ArticleBMJ open2019
Journal editors' perspectives on the roles and tasks of peer reviewers in biomedical journals: a qualitative study.
Article in BMJ open, 2019. The graph could read no effect estimate from its abstract, so it casts no vote on the map. Cited by 14 papers.
What it found
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The abstract states no effect estimate the extractor could read, or names no intervention and outcome on the map, so this paper lights no cell and moves no belief. It is still indexed, cited and linked below.
The trial behind it
Trials whose registry record cites this paper, or whose number appears in the abstract. A trial that started after this paper was published is citing it as background, not reporting it.
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Who cites it
14 citing papers in PubMed.
- Behavior characteristics of peer reviewers in medical journals: a survey from China.Research integrity and peer review · 2026Article
- Exploring reviewer self-assessment in the context of academic peer review.Scientific reports · 2025Article
- Librarians and information specialists as methodological peer-reviewers: a case-study of the International Journal of Health Governance.Research integrity and peer review · 2024Article
- Reviewing scientific manuscripts in 2023: is it (still) worth the time?EuroIntervention : journal of EuroPCR in collaboration with the Working Group on Interventional Cardiology of the European Society of Cardiology · 2023Article
- The Reviewer Academy of the Society of Critical Care Medicine: Key Principles and Strategic Plan.Critical care medicine · 2023Article
- Knowledge and motivations of training in peer review: An international cross-sectional survey.PloS one · 2023Article
- Opening Up of Editorial Activities at Chemistry Journals. What Does Editorship Mean and What Does It Involve?Frontiers in research metrics and analytics · 2022Article
- Peer review reduces spin in PCORI research reports.Research integrity and peer review · 2021Article
- Transparency of peer review: a semi-structured interview study with chief editors from social sciences and humanities.Research integrity and peer review · 2021Article
- Editors between Support and Control by the Digital Infrastructure - Tracing the Peer Review Process with Data from an Editorial Management System.Frontiers in research metrics and analytics · 2021Article
- Scientific Publishing in Biomedicine: How to Choose a Journal?International journal of endocrinology and metabolism · 2021Review
- Comparing quality of reporting between preprints and peer-reviewed articles in the biomedical literature.Research integrity and peer review · 2020Article
- Journal editors' perspectives on the communication practices in biomedical journals: a qualitative study.BMJ open · 2020Article
- Writing Constructive Reviews for Scientific Journals.HemaSphere · 2020Article
Corrections and comments
PubMed lists nothing against this paper. Absence here is not a guarantee, only a check that was made.
Authors and funding
4 authors.
Funding
No grant is acknowledged in the PubMed record.
Abstract
objectivePeer reviewers of biomedical journals are expected to perform a large number of roles and tasks, some of which are seemingly contradictory or demonstrate incongruities between the respective positions of peer reviewers and journal editors. Our aim was to explore the perspectives, expectations and understanding of the roles and tasks of peer reviewers of journal editors from general and specialty biomedical journals.
designQualitative study.
settingWorldwide.
participants56 journal editors from biomedical journals, most of whom were editors-in-chief (n=39), male (n=40) and worked part-time (n=50) at journals from 22 different publishers.
methodsSemistructured interviews with journal editors were conducted. Recruitment was based on purposive maximum variation sampling. Data were analysed thematically following the methodology by Braun and Clarke.
resultsJournal editors' understanding of the roles and partly of tasks of peer reviewers are profoundly shaped by each journal's unique context and characteristics, including financial and human resources and journal reputation or prestige. There was a broad agreement among journal editors on expected technical tasks of peer reviewers related to scientific aspects, but there were different expectations in the level of depth. We also found that most journal editors support the perspective that authorship experience is key to high-quality reviews, while formal training in peer reviewing is not.
conclusionThese journal editors' accounts reveal issues of a social nature within the peer-review process related to missed opportunities for journal editors to engage with peer reviewers to clarify the expected roles and tasks.Further research is needed on actual performance of peer reviewers looking into the content of peer-reviewer reports to inform meaningful training interventions, journal policies and guidelines.
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What OpenQuestion holds
Registered trials
Read under generation 80e0d062 · epoch 390. Bibliography from PubMed, PubMed Central and OpenAlex; grants from NIH RePORTER; trial links from ClinicalTrials.gov; estimates, votes and beliefs from the OpenQuestion graph.