Open peer review

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Open peer review is an alternative to the traditional scientific peer review process, in which reviewers' names are concealed from the public and from the authors of the work under review. The traditional anonymous peer review has been criticized for its lack of accountability, possibility of abuse by reviewers, its possible bias and inconsistency,^[1] alongside other flaws.^[2][3] Both processes are intended to subject the scholarly publications to the scrutiny of others who are experts in the same field. In response to these criticisms, other systems of peer review with various degrees of "openness" have been suggested.

In 1996, the Journal of Interactive Media in Education^[4] launched using open peer review.^[5] Reviewers' names are made public and they are therefore accountable for their review, but they also have their contribution acknowledged. Authors have the right of reply, and other researchers have the chance to comment prior to publication. In 1999, the open access journal Journal of Medical Internet Research^[6] was launched, which from its inception decided to publish the names of the reviewers at the bottom of each published article. Also in 1999, the British Medical Journal^[7] moved to an open peer review system, revealing reviewers' identities to the authors (but not the readers),^[8] and in 2000, the medical journals in the open access BMC series^[9] published by BioMed Central, launched using open peer review. As with the BMJ, the reviewers' names are included on the peer review reports. In addition, if the article is published the reports are made available online as part of the 'pre-publication history'.

Several of the other journals published by the BMJ group^[10] allow optional open peer review,^[11][12][13] as do PLoS Medicine, published by the Public Library of Science^[14][15]. The BMJ's Rapid Responses^[16] allow ongoing debate and criticism following publication.^[17] By 2005, the editors found it necessary to more rigorously enforce the criteria for acceptance of Rapid Responses, to weed out the "bores".^[18]

The evidence of the effect of open peer review upon the quality of reviews, the tone and the time spent on reviewing is mixed, although it does seem that under open peer review, more of those who are invited to review decline to do so.^[19][20]

Atmospheric Chemistry and Physics, an open access journal launched in 2001 by the European Geosciences Union, has a two-stage publication process. In the first stage, papers that pass a quick screen by the editors are immediately published on the Atmospheric Chemistry and Physics Discussions website. They are then subject to interactive public discussion alongside formal peer review. Referees' comments (either anonymous or attributed), additional short comments by other members of the scientific community (which must be attributed) and the authors' replies are also published in ACPD. In the second stage, the peer-review process is completed and, if the article is formally accepted by the editors, the final revised papers are published in ACP. The success of this approach is shown by the ranking by Thomson Reuters of ACP as the top journal in the field of Meteorology & Atmospheric Sciences [1].

In June 2006, the high impact journal Nature launched an experiment in parallel open peer review — some articles that had been submitted to the regular anonymous process were also available online for open, identified public comment.^[21] The results were less than encouraging — only 5% of authors agreed to participate in the experiment, and only 54% of those articles received comments.^[22][23] The editors have suggested that researchers may have been too busy to take part and were reluctant to make their names public. The knowledge that articles were simultaneously being subjected to anonymous peer review may also have affected the uptake.

In 2006, a group of UK academics launched the online journal Philica, which tries to redress many of the problems of traditional peer review. Unlike in a normal journal, all articles submitted to Philica are published immediately and the review process takes place afterwards. Reviews are still anonymous, but instead of reviewers being chosen by an editor, any researcher who wishes to review an article can do so. Reviews are displayed at the end of each article, and so are used to give the reader criticism or guidance about the work, rather than to decide whether it is published or not. This means that reviewers cannot suppress ideas if they disagree with them. Readers use reviews to guide what they read, and particularly popular or unpopular work is easy to identify.

Another approach that is similar in spirit to Philica is that of a dynamical peer review site, Naboj.^[24] Unlike Philica, Naboj is not a full-fledged online journal, but rather it provides an opportunity for users to write peer reviews of preprints at arXiv.org. The review system is modeled on Amazon and users have an opportunity to evaluate the reviews as well as the articles. That way, with a sufficient number of users and reviewers, there should be a convergence towards a higher quality review process.

In February 2006, the journal Biology Direct^[25] was launched by Eugene Koonin, Laura Landweber, and David Lipman, providing another alternative to the traditional model of peer review. If authors can find three members of the Editorial Board who will each return a report or will themselves solicit an external review, then the article will be published. As with Philica, reviewers cannot suppress publication, but in contrast to Philica, no reviews are anonymous and no article is published without being reviewed. Authors have the opportunity to withdraw their article, to revise it in response to the reviews, or to publish it without revision. If the authors proceed with publication of their article despite critical comments, readers can clearly see any negative comments along with the names of the reviewers.^[26]

An extension of peer review beyond the date of publication is Open Peer Commentary, whereby expert commentaries are solicited on published articles, and the authors are encouraged to respond.

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[edit] See also

• Open research