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| EDITORIAL |
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| Year : 2016 | Volume
: 6
| Issue : 2 | Page : 11 |
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The peer-review process: A formality or necessity?
M M Aarif Syed
Department of Dermatology and Venereology, Institute of Medicine, Tribhuvan University, Kathmandu, Nepal
| Date of Web Publication | 8-Feb-2018 |
Correspondence Address:
M M Aarif Syed
Department of Dermatology and Venereology, Institute of Medicine, Tribhuvan University, Kathmandu
Nepal
 Source of Support: None, Conflict of Interest: None  | Check |
DOI: 10.4103/ijsr.Int_J_Stud_Res_19_17
How to cite this article:
Syed M M. The peer-review process: A formality or necessity?. Int J Stud Res 2016;6:11 |
Peer review is an important part of editorial processing that an article undergoes. It sets the standard of the article and acts as the most important filter following submission to a journal. It can be seen as the direct confrontation of the author(s) with the elites/academicians who judges the article. However, the battle is a win-win situation for both the parties. For authors, it lends more credibility to the article as one that has been peer reviewed is always at a better position to be referred and cited. For reviewers/editors, it helps maintain the quality of publication.
The International Journal of Students' Research (IJSR) has always followed double-blinded peer-review system. The authors do not know the reviewers, while to the reviewers, the identity of the authors is not revealed. The aim of this exercise is to prevent bias. Once an article has been submitted, one of the members of the editorial team assesses it for the suitability for the journal, reliability, authenticity, scientific content, and plagiarism. Majority of the rejections at our submission portal takes place at this juncture. After it has passed the initial barrack, which generally takes a week following submission, the reviewers are invited. The selection of reviewer also follows a set guideline. The reviewer is selected from the list of registered reviewers who have already mentioned their areas of work/interest. If we fail to find a suitable reviewer from the list, we make an online/PubMed search to find articles on the submitted topic/subject. Only those authors who are affiliated to educational institutions are then invited. We avoid inviting private practicing clinicians/doctors/scientists. An initial communication with the reviewer may reveal the abstract; however, the complete article is only revealed once the reviewer has accepted the invitation and agreed to the terms and conditions of the journal. The duration between the acceptance of the article for review and receipt of comments of the reviewer is highly variable. It may vary from 3 days to 6 weeks. If a reviewer has failed to respond to the initial invitation within 1 week of sending such requests, the invitation is automatically canceled and the link to access the article expires from the invitation email. We generally send invitations to four reviewers in the first go. Depending on the response, a second round of invitation may be required after a week.
With stringent peer-review process, we try to maintain high quality of the articles that are published by our journal. It may sometimes require a lot of patience on the part of authors as well as editors, as the reviewers may ask for repeated changes and demand to see the corrected versions before the article is finally accepted by the editors. We at IJSR have always believed in quality rather than quantity of the published articles. Thus, our rejection rates stand high. We are committed to maintain this unbiased double-blinded rigorous peer-review process. We also hope to get the continued support and patience of our esteemed authors.
Competing Interest
The Author Declares That He Has No Competing Interests.
Funding
Sources of funding: None.
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