To celebrate Peer Review Week this year, participating organizations organized virtual events and activities to highlight the role of personal and social identity in peer review. All the webinars and events can be viewed on Peer Review Week’s YouTube channel.
Learn more about peer review with these resources and tips compiled by Becker:
Get started as a peer reviewer
- Hear advice from editors in a video from last year’s Peer Review Week: How to Be A Peer Reviewer.
- Review the COPE Ethical Guidelines for Peer Reviewers.
- Collaborate with an experienced researcher on a peer review report. Make sure you check with the editor before co-reviewing and avoid ghostwriting.
Learn more about the peer review process for NIH grant applications
- Check out two videos from the NIH 2020 Virtual Seminar Let’s Look at Peer Review (transcript) and a “Live” Mock Study Section (transcript).
- Register to observe the ICTS Mock Study Section that will be held virtually on Nov. 10, 2021. For more details, view the flyer.
Get credit for the peer reviewing you do
- Sign up for a Publons account to highlight your peer review activity. Many publishers partner with Publons and verify your review activity. You can also connect Publons to your ORCID account to display your peer review activity on your ORCID record.
- Watch for CME credits that some clinical journals offer to peer reviewers. Some publishers also offer discounts on books to reviewers.
- Remember to list your peer reviewing activity on your CV.
Improve your peer review skills
- Aim for neutral language in your reviews to ensure feedback is constructive. For examples, see Baglini & Parsons’ If you can’t be kind in peer review, be neutral.
- Use a checklist or reporting guideline when peer reviewing. Reporting guidelines are not only for authors – more journals are including reporting guidelines or reviewer’s checklists in their instructions to reviewers. If you don’t get a checklist from the journal, check out the resources from the Equator Network: Peer Reviewing Research
Working on a research project related to peer review or publications?
- Submit an abstract for next year’s Ninth International Congress on Peer Review and Scientific Publication. It will be held in Chicago, IL, Sept. 8-10, 2022. Abstracts submissions can be submitted from Dec. 1, 2021, through Jan. 31, 2022.