The primary purpose of the peer review process is to provide the editor with the information needed to reach a decision and to help authors improve their papers. If the review report does not meet the journal’s quality standards, the reviewer may be asked to revise the report, or the report may be discarded. The review process is anonymous for both authors and reviewers (double-blind peer review).

Reviewers accept the Ethical Guidelines For Peer Reviewers by the Committee on Publication Ethics (COPE) and are responsible for the content of their reviews.

 

General expectations for review reports

Reviewers

– should declare all potential conflicts of interest that may be perceived as bias for or against the supposed authors;

– should not accept the invitation to review if the scope of the manuscript is outside their expertise;

– should call to the editor’s attention to any significant similarity between the manuscript under consideration and any papers of which they are aware;

– should keep the content of the manuscript confidential;

– should also be careful not to reveal their identity to the authors, either in their comments added to the original manuscript or in metadata of their review reports submitted in electronic form; 

– must give unbiased consideration to the manuscript, without regard to the author(s) supposed nationality, religion, gender, sexual orientation, institutional position or affiliation;

– should make all effort to submit their report by the agreed deadline or should inform the editor if this is not possible.

 

How to prepare the review reports

– The review report should be prepared in the language of the manuscript.

– Comments should be sufficiently clear and detailed so that the authors may correctly understand them.

– References can be recommended, but reviewers may only recommend the use of their own work or that of close colleagues if it is clearly necessary to improve the quality of the manuscript.

– A neutral tone should be maintained, providing constructive criticism and suggestions that may help the authors improve their work.

– Reviewers are prohibited from using AI or AI-assisted tools (such as ChatGPT) to produce peer review reports.

– A review form is provided for the reviewers to prepare their review report. 

 

Aspects to consider when preparing your review

– Is the manuscript relevant for the field? Does the work fit the scope of the journal?

– Does the title correspond to the topic of the manuscript and the characteristics of the journal?

– Is the topic of the manuscript original and novel? Does it clearly state the aims and research questions of the study?  

– Is the theoretical basis and background of the manuscript adequate? Are the results significant scientifically?

– Is the structure of the manuscript transparent, logical and well-proportioned? 

– Does the manuscript rely on the most important and relevant literature? Does it correctly cite the literature used? Are the cited works relevant to the topic?

– Are the sources and methods suitable for examining the issues raised by the manuscript? Are these described with sufficient details? Are the sources properly cited and analysed? Are the methods correctly applied? Are the data appropriately and consistently introduced and interpreted?

– Does the manuscript make appropriate and coherent use of terminology related to the field?

– Are the figures and tables easy to read and understand, interpreted appropriately and consistently?

– Are the conclusions justified and consistent with the evidence and arguments presented?

– Does the abstract adequately and clearly summarise the topic, purpose, methods and main results of the manuscript?

– Does the style, language use and spelling of the manuscript meet the requirements of academic writing and linguistic correctness?

– Is the manuscript (including the citations and bibliography) formatted according to the author’s guidelines?

 

Concluding evaluation

The review should be concluded with an overall recommendation:

a) I propose to accept the manuscript in its present form;

b) I propose to accept the manuscript after minor revisions;

c) I propose major revisions and resubmission of the manuscript;

d) I propose the rejection of the manuscript.

In all cases, the decision must be duly reasoned.