Questions tagged [editors]
Questions about the roles and responsibilities of editors, who decide what papers are accepted into peer-reviewed journals.
605
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I am an editor for a lousy paper and I found a better algorithm than theirs. Must I share it with them?
I am handling a paper as an associate editor that proposed an algorithm that I find to be weak. In fact, I was able to show that a very simple, brute-force approach actually has a better running time ...
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68
votes
9
answers
14k
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Journal published a paper, ignoring my objections as a referee
A few months back I received a request from a reputed journal to review an article. The article was in a fast-track mode because of its assumed importance. I did review it, and found that it makes ...
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62
votes
10
answers
17k
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Is it fair to desk-reject a manuscript because it breaks relativity?
Every so often a journal I edit receives papers with some kind of claim that, if true, would break mainstream physics. For example, a paper could claim that waves in dark matter can travel at v ~ 1014 ...
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60
votes
2
answers
7k
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Can you share some screenshots of editor's control panels?
Most journals use similar manuscript handling systems such as ScholarOne. I have seen both author and reviewer accounts (which are similar). I wonder how an editor account looks like. I mean how you ...
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votes
5
answers
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Should an Editor in Chief publish in their own journal?
An Editor in Chief of a journal ought to be proud of their journal and consider it a good place to publish their own work, so not publishing in the journal that they edit suggests a lack of confidence ...
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54
votes
4
answers
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What to do when you notice that a value in your paper is wrong, once it is accepted but before it is published?
8 months ago, I have submitted my paper to the top journal in my field and finally it got accepted. Unfortunately, I have found one wrong table entry (Experiment Section), which is not a logical value ...
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53
votes
3
answers
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Masters' advisor uses my work without citing it - Journal decided to intervene
About a month ago, I read a new article published by my previous advisor and three other researchers in a top journal. I noticed that part of it uses part of my master's thesis, only written as if ...
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52
votes
6
answers
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When / how should I ask about a manuscript's status in review?
I have a manuscript that has been in review for 60 days. The journal asks for reviews within four weeks. At what point is it acceptable (and not detrimental) to contact the editor for an update? How ...
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51
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9
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I got a very bad review from one reviewer, but the paper was not rejected
Some time ago, I submitted my paper to a reputable journal (but far from being one of the best in my field) and have recently received two reviews. One review was positive overall and the reviewer ...
user85088
49
votes
4
answers
4k
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Should I contact accomplished researchers listed as editors of shady journal?
I recently got an unsolicited email advertising a questionable-looking mathematics journal. Upon investigation, it looks pretty shady: page charges, manuscripts to be submitted in Microsoft Word (...
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45
votes
6
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6k
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Can I write a referee report too fast?
As a math postdoc, I received my first invitation to referee a journal article today, and I accepted the invitation. I've already read a preprint of the submitted article (which has been available on ...
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45
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7
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8k
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Referee made a mistake but recommended acceptance, what to do?
I recently received a referee report on a math paper in a mid-tier journal.
In this paper I proved (to give an example avoiding technicalities) that all dogs are cute.
But the referee claimed in his ...
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43
votes
6
answers
8k
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Is it common for Chinese nationals to turn down review requests?
I am an associate editor for some international scientific journals. Unsurprisingly, I receive a number of submissions from Chinese scholars (working in China), which go through the standard peer ...
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43
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3
answers
6k
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How to tell reviewers that I can't update my results
I spent a lot of time during my post-doc doing a big-data analysis using cloud credits paid for by a grant. I got the research conducted, written up, and submitted to a journal. The modeling I did ...
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42
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4
answers
5k
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Published papers with incorrect solutions of famous problems: how to raise concerns with editors?
I recently discovered the following two papers:
Bruckman, Paul S. A proof of the Collatz conjecture. Internat. J. Math. Ed. Sci. Tech. 39 (2008), no. 3, 403–407, DOI: 10.1080/00207390701691574.
...
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41
votes
2
answers
4k
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How to respond to a perplexing review?
I've received a perplexing peer-review to a submitted paper of mine. The editor asks for major revisions, and sent us two reviews. The first one is serious and raises good points: we'll work, amend ...
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41
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4
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How long typically are paper reviews? Is there such a thing as “too long”?
When you review papers submitted for publication, is there an “optimal” length for reviews?
In my experience as an author and referee, I have seen a large range of review lengths (for reference, a ...
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40
votes
8
answers
12k
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How to review a revised paper I have already rejected?
I reviewed a manuscript submitted to a high-impact journal. The quality was low and I believed it could not reach the journal’s standards even by revision. I clearly recommended rejection.
Now I ...
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40
votes
4
answers
11k
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How to deal with an unreasonable reviewer asking to cite irrelevant articles?
Two years ago, when I was doing my master’s degree, I was working on a computational project. My supervisor was well-known in the field and a highly reputed person. We were doing a great job, trying ...
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40
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5
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Author wants to withdraw or insist on re-reviewing at proof stage of publication
I am editing a small scholarly journal published by a learned society. One of our authors, after his manuscript was finally accepted for publication and he had signed and returned the publishing ...
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40
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8
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Reviewer signs name on review. Should the editor censor?
Say a reviewer writes something like
This paper is [yada yada blah blah].
Sincerely,
Professor John Smith, Big Name University
Should the editor just forward the review to the authors because ...
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40
votes
3
answers
6k
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Whose responsibility to detect plagiarism during peer review: editor or referee?
Around a month ago, I was requested to review a paper submitted to a well-known APS journal. The main idea introduced in the paper was nice and the experimental implementation had fairly good results. ...
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6
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Are you permitted to forward the reviews from a rejected manuscript when submitting to a new journal?
Suppose I have a paper rejected from a top tier journal. The anonymous reviews highlight a number of strengths of my paper, but ultimately judge that the paper does not merit publication in that lofty ...
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39
votes
9
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What should PhD students do if they submit a paper to two journals and a reviewer notices concurrent submission?
I am in a desperate situation. I made a mistake and committed academic misconduct.
I have submitted my article to two journals in parallel, let's say in j1 and j2. Once I received acceptance from ...
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votes
3
answers
7k
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Is it acceptable, as a Reviewer, to ask the Editor about another reviewer?
I recently reviewed a manuscript submitted to a Journal. Today, I received the editor's response to the authors, which included all the reviews made by the (anonymous) reviewers.
I was particularly (...
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37
votes
2
answers
8k
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What to do when a journal publishes a paper plagiarizing one's work but doesn't care about it?
Recently I caught a paper which had plagiarized my paper. Several sentences had been copied from my article without citing my article. Some of the copied sentences had been shuffled, so the words were ...
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votes
8
answers
28k
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Why do editors sometimes accept a paper even if a reviewer recommends rejection?
For the last many days, I have a question in mind related with the editorial decision of accepting or rejecting the manuscript after peer-review:
Few days back I got a review report from a very ...
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35
votes
2
answers
7k
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The editor mixed up the reviews and rejected my paper based on the reviews of a different paper! Now they're denying everything. How to proceed?
I have heard lots of stories about rejection based on unfair reviews, etc. But this is a new one for me, and I wanted to seek the Academia SE's advice...
We recently submitted a paper (let's call it A)...
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2
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As a reviewer, what steps can I take after paper is published despite major scientific and ethical concerns, with no explanation from editor?
I recently reviewed a manuscript for a journal I didn't know very well, but which was indexed on Pubmed and Scopus and seemed to be legitimate. In my review, I recommended rejection based on what I ...
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34
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5
answers
8k
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As an editor, what to do when a referee recommends citing their own papers?
Occasionally it happens that a referee suggests citing their own papers in a review. This may be a problematic practice, since there is a thin line between appropriate and inappropriate ...
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34
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3
answers
7k
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Journal does not tell me why they rejected my paper, even on request
I submitted my paper to one of Springer’s journals seven months ago. One month ago I received a letter from the editor-in-chief:
Following a review of the manuscript by the editorial
board, we ...
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33
votes
4
answers
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views
Do editors ever "overbook" referees?
Is the following common? An editor for a journal sends a paper out to, say, three or four referees. After getting the first two referee reports, the editor makes a decision and tells the third and ...
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8
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Should I review a paper that violates the maximum length limitation?
I am reviewing a conference paper that violates the maximum number of pages by more than 10%. I believe that this is enough reason to outright reject the paper.
However, maybe the authors would ...
- 1,149
32
votes
3
answers
3k
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Is it OK to select an editor if I solved his conjecture?
I am about to submit a paper to a respected math journal. In this paper I solved a conjecture that was raised by a member of the editorial board (and this is one of the main reasons I chose this ...
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5
answers
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What happens if the editor cannot find reviewers?
I submitted to a journal a couple of months ago. The editorial flow is somehow quick and very transparent. I receive notifications for all events happening to the manuscript.
Unfortunately, the ...
user7112
31
votes
4
answers
5k
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Use of "we have a large backlog" euphemism by journal editors when rejecting articles without sending them out for review
Several times now I've had desk rejections from journals in pure mathematics that are variations on the theme of 'we have a large backlog of very good articles, so unfortunately we won't even be ...
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31
votes
2
answers
3k
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Technical editor changed author order of the paper
Recently, I attended a conference as a corresponding author of a paper with five authors. After the paper was published in the conference proceedings, I realized that the technical editor changed the ...
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31
votes
5
answers
6k
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How to handle newly discovered problems in second and third round reviews
For the first time, I had to review a revision of an academic paper (I have already reviewed several other papers, but they were all rejected after the first round). While the authors had clearly ...
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31
votes
7
answers
2k
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What to do when a referee wants to criticize someone else through me
A couple of months ago I submitted a paper for which a referee review came back recently, recommending minor corrections. There are two methods to calculate some quantities in the literature which do ...
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31
votes
2
answers
16k
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What corrections can you make on galley proofs?
When I receive galley proofs of a paper, I look at possible errors introduced by the copy-editing team. But while I proofread the article, there are sometimes small mistakes I'd like to fix, which ...
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30
votes
1
answer
2k
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Editors resigning because they published a low quality paper
Very recently the chief editors of the journal
'EMS SURVEYS IN MATHEMATICAL SCIENCES'
resigned because they published a paper (whose "methodology does not contradict Cantor’s and non-standard ...
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2
answers
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What might the editor do if my supervisor contacts a journal to claim authorship of a paper?
When I was doing my PhD project, I got an idea to solve a different but related problem. However, my supervisor said neither the motivation nor the initial result were interesting, and so he refused ...
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votes
6
answers
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Why would a "poorly written" paper get a reject and resubmit decision rather than major revision?
Recently, I got a reject and resubmit decision from a reputed mathematics journal. I received two referee reports: the first referee suggested improving the presentation, with no recommendation of ...
- 2,035
28
votes
5
answers
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What do legit journal/conference/review invitations look like?
As everyone else here probably does, I receive a lot of unsolicited emails. I don't like it, but I've gotten used to it and can just ignore them with a friendly smile on my face, because at least ...
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27
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3
answers
6k
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Is it good courtesy to reply and express gratitude to an editor's long letter of rejection?
I think the editor's generic decision letter will be about one page or less. However, I received an editor's decision letter that is longer than two pages, single-space, with small fonts and small ...
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3
answers
20k
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Why become a journal editor?
I know peer-reviewing research papers is a lot of work, but it is something that as a scientist in academia you must do. However, you are not required to become an editor of a journal. It seems to be ...
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27
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2
answers
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Can a referee request a paper referenced in the reviewed paper?
If you review a paper which relies on results some other paper and you do not have access to that paper, is it acceptable to contact the editor and ask whether the author can provide a copy of the ...
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5
answers
9k
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Is it bad to withdraw a manuscript one day after its submission?
I submitted it yesterday, after sending it to a repository. Then, a colleague gave a quick read and found some narrative issues, i.e., our abstract seems to be claiming something we did not do and we ...
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26
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6
answers
7k
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How can editors and reviewers detect data manipulation?
I am preparing a paper in the field of Computer Science.
In order to report test results, we usually run a number of tests and report the average of those tests.
For each test, we generate random ...
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26
votes
2
answers
14k
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How to become a journal editor?
Being an editor of a journal can be time-consuming, but has obvious benefits (especially if one enjoys reading and reviewing manuscripts). So I expect many academics have a desire to become an editor.
...
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