PeerChoice Review Process

Elsevier fully supports peer review and sees it as the best mechanism to certify scholarly research, but is open to any mechanism which may enhance or increase efficiency within this proven approach.

We, like most scientific publishing companies, rely on effective peer review processes to uphold not only the quality and validity of individual articles, but also the overall integrity of the journals we publish.

Frequently Asked Questions

Q: Will this system replace the thorough peer review process that we have come to appreciate?
A: No. The PeerChoice Review Process is aiming to facilitate the process, and is expected to deliver fast supplementary information for the Editors to base their decision on. However, for exceptionally interesting subjects or articles, we foresee that we may be able to reach quicker decisions – both in acceptance and rejection, of course, without any compromise with regards the existing standards of careful decision making. For articles that have not been downloaded for such self-selected review, the normal review process will prevail anyway. This pilot will hopefully teach us in what percentage of the articles this will be the case. In any case, in the period the articles are up for downloading, the Editors will already have started their process to search for suitable reviewers.

Q: What is the reason for this pilot?
A: The pilot at hand addresses the important issue of article relevancy. Reviewers often refuse an article sent to them based on the feeling that it is not relevant to their research. PeerChoice Review completely reverses the current model in which the Editor finds a reviewer matching a submitted article, into: the reviewer selects the article that seems a best match to his/her academic competency and current interest. Rather than “push” this system makes use of “pull” – making use of new technologies, while, in essence we will be making use of the same scientific networks that form around the subjects published in the journal, except more targeted, and hence more efficient and effective.

Q: What decides on success or failure of this pilot?
A: We see two sides to this pilot: to begin with, the operational and systems side – i.e. will it all work, and we surely will go though a learning curve there. The pilot should give us enough feedback on that aspect. In addition, will a sufficient number of potential reviewers be sufficiently interested to sign up to this, and promise to deliver a timely review, and deliver on that promise?

Q: How will you deal with conflict of interest or apparent other manifestations of unethical behaviour?
A: We will check on an overlap in affiliation and other apparent signs of connection between the PeerChoice reviewer and the author. Other than that, the Editor will always have a look at the review, and when unethical behaviour is spotted the reviewer will simply be removed from the list of trusted reviewers. The PeerChoice reviewer will be asked if a conflict of interest exists before he/she submits the review. If a PeerChoice reviewer by chance downloads an article where this might be the case, he/she can tell us, and the reviewer concerned is relieved from the obligation to deliver a review.

Q: You make the article more or less publicly available before publication. What if the authors object?
A: We only make the title and abstracts available, the author remain anonymous until a PeerChoice reviewer has downloaded the article. An article will cease to be available after 4 people have downloaded it (and therewith have agreed to deliver a review). This is not much different from the normal practice where at least 2, but sometimes 3 or 4 people get to see the article under the same conditions of confidentiality as we will apply in this pilot. Like in the normal review process, the author can ask for certain reviewers to be excluded from the process.

Q: What if nobody volunteers to perform a PeerChoice review for a certain article?
A: In such case the normal process applies. The aim of the PeerChoice review process is to deliver supplementary information and not necessarily, and certainly not immediately, replace the normal reviewer selection process.

Q: What does Elsevier want to achieve from this pilot?
A: We would like to gain experience with this concept of self-selection in the peer review process: does this lead to faster reviews back with the Editor, and do all self-selected reviewers indeed deliver within the promised time frame? And last but not least, does this process address current reviewers’ concerns of article relevancy?

Q: What will be the next step after the initial 3 month pilot?
A: As this is a pilot, the outcome will largely decide on the next step. Obviously we will take into account lessons learned. However, assuming there is a sufficient uptake and positive feedback from the Editors and reviewers we will extend the experiment and expand its reach, e.g. by bringing in more subjects areas or reach out to a larger pool of reviewers where possible.