On the Evolving Complexities of Peer Review

Subjecting your ideas to peer review always places an author in a vulnerable position, as you have no control whatsoever as to what an anonymous reviewer will say about your work. The idea of such a system is to ensure integrity within the scientific/academic literature by calling on experts to spot logical errors or misleading claims. And although peer review has always been a contested process (e.g., Emden 1996; Jasper et al. 2014), most of us generally believe it has value overall. As we witness a public media and political world in which ideas are being expressed unfettered, the danger of unscrutinized messages being portrayed as scientific truths is blatantly obvious. And truth be told, all of us who have published a significant number of papers over time will recognize the many occasions on which astute observations from peer reviewers have allowed for revisions that genuinely strengthened our arguments and made our claims more credible. But that is not how it always works. Over the past few years, my colleagues and I—like many of you I am sure—have encountered some highly frustrating experiences with peer review. Among my own was with a reputable health services journal that publishes a blend of qualitative and quantitative studies, including those led by nurses. Our submission was based on a qualitative study. In the first round of reviews, although it took 6 months to complete, both peer reviewers saw considerable merit in the manuscript and recommended minor revisions, all of which seemed quite manageable. We revised accordingly and turned around the manuscript within a week or two, only to wait another 6 months for a response. When it came, it was apparent that we now had two entirely different reviewers, each of whom saw merit in the paper but suggested a few more minor changes. Again, we turned it around in a couple of weeks. By the time a decision letter arrived more than 6 months after our second resubmission, Reviewers #1, 2, 3 and 4 had all disappeared and a new reviewer, Reviewer #5, reported “There are issues with the statistics in the study”; and concluded “The study contains fundamental flaws…. the sample size is too small.” On the basis of that singular review, the journal's new Editor who, according to the journal website holds a master's degree in a laboratory science field unrelated to health services research, rejected the manuscript outright, saying, “I'm sorry that we cannot be more positive on this occasion and hope you will not be deterred from submitting future work to [XXX Journal].” Needless to say, we probably will. It is always a challenge for journal editors to weigh the pros and cons of intervening when reviews seem particularly harsh or strongly critical, especially to authors who may be vulnerable due to their early career stage or to their status within a population group exposed to problematic societal attitudes (COPE Council 2021). Editors and journals take a differing stance on this matter, some deferring to preserving the integrity of the peer review process (in the case of non-intervention) and others favoring being supportive toward authors (in the case of either modifying inappropriate reviews or providing editorial commentary that supports the author in interpreting it). And in some situations the relatively critical stance of a peer review may well be ultimately constructive in alerting authors to how reasonable readers are likely to interpret their remarks, and offering them an opportunity to present their ideas in a more professional and effective manner—one that they will not find cringeworthy when they (or their future students) look back on it in years to come. I am quite confident that many scholars have something lurking in their publication record for which they wish, in retrospect, that someone had reigned them in a bit. Moving beyond the natural indignation one feels when being treated in an unfair manner, my recent experiences have caused me to reflect on how broken the peer review system is becoming in some aspects. Many of the larger publishing houses have invested greatly in promoting open access publishing, either in exclusively open access journals or hybrid journals. Clearly there is a significant financial gain in their being able to extract an article processing fee, whether that comes from the author or an institutional sponsorship. In alignment with the effort to attract more article processing fees, many publishing houses have also developed energetic marketing campaigns, expanding their outreach to authors from parts of the world that have not historically been well represented in the English language publishing world and making the article submission process more “author friendly.” While expanding accessibility and striving for greater inclusivity are admirable aspirations, the effect on many journal editors has been a rapid expansion in the number of manuscript submissions and, among those potentially viable for eventual publication, an even larger increase in the work required of the peer review community. Many of the newer authors trying to gain entry into scholarly publishing are not yet well prepared to contribute to peer review, and so the full burden of this work falls upon the mid-career and senior scholars. This means that some reviews have protracted delays (in that life happens to even the most reliable of us), and that sometimes reviews are not of as high quality and professionalism as an Editor might have preferred. And working out how to manage that in turn adds to the increasingly heavy demand on Editors. Some are finding that the excessive workload expectations are incompatible with the level of support they may receive for that work and, in some cases, it seems that unqualified individuals are placed in these positions of decisional authority without the experience and skillset to make sound or well-reasoned decisions. No wonder there is an increasing level of cynicism among many of those involved in the scholarly aspects of journal publication. That said, I want to also make a point of expressing how incredibly gratified I have been with the generous, willing and thoughtful community of scholars who contribute to the integrity of the peer review process for Nursing Inquiry (Thorne 2013). Reviews for this journal are often complicated in that they not only require scientific and technical expertise with respect to research methodologies, but they also draw on professional judgment with respect to matters of critical reflection on the ideas that shape nursing and health care. The majority of our manuscripts are either of a discursive nature or have a significant discursive component. And in that context, reviewers need to be able to distinguish between that which can legitimately be stated in a factual manner and that which cannot. They need a sophisticated understanding of the manner in which opinions can be expressed without being misinterpreted as facts. And they also need a strong sense of the level of confirmatory evidence that is required for the kinds of claims that authors are seeking to make. As we head into a new era of the increasing use of artificial intelligence in so many aspects of the peer review and publishing processes (Kousha and Thelwall 2024), this capacity for high level scrutiny of the nature and quality of the intellectual claims that authors make will become vastly more important. We will need peer reviewers willing to dig into the supporting evidence, judge the appropriateness of authorities cited, scrutinize the logical flow of arguments, and determine the originality of ideas. A peer review for Nursing Inquiry has never been a checklist sort of operation—it has always required thoughtfulness and critical analysis—but it will likely become an even more complex proposition as the stakes for ensuring the integrity of arguments evolve. Because of how much respect I have for the amazing people who, year after year, agree to take on peer reviews for this journal, and conduct them with scholarly generosity, creativity and integrity, I know that this journal will be able to sustain itself through these complex times as a venue for excellence in nursing scholarly publication. And so, as we head into 2025, I want to express my sincere and deep gratitude for all of our marvelous reviewers, and thank you for the essential contribution you continue make to the ongoing publication of exceptionally high-quality critically-informed thought within our discipline.

Récupéré en direct depuis OpenAlex et désinversé. Les résumés ne sont pas conservés dans cette base de données : les index inversés représentent 8,6 Go des 9,3 Go de texte de la base, et le serveur dispose de 13 Go libres.