After the review
After you submit a review you should receive a notification that the review was successfully received.
- Some journals will inform reviewers if the manuscript was accepted or rejected, while others do not.
- Some journals send reviewers the comments of other reviewers on the same manuscript along with the decision letter; reading these comments can help you improve your future reviews.
If the authors revise and resubmit the manuscript after review, the editor will often review the changes to decide if the reviewer comments have been fully addressed.
Sometimes, however, the editor will send the manuscript back to the original reviewers to get their feedback about the acceptability of the revised manuscript.
- If this happens, focus on if the authors have resolved the problems you pointed out in your first review.
- Try to avoid raising new problems unless they have to do with the author’s revisions. For example, if you asked the authors to explain their methods more clearly, and can now see problems with the experimental design that were not apparent before, it is still appropriate to mention them.
If the authors decided not to follow one or more of your suggestions, and explained why in their response letter, evaluate their reasons fairly and decide if you agree with their decision.
- If your suggestion arose from a misunderstanding of the manuscript, check to see if the authors have revised the relevant section to make it clearer or if they have explained a particular problem as a limitation of the study. Be fair.
- If you still feel strongly that the manuscript should not be published because of a problem that has not been addressed, you should indicate this to the editor and explain why a particular change or addition is necessary.
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