Research Guides: Scholarly Peer Review Guide: How to Review Others

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How to Peer-Review Like a Pro (17 min)

Reviewing Others: How-to

If you want to start contributing to peer review service, these resources will help you learn the practical steps.

Peer Review: The Nuts and Bolts A guide to peer review written by early career researchers for early career researchers, from Sense About Science (2012).
ACS Reviewer Lab: Hands-on Training for Reviewers "A free, 4-hour online course developed to educate researchers on the principles of quality peer-review. ...interactive modules covering the basics of peer review and ethics, as well as real-life guidance on how to write a first-rate review." (American Chemical Society, ACS)
How to Peer Review: Tutorial from Springer "This tutorial gives you an introduction to peer review and explains how you should go about reviewing a paper."
Reviewer Hub from Elsevier Articles, videos, and more to help new reviewers learn the ropes to begin reviewing, structure reviews, manage potential hurdles, promote reviewing activity, and more. (Elsevier)

Reviewing Others: Standards and Best Practices

In addition to the "nuts and bolts," it's important to be aware of professional standards and best practices.

Although some aspects may vary between disciplines, the resources below will help you understand some standard best practices.

Best Practices for Peer Review "The Best Practices handbook was developed...to articulate a set of practices that comprise a rigorous process of peer review." (Association of American University Presses, AAUP)
Guidelines on Roles and Responsibilities in Peer Review Section 2.3 of the White Paper on Publication Ethics, from the Council of Science Editors.
Toolkit for Peer Reviewers from the European Association of Science Editors (EASE) "A range of resources, divided over four categories, covering general tips, training, guidelines, tools and checklists for new peer reviewers, and established journal editors"
SAGER Guidelines (Sex and Gender Equity in Research) Prepared by the Gender Policy Committee of the European Association of Science Editors (EASE) to help both authors and peer reviewers by providing "a comprehensive procedure for reporting of sex and gender information in study design, data analyses, results and interpretation of findings."

Tools for Crediting Reviewers

Although peer review is first and foremost provided as a service to the discipline and its ongoing scholarly conversation, it can also benefit reviewers to be able to verify and be acknowledged for this service.

The following resources address methods of verifying review activity and giving credit for review service.

4 Ways Journal Publishers are Recognizing Peer Reviewers
ReviewerCredits
"Recognition and certification of peer review and conference talks." "An academic spin off, born from scientists for scientists." "Completely free and completely independent from publishers."
Web of Science Author Profiles (formerly Publons)
"On your Web of Science researcher profile, you can add reviews which are performed for journals, conferences or book series." In addition to manual entry options, you can add reviews from partner journals, interactive review processes (e.g., Frontiers), and by sending review receipts to reviews@webofscience.com.
Elsevier Reviewer Recognition Platform
"Researchers can see the list of Elsevier journals for which they have reviewed during the past five years and collect: Review certificates associated to their status based on the number of submitted reviews per journal; A yearly overview of their peer review performance; Their signature, listing journals for which they have acted as referees; Vouchers for Elsevier books and article publication services" (Elsevier)