Recommendations for accelerating open preprint peer review to improve the culture of science

Michele Avissar-Whiting, Frédérique Belliard, Stefano M. Bertozzi, Amy Brand, Katherine Brown, Géraldine Clément-Stoneham, Stephanie Dawson, Gautam Dey, Daniel Ecer, Scott C. Edmunds, Ashley Farley, Tara D. Fischer, Maryrose Franko, James S. Fraser, Kathryn Funk, Clarisse Ganier, Melissa Harrison, Anna Hatch, Haley Hazlett, Samantha Hindle, Daniel W. Hook, Phil Hurst, Sophien Kamoun, Robert Kiley, Michael M. Lacy, Marcel LaFlamme, Rebecca Lawrence, Thomas Lemberger, Maria Leptin, Elliott Lumb, Catriona J. MacCallum, Christopher Steven Marcum, Gabriele Marinello, Alex Mendonça, Sara Monaco, Kleber Neves, Damian Pattinson, Jessica K. Polka, Iratxe Puebla, Martyn Rittman, Stephen J. Royle, Daniela Saderi, Richard Sever, Kathleen Shearer, John E. Spiro, Bodo Stern, Dario Taraborelli, Ron Vale, Claudia G. Vasquez, Ludo Waltman, Fiona M. Watt, Zara Y. Weinberg, Mark Williams

PLOS Biology. ;22(2):e3002502. doi: 10.1371/journal.pbio.3002502

Peer review is an important part of the scientific process, but traditional peer review at journals is coming under increased scrutiny for its inefficiency and lack of transparency. As preprints become more widely used and accepted, they raise the possibility of rethinking the peer-review process. Preprints are enabling new forms of peer review that have the potential to be more thorough, inclusive, and collegial than traditional journal peer review, and to thus fundamentally shift the culture of peer review toward constructive collaboration. In this Consensus View, we make a call to action to stakeholders in the community to accelerate the growing momentum of preprint sharing and provide recommendations to empower researchers to provide open and constructive peer review for preprints.

https://journals.plos.org/plosbiology/article?id=10.1371/journal.pbio.3002502

Keywords

Scientific publishing

Zoology

Library Collection(s)

Bias, peer review, and publishing