This news article introduces a new COST
Action entitled PEERE (TD1306), which stands for
New Frontiers of Peer Review (PEERE). PEERE is a
trans-domain proposal which brings together researchers from various different disciplines and science stake-holders for the purpose of reviewing the process of peer
review. PEERE officially began in May 2014 and will
end in May 2018. Thirty-one countries, including Malta,
are currently participating in the Action. In order to set
the context in which this COST Action was initiated,
we  first look very briefly at the history of the process of
peer review and various models of peer review currently
in use. We then share what this COST Action hopes to
achieve.peer-reviewe

Edmonds, Bruce

Franzoni, Chiara

Grimaldo, Francisco

Marusic, Ana

Seeber, Marco

Shankar, Kalpana

Squazzoni, Flaminio

Wijesinha-Bettoni, Ramani

English

OAR@UM

Wijesinha-Bettoni, R., Shankar, K., Marusic, A., Grimaldo, F., Seeber, M., Edmonds, B., Franzoni, C., andSquazzoni, F. (2016).Xjenza Online, 4:82–85.Xjenza Online - Journal of The Malta Chamber of Scientistswww.xjenza.orgDOI: 10.7423/XJENZA.2016.1.11Note ArticleReviewing the review process: New Frontiers of Peer ReviewRamani Wijesinha-Bettoni1, Kalpana Shankar2, Ana Marusic3, Francisco Grimaldo4, Marco Seeber5,Bruce Edmonds6, Chiara Franzoni7 and Flaminio Squazzoni∗81Visiting Senior Lecturer, Department of Food Studies & Environmental Health, University of Malta, Msida, Malta2School of Information Studies, University College Dublin, Dublin, Ireland3Department of Research in Biomedicine and Health, University of Split School of Medicine, Split, Croatia4Department of Computer Science, University of Valencia, Valencia, Spain5Department of Sociology, University of Gent, CHEGG–Centre for Higher Education Governance, Gent, Belgium6Centre for Policy Modelling, Manchester Metropolitan University Business School, Manchester, UK7School of Management, Politecnico di Milano, Milan, Italy8Department of Economics and Management, University of Brescia, Brescia, Italy (Chair of the Action)Abstract. This news article introduces a new COSTAction entitled PEERE (TD1306), which stands forNew Frontiers of Peer Review (PEERE). PEERE is atrans-domain proposal which brings together research-ers from various different disciplines and science stake-holders for the purpose of reviewing the process of peerreview. PEERE officially began in May 2014 and willend in May 2018. Thirty-one countries, including Malta,are currently participating in the Action. In order to setthe context in which this COST Action was initiated,we first look very briefly at the history of the process ofpeer review and various models of peer review currentlyin use. We then share what this COST Action hopes toachieve.1 IntroductionAs researchers, we are no doubt all too familiar withthe feelings of euphoria associated with having a paperaccepted for publication in a peer-reviewed journal, es-pecially if the journal in question happens to be the topjournal in our academic field, which is likely to be ajournal with a high “impact factor”1. Sadly, probablyeven the best among us would also have experienced the1The “Impact Factor” is probably the most commonly accep-ted, if controversial, way of rating the quality of academic journ-als. It is a quantitative tool for ranking, evaluating, categoriz-ing, and comparing journals. It is a measure of the frequencywith which the ”average article” in a journal has been cited ina particular year or period. The annual Journal Citation Re-sting of having a paper rejected, although these feelingscan be somewhat mitigated if we feel that the paper hasundergone an impartial peer-review process, and we areprovided with good review comments that can help usto improve the paper for submission to the next journalon our list.Of course, this is from our own viewpoint, as research-ers. As researchers, what we sometimes forget to dwellon is the important “gatekeeper” function peer reviewcan play (deciding which information “deserves” to bedisseminated). Wrong or misleading information canhave a huge impact on the daily life of people, from med-ical treatments to recovering from the economic crisis.Therefore, the correct functioning of the peer reviewprocess is in the interest of science and of society as awhole.Although the need for some form of peer review(either pre- or post-publication) is acknowledged bymost researchers, the system of peer review is far fromperfect and there have been numerous high-profile casesof fraudulent publications that have passed the peer re-view process (Martin, 2012; Storbeck, 2011, July 7).port impact factor is a ratio between citations and recent citableitems published. Thus, the impact factor of a journal is calculatedby dividing the number of current year citations to the sourceitems published in that journal during the previous two years. AnImpact Factor of 1.0 means that, on average, the articles pub-lished one or two years ago have been cited one time. An ImpactFactor of 2.5 means that, on average, the articles published oneor two years ago have been cited two and a half times. http://admin-apps.webofknowledge.com/JCR/help/h impfact.htm*Correspondence to: Flaminio Squazzoni (flaminio.squazzoni@unibs.it)c© 2016 Xjenza Online83 Reviewing the review process: New Frontiers of Peer ReviewProblems are frequently attributed to the social and sub-jective dimensions of the process (e.g. bias and conflictof interest; Lipworth, Kerridge, Carter & Little, 2011).Other common criticisms levied against the peer reviewprocess include unacceptable delays in publication, ex-pense, inconsistencies, fraud/plagiarism, nepotism, andcounter to innovation – and the list goes on!2 What exactly is scientific peer review?Peer review or refereeing is the process of subjectingan author’s work, research, or ideas to the scrutiny ofexperts (peers) in the same field, traditionally, beforethe work is published in a journal.In its most basic form, peer review is the evaluationof an author’s manuscript by identified reviewers, whomake recommendations to the journal’s editor as towhether or not a manuscript should be accepted as is,revised prior to publication or rejected, based on thequality, originality and importance of the manuscript(Sense about Science, 2009). Peer review is one signi-ficant method by which research grants are allocated,papers published, academics promoted, and Nobel andother major prizes won (Smith, 2006).Peer review concerns all of us. As aptly stated by ThePublishers Association in response to the UK House ofCommons Science and Technology Committee consulta-tion on Peer review in scientific publications conductedin 2010–2012, peer review is “a duty and a skill, per-formed by researchers, for researchers. It is a systemthat has been developed by the academic community, forthe academic community over centuries and it is estab-lished practice that professional scientists are preparedto engage in peer review as a service to the communityat large and as a contribution to the progress of science”(The National Archives of the UK, 2011).The first recorded use of peer review is ascribed toIshaq bin Ali Al Rahwi (AD 854–931). In his book,Ethics of the Physician, Al Rahwi apparently encour-aged doctors to keep contemporaneous notes on theirpatients, later to be reviewed by a jury of fellow phys-icians. Journal peer review followed much later, whenHenry Oldenburg, editor of Philosophical Transactionsof the Royal Society, adopted peer review in the seven-teenth century (The National Archives of the UK, 2011).Since then, peer review has played an increasingly im-portant role in scientific publishing: in 2008, 1.3 millionlearned articles were published in peer-reviewed journ-als. Peer review is now fundamental to the integrationof new research findings into established knowledge, en-abling other researchers to analyse or use findings and,in turn, society at large to access and interpret researchclaims (Sense about Science, 2009).Several different types of peer review process are nowavailable (see Box 1). It is an evolving process, withcontinuous attempts being made to find better, more ef-fective models of peer review. The peer review processhas also been complicated by the increasing use of insti-tutional repositories, self-archiving, data sharing, socialmedia, and other tools. However, the underlying as-sumption in all situations is that, since peer review isbased on human labour and judgement, it is unlikelythat a perfect system can ever be found.3 Why PEERE?This COST Action aims to improve the peer review pro-cess, potentially increasing the credibility of science inEurope in an era of increasing scandals and public con-cern. The main objectives of the Action are given inBox 2.In order to achieve these objectives, three workinggroups (WG) have been created. They will be workingin the following areas:• WG1: Theory, analysis and models of peer re-view (Analysing peer review by integrating qual-itative and quantitative research and incorporatingadvanced computational and experimental investig-ation; Testing implications of different peer reviewmodels).• WG2: Data sharing and testing (Establishingstandards and appropriate Information and Com-munications Technology (ICT) applications totreat, manage and share data on peer reviewbetween stakeholders; Providing guidelines andprotocols for data sharing; Developing quality andefficiency indicators and monitoring measures toevaluate the potential impact of new models).• WG3: Research and implementation agenda (De-fining and monitoring challenges and prospects foran evidence-based evolution of peer review; Lever-aging existing resources and identifying new oppor-tunities for collaboration and research).4 Opportunities for MaltaAs this is a new COST Action, Malta currently hasonly one representative on the Management Committee.The Action currently includes researchers from diversedisciplines such as computational sociology, economics,basic sciences, etc. Some members have experience asjournal editors. Important stakeholders such as the pub-lishers Elsevier, Springer and Wiley, and partners fromthe US, Canada and Brazil are also included. Whateveryour research background, you may have ideas that canhelp to improve the process of peer review, which is (ar-guably) the cornerstone of science! If you are interestedin joining this Action, please contact Prof. Janet Mif-sud (janet.mifsud@um.edu.mt), COST Malta CountryNational Contact. More information on the Action is10.7423/XJENZA.2016.1.11 www.xjenza.orgReviewing the review process: New Frontiers of Peer Review 84available at: http://www.cost.eu/COST Actions/tdp/TD1306 and from http://peere.org/.Box 1: Types of peer review“Single blind” peer review: The author’sname and institution is known to the reviewer, butnot vice versa. This is the most common form ofpeer review, especially in the sciences.“Double blind” peer review: This system isfully anonymised i.e. the authors are unaware ofthe identity of the reviewers, and vice versa. Thisis more common in the social sciences.“Open” peer review: In which the authors’and reviewers’ names are revealed to each other.This is not too common, but is used in some bio-medical journals, such as BioMedCentral journalsand the British Medical Journal (BMJ).Post-peer review or post-publication peerreview: Different models can be found under thistitle, for example, Review by formally invited re-viewers, after publication of the un-reviewed art-icle; Review by volunteer reviewers, after public-ation of the un-reviewed article; and Commentson blogs or third party sites, independent of anyformal peer review that may have already occurredon the article. Post-publication peer review canbe named or anonymous, and reviews can in somecases be written by uninvited reviewers who maynot necessarily be literal “peers” in the field (Am-sen, 2014).Cascading peer review (or cascading re-views between linked journals): This is a sys-tem whereby a publishing house redirects rejectedmanuscripts to related journals that have lower re-jection rates, in the same field. Advantages to thepublisher are reduced cost and higher efficiency,while the advantages to the author is faster pub-lishing (Davis, 2010).Pre-print servers such as the arXiv repositoryof electronic preprints (http://arxiv.org/), wherethe e-prints are commented on by the community,and can later be submitted to a journal and pub-lished. Some of the benefits of the arXiv systemare that it “allows the scientists to publish researchquickly and get informal feedback and identify anyweaknesses. This is then followed by formal peerreview in a journal” (The National Archives of theUK, 2011).Box 2: Objectives of PEEREThe main objective of the Action is to improveefficiency, transparency and accountability of peerreview through a trans-disciplinary, cross-sectorialcollaboration. This is will be achieved through:• analysing peer review by integrating qualitat-ive and quantitative research and incorporat-ing advanced computational and experimentalinvestigation;• testing implications of different peer reviewmodels (e.g., open vs. anonymous, pre vs.post publication) and different scientific pub-lishing systems (e.g., open vs. subscriptionbased publication systems) for the rigour andquality of peer review;• discussing present reward structures, rules andmeasures and exploring new solutions to im-prove collaboration in all stages of the peerreview process; and• developing a coherent peer review framework(e.g. principles, guidelines, indicators andmonitoring activities) for stakeholders thattruly represents the complexity of research invarious fields.ReferencesAmsen, E. (2014). What is post-publication peer re-view? F1000Research. Retrieved August 15, 2014,from http://blog.f1000research.com/2014/07/08/what - is - post - publication- peer - review/#sthash .ia28atvc.dpufDavis, P. (2010). Cascading Peer-Review – The Futureof Open Access? Retrieved August 15, 2014, fromhttp://scholarlykitchen.sspnet.org/2010/10/12/cascading-peer-review-future-of-open-access/Lipworth, W. L., Kerridge, I. H., Carter, S. M. & Little,M. (2011). Journal peer review in context: A qualit-ative study of the social and subjective dimensionsof manuscript review in biomedical publishing. SocSci Med, 72 (7), 1056–1063.Martin, B. R. (2012). Does peer review work asa self-policing mechanism in preventing miscon-duct: a case study of a serial plagiarist. InT. Mayer & N. Steneck (Eds.), Promoting Re-search Integrity in a Global Environment (pp. 97–114). London/Singapore: World Scientific Publish-ing/Imperial College Press.Sense about Science. (2009). Peer Review Survey 2009:Full Report. Retrieved August 15, 2014, from http://www.senseaboutscience.org/news.php/87/peer-review-survey-2009Smith, R. (2006). Peer review: a flawed process at theheart of science and journals. J R Soc Med, 99 (4),178–182.10.7423/XJENZA.2016.1.11 www.xjenza.org85 Reviewing the review process: New Frontiers of Peer ReviewStorbeck, O. (2011, July 7). A summary of the BrunoFrey affair [Web log post]. Retreived from: http ://fivethirtyeight.blogs.nytimes.com/2013/07/15/senate- control- in-2014- increasingly- looks- like-a-tossup/.The National Archives of the UK. (2011). Eighth Report:Peer review in scientific publications. Science andTechnology Committee. London.10.7423/XJENZA.2016.1.11 www.xjenza.org

10.7423/XJENZA.2016.1.11 www.xjenza.org 85 Reviewing the review process: New Frontiers of Peer Review

Does peer review work as a self-policing mechanism in preventing misconduct: a case study of a serial plagiarist. In

Peer Review Survey 2009: Full Report. Retrieved August 15, 2014, from http: //www.senseaboutscience.org/news.php/87/peerreview-survey-2009

The National Archives of the UK.

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