Flood of Submissions Bogs Down Peer Review

“What’s Wrong with Peer Review?” (Review, Nov. 11) makes the point that journals have a hard time checking the validity of data and methods because they can be overwhelmed with submissions. Another phenomenon that few know about is the “desk reject,” whereby journal editors or their staff reject a paper without sending it to peer review. In some fields, desk rejection accounts for the majority of papers refused publication in top-ranked journals. This is also a phenomenon that has arisen due to the overwhelming number of submissions, which is the result of the need of researchers to advance their careers by publishing journal articles.

It is perhaps more damaging to science than the flawed peer-review process because it means that the review process can’t meet the gold standard of being double-blind or anonymous to a reviewer. It risks having editors or staff pick papers to send to referees based on their personal knowledge and assessment of authors, their credentials, and the subject matter. This can result in a bias toward the status quo.