Regrets or no regrets? No regrets! The fate of rejected manuscripts

This area is explored by combining the data in the database of Cardiovascular Research with data in Ovid (Ovid Search …) to explore the role of peer review in the editorial process of manuscripts.

Abstract

In general, Editors are facing larger numbers of submitted manuscripts than they can publish. Thus they search for instruments to make a reasonable selection. One criterion may be a preference for certain topics within a broader field. Even then an imbalance may remain between submissions and available pages. Weighing of the relative quality of the submitted work is a prerequisite in order to make fair decisions. The most important instrument in this process is the advice of one or more peer reviewers [1]. Specialized research on the limitations of the peer review system is just starting to emerge [2–4]. From investigations on the editorial process of Radiology [5] and the Journal of Clinical Investigation [6], it has appeared that reviewers set markedly different standards in their appreciation of manuscripts even if based on a large group of reviewers that each handled many manuscripts. Also the concordance between reviewers on the same manuscripts is limited [6]. When fictitious manuscripts are sent to many more reviewers than what is usual for a standard journal, marked differences in reviewer's opinions become overt [7]. In the social sciences, papers published already have an almost 90% chance of being rejected when they are resubmitted to other journals [8]. The latter two types of studies raise ethical issues with respect to reviewers unaware of the fact that they are guinea pigs in an experiment [9]. The fate of rejected manuscripts, however, is terra incognita. We have explored this area by combining the data in the database of Cardiovascular Research with data in Ovid (Ovid Search …