Peer Review Workshop

For this week I’d like to comment on our workshop on how to do a peer review. I learned that peer reviews are an important way to protect the quality of research that is published. It was also interesting to discover that the standards of what constitutes “good quality” can differ between different journals. From the peer review tips we learned, what really struck me was the advice of Dr. Tyworth, that we should not turn a project into what we would do. For example, I can see this becoming problematic if you are in a field in which you have extensive knowledge and experience. I learned that ultimately, as a peer reviewer, I must not try to change the question. Rather, I must thoroughly understand exactly what the author is arguing or trying to explain in their article, and based on this, then evaluating whether their methods are appropriate to their research question.

As we all are submitting a peer review, I also found it very useful to hear my classmate’s suggestions on best practices and strategies to utilize in our peer reviews. For example, we could look at the general readability of the article as well as the originality of the actual research question. Perhaps an extension to the workshop could have been reviewing an article together (however, not one of the articles we are selecting from), and then commenting on areas for improvement. I understand the time constraints; we are limited in our discussion time. Still, a practical hands-on example could be beneficial. Athough many of us have never written a peer review before, hopefully we all feel a bit more confident in our ability to write professionally and constructively in our peer reviews after attending the workshop.