How can peer reviewers avoid bias and conflicts of interest?

Imagine pouring your heart and soul into a project, only to realize there's a flaw you overlooked. Peer review acts as a safety net, catching those errors or discrepancies before they make their way into the broader discourse. It's a humbling yet invaluable process that challenges us to refine our work, pushing the boundaries of what's possible. Moreover, peer review serves as a shield against misinformation and malpractice.

Peer review improves quality of publications if publisher and review are able to cope up with constraints of the act. Any activity has motives, hence publishing activity is also in context to deliver something that the publisher wants to spread in the community.peer reviewer must align that objective defined without intervention of personal views.

During the pre-publication screening of research manuscripts, peer review is the refereeing work done by subject matter experts that help journal editors decide whether or not to accept a paper for publication. Good peer review is one of the main bastions in the evolution of knowledge. It analyses the quality of research design, rigour of data collection and interpretation, and novelty of the research findings. It also reduces the dissemination of irrelevant findings, unwarranted claims, unacceptable interpretations, and personal views.

One can't avoid contextuality in the system. For example when multiple files open on the desktop, selection of any one makes others defocuses. Similarly selection of any contextual path defocuses others. Peer reviewers have to justify selected context. Time management is a personalised factor yes, that affects the reviewing activity.

Peer review ensures scientific integrity and credibility by evaluating manuscripts before publication. Challenges such as bias, quality variation, and time constraints impact its effectiveness. Avoiding bias and conflicts of interest, ensuring quality, and managing workload are crucial aspects of maintaining the integrity of the process. Academics heavily invested in research need immediate training in editorial practices, notably peer review. This can be about defining conflicts of interest, broadening reviewer selection, and recruiting diverse technical experts.

Peer review isn’t a perfect process, and that is evidenced by the wide differences seen not only at a single journal, but between journals. Variations in timing, content and quality of review are sometimes stark.

I feel one of the biggest challenges faced by reviewers isn’t identifying their biases, but having the willingness to divulge them as soon as possible. It takes a lot of humility, moral character and strength to admit you may not be the best person for a review.

Appropriate training in editorial and publishing practices, especially peer review, is urgently required for academics that devote most of their time to research. Clarification of what constitutes conflicts of interest, diversifying the pool of potential reviewers, and widening the options for recruitment of technical, statistical or subject matter espert reviewers seem to be options most journal editors are already considering. Performing an objective and quantitative evaluation of the work of reviewers is starting to to take prominence as one of the main stalwarts in assuring the quality of the process.

The scientific review should be highly informative and well articulated, with the ultimate aim to improve the quality of the research manuscript. The style and content of a manuscript are open to criticism, as are the thought processes that birthed it. Everything from word choice to significance of the research focus is under scrutiny. Nevertheless, monitoring the peer review process even post publication is possible. Models that favour double anonymous or collaborative peer review are being assessed and have already proven useful to minimise time constraints in the dissemination of knowledge.

Allocating time across multiple days is key. In the 4 step method, I tend to do the first broad read through and look for related references on the first day. I also consult my pillow between the first read, where I identify major problems, contradictions, omissions, and second detailed read, where I note inconsistencies, and structural/grammatical issues. Structured peer review reports that are adapted to the subject and field are great time-saving devices. They help to define key priorities and differentiate between "must have" and "would be nice to include".