reasons for peer review rejection and some ways to avoid it.

This webinar, organised for Peer Review Week 2022, discusses the importance of peer review in enabling research integrity.

At times, authors can be pulled in different directions in terms of revising their manuscripts in the light of the comments from reviewers. This article offers you some tips on how to handle this situation and respond to the reviews effectively.

Peer review is meant to be a neutral, impartial assessment of the novelty, rigour and scientific merit of a study. Any deviation from objectivity in academic peer review is considered biased peer review. Biased peer review compounds other biases.

With the rapidly increasing volumes of submissions today, timely peer review depends on a diverse and readily available reviewer pool. Early Career Researchers (ECRs) are a valuable resource to tap into for this. What’s more, ECRs stand to gain much from early peer review experience. 

On occasion, an author will receive a rejection that should be appealed against. Although appeals typically fail, editors tend to be reasonable and view appeals as an important element of maintaining the research integrity of their journals.

Viewed from the outside, the peer review process can resemble a ‘black box’, an opaque system that remains largely obscure to all except the editorial office and the reviewer panel. This article opens the black box, unravelling how peer reviewers view a submitted article.

A crucial tool nearly all journals use to train and guide their peer reviewers is the review or reviewer protocol, a formal document to guide the reviewer through the different steps of a manuscript review. 

Although the peer review process has limitations and flaws, it remains the single-most important mechanism for evaluating scientific research. An essential component to research integrity is integrity in the peer review process. Authors, reviewers and editors all contribute to research and peer review integrity. 

In this webinar, hear our expert panel share strategies on how you can get published in high-impact journals.

Journal editors are constantly on the lookout for good peer reviewers (also referred to as ‘referees’). The qualities of a good peer reviewer include the right qualifications and expertise to effectively review a manuscript, the ability to meet deadlines, and a lack of potential conflicts of interest with the manuscript’s authors and their research. Another key factor in the selection is to meet the mandate of diversity, equity and inclusion (DEI). Accordingly, reviewer selection also needs to be diverse enough in terms of gender, geographical location and career stage.

Authors experience mixed emotions on receiving requests for review and resubmit (R&R). R&R request denotes that a manuscript is worth publishing after some recommended changes. It is an intermediate step toward the decision of either getting your manuscript accepted or rejected. Thus, it can be considered as a signal for both recognition and challenge.

The peer review process has provided a trusted framework for evaluating scholarly work for decades. In this system, reviewers’ names are kept secret, so authors get honest feedback. 

Peer review has been a golden standard for evaluating the quality and validity of scientific research since the 17^th century. However, as technology advances, the academic and scholarly publishing processes also transform significantly.

Peer review and editorial decision-making are critical processes in publishing research. The process of editorial decision-making may slightly vary among journals. 

Tenses get you tense? Fret not, let’s untangle the grammatical web in crafting that all-important response letter. Peer review reports can be daunting, but mastering the art of tenses in your replies need not be.

Selecting the right journal is often a daunting task for researchers. Several factors play a role in journal selection. However, timely publication is one of the most crucial factors in selecting a journal for publishing one’s research.

Submitting a manuscript for peer review is a crucial step in the academic publishing journey, marking the initiation of a meticulous evaluation process.

Peer review stands as a cornerstone of academic publishing, serving as the gatekeeper that ensures scholarly work meets rigorous standards of quality and integrity. Central to this process is the invaluable feedback provided by reviewers.