I review a fair number of papers [*] for the Royal Society of Chemistry, but this last week something new happened: I had a paper returned to me for a second review. I originally had been critical of the paper, somewhat for what was done, and somewhat for the way it was presented (quite sloppily with mistakes you would expect from an undergrad taking a lab class). I've been critical of papers before when reviewing them and never have really followed up on what happened to them (I've been meaning to, but it's not a top priority). I figure either the editor ignored my feedback or the authors went elsewhere with it.
So you can see that I was pretty amazed to get a paper back with an attachment showing the comments that I had originally made and their responses to them. They agreed with all them and made the appropriate changes. I figured this was the way it was suppose to work, but I've not seen it yet. So now I'm excited because I can see that I actually made a difference. How cool is that?
[*] What's a "fair number"? I probably average about 1 a month, although that actual event - "1 a month" never occurs. They always come in groups of 2 or 3 followed by longer periods of inactivity. I have no idea how 12/year compares to other reviewers. I suspect some do more, some do less.
1 comment:
Hello,
Thanks for sharing this link - but unfortunately it seems to be not working? Does anybody here at rheothing.blogspot.com have a mirror or another source?
Thanks,
Mark
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