[Insight-users] PEER-REVIEW: Peer review highly sensitive to poor refereeing, claim researchers

[Luis Ibanez]

http://physicsworld.com/cws/article/news/43691

<quote>

Just a small number of bad referees can significantly undermine the ability
of the peer-review system to select the best scientific papers. That is
according to a pair of complex systems researchers in Austria who have
modelled an academic publishing system and showed that human foibles can
have a dramatic effect on the quality of published science.

...

While the concept of peer review is widely considered the most appropriate
system for regulating scientific publications, it is not without its
critics.

....

This may be particularly apparent when referees are asked to review more
controversial ideas that could damage their own standing within the
community if they give their approval.


...

"Our message is clear: if it can not be guaranteed that the fraction of
rational and random referees is confined to a very small number, the
peer-review system will not perform much better than by accepting papers by
throwing (an unbiased!) coin," explain the researchers.

...

the study exposes the vulnerability of peer review when referees are not
accountable for their decisions. "The system provides an opportunity for
referees to try to avoid embarrassment for themselves, which is not the goal
at all,"

Kennefick feels that the current system also encourages scientists to
publish findings that may not offer much of an advance. "Many authors are
nowadays determined to achieve publication for publication's sake, in an
effort to secure an academic position and are not particularly swayed by the
argument that it is in their own interests not to publish an incorrect
article.

**
</quote>

*The original paper, by a pair of complex systems researchers,
 is available (OPEN ACCESS) at arXiv.org <http://arxiv.org/abs/1008.4324v1>.

http://arxiv.org/abs/1008.4324v1

*
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