Hey all. I want to do a quick thread abt reviewing journal articles. I'm writing this as a former managing editor & as someone who routinely participates in the peer review process. The purpose is just to highlight best practices. Feel free to add to this list. #AcademicTwitter

1. Only agree to peer review an article, if you can do it in a timely fashion. Otherwise, it's unfair to the authors & to the managing editor.
2. If life gets in the way of reviewing the article in a timely fashion, let the managing editor know.

3. Review the article on its merits & for what it is as opposed to telling them to write a different article.

4. If an author didn't sufficiently explain why they used certain cases, SAY THAT. Instruct them to explain it better. Don't tell them to use different cases.

5. When you tell someone to cite literature X, give them a FEW examples to help get them started.

6 Be kind. You're critiquing something that someone worked really hard on. There's no reason to belittle them.

7. Approach reviewing as service to one another, rather than service to the discipline. You're helping someone to improve an article so they can get it published. Maybe w/ this journal. Maybe not. Think of it like mentoring.

8. Think about critiquing in terms of structure, analysis, methods, evidence, writing & citing. What are the authors' strengths & weaknesses in each category? This is also a useful metric for assessing undergrad papers. :)