Peer review

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Peer review is a method for evaluating the scientific quality of a piece of information. In peer review a number of people that can be considered as reasonably acquainted with the topic that the piece of information addresses give their statement whether or not the piece of information is of good enough quality for publication in a scientific journal.

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Most often peer review is considered in the context of publishing scientific articles that tend to be descriptions of scientific studies and their results. Peer review can also used as a means of controlling quality of assessments and their outputs. Basically peer review is actually about acceptability of the process of producing information, and thereby also acceptability of the outcomes of that process. However, peer review is usually not a systematic method, but rather a practice that builds on the assumption that peers can implicitly identify good works from bad ones based on their own expertise. Consequently peer review also often ends up addressing also questions of e.g. usability and relevance, in a relatively random fashion. Despite its shortcomings, peer review does have value in quality control, also in the context of assessment.

Technically, it is a discussion on the Talk page of the object and has the following statement:

"The definition of this object is based on the state-of-the-art scientific knowledge and methods. The data used is representative and unbiased. The causalities are described in a well-founded way. The formula correctly describes how the result can be calculated based on the data and causalities. Overall, the information in the definition reflects the current scientific understanding and is unlikely to substantially change because of some existing information that is omitted."

Study is a special kind of object in the sense that the definition typically describes a particular study that has been performed. Therefore, it is not possible to evaluate (in the sense of attempting to improve) the definition as such, because what was done was done. Instead, the interesting question is about the generalisability of the results.

Thus, the peer review of a study aims to answer this question: "To what questions do the study actually answer reliably, based on the current scientific understanding?"

Who can and should do a peer review in Opasnet?

Basically, Opasnet is applying an open peer review process in its widest sense. It means that anyone can make a peer review about anything. However, a peer review is worthless unless the readers believe that the reviewer actually is a peer, which means a person who has enough relevant expertise, usually a fellow researcher. Therefore, the following guidance is advised:

  • If you need the information of a page in your assessment or other work and the page has not been reviewed yet, you should consider reviewing the page yourself before using it. Or, if you don't feel qualified, you should put some effort in finding a person who could review the page. This way, you increase the credibility of your own work, and you also help the Open Assessors' Network to evaluate and improve the contents of Opasnet.
  • You can peer review a page in Opasnet, if you have a credible record of expertise in the area of the page. It is advised that reviewers put enough information about this on their user page (maybe a brief curriculum vitae and a list of publications).
  • You should not be a major contributor of the page you review, i.e. you should not be one of those who have brought a substantive amount of scientific material to the page. Technical and linguistic edits can be done without limitation.
    • The roles of each contributor are clarified in the Acknowledgements of the page.

See also

References

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