Znanstvena recenzija: ocjena vrijednosti

Abstract

Objectives: Editors o f journals depend on the system of peer review to screen out poorly conceived, poorly executed and unoriginal manuscripts. This study was designed to assess the reliability and consistency of reviewers ’ responses with regard to manuscripts submitted for publication to a leading international dental journal. Methods: Three elements in the peer review process were investigated; namely: (1) reviewers\u27 reports on manuscripts to the oral and maxillofacial radiology section of Oral Surgery, Oral Medicine, Oral Pathology, Oral Radiology and Endodontics were studied for consistency in the three reports for each of 78 consecutively submitted manuscripts rated as Ufull papers”; (2) ten previo sly accepted and ten previously rejected manuscripts were sent out for re-review by different panels of reviewers who were uninformed o f the prior review; and (3) questionnaires were sent to the editors o f ten leading dental journals to compare their peer review criteria and outcomes. Results: Reviewers were consistently reliable in their responses to questions regarding originality and scientific merit, and in delineating manuscript acceptability. O f manuscripts that were previously accepted eight o f ten were again accepted following a further double blind review. Of manuscripts that were rejected originally, six of ten were again rejected upon a second review by other referees. The use o f two reviewers was validated for accepted articles; but validity required at least three reviewers when manuscripts were rejected. The selected jo urnal editors reported acceptance rates of from 30 to 80% with publication waiting times form three to 24 months. Higher acceptance percentages generally were associated with greater delays in publication. Conclusions: Journal peer review is not perfectly reliable; however, it does serve the purpose of reducing the number of poorly conceived and poorly constructed research papers.Cilj istraživanja: Urednici časopisa ovise o sustavu recenzija kako bi se zaštitili od loše zamišljenih, loše izvedenih i neoriginalnih rukopisa. Cilj ove studije bio je procijeniti pouzdanost i dosljednost recenzenta prema rukopisima poslanim kako bi se objavili u vodećem međunarodnom stomatološkom časopisu. Postupak: Istraživana su tri elementa u postupku recenzije; poglavito: (1) proučeni su izvještaji recenzenata o rukopisima poslanim odsjeku za radiologiju časopisa Oral Surgery, Oral medicine, Oral Pathology, Oral Radiology and Endodontics, kako bi se ustanovila dosljednost triju recenzija za svaki od 78 redom pristiglih radova označenih kao “juli papers (2) deset već prihvaćenih i deset prethodno odbijenih radova poslano je na ponovnu recenziju različitim recenzentima koji nisu bili obaviješteni o prethodnim recenzijama; i (3) poslani su upitnici urednicima vodećih stomatoloških časopisa kako bi se usporedili kriteriji i rezultati recenzija. Rezultati: Recenzenti su bili dosljedno pouzdani u odgovorima o izvornosti, znanstvenom doprinosu i odluci o prihvatljivosti rukopisa. Od deset prethodno prihvaćenih rukopisa osam je bilo ponovno prihvaćeno nakon dvostruke slijepe recenzije. Od deset rukopisa koji su prethodno bili odbijeni šest je po odluci drugih referenata bilo ponovno odbijeno. Korištenje dva recenzenta bilo je punovrijedno za prihvaćene članke, ali da bi se postigla pravovaljanost kod odbijenih rukopisa potrebna su barem tri recenzenata. Urednici izabranih časopisa izvijestili su o prihvaćanju radova u 30 do 80% slučajeva, a vrijeme do tiska radova bilo je od 3 do 24 mjeseca. Viši postotak prihvaćenih radova općenito je bio povezan s dužim razdobljem do objave radova. Zaključak: Recenzija u časopisu nije savršeno pouzdana; međutim, ona služi da bi se i smanjio broj loše zamišljenih i loše izvedenih znanstvenih radova