Read on Twitter
This article ( https://cacm.acm.org/blogs/blog-cacm/248824-how-objective-is-peer-review/fulltext) has got me thinking a bit about this, and it has a lot to do with expectation setting. I don't think that peer review is perfect or objective and I don't think it can be. This is the first thing that we have to be clear about. 1/n
Next, individual decisions will never be perfect. This is really important to understand. Sometimes junk is accepted and great results are rejected, even multiple times. This can be a problem for grad students since for them, 1-2 bad decisions can affect their career. 2/n
However, as an overall community process, there is a correlation between quality and acceptance, especially at top tier conferences. Over time, when looking at larger numbers, the process does actually work. 3/n
The hard part is that sometimes people are adversely affected, since it's not a perfect process. However, people rarely accept that a rejection is justified or at least reasonable, and so the negative feelings are amplified and people take it very personally. 4/n
Our roles as advisors is to help here and make it clear that it's rarely a single decision that changes a career, and to point out that sometimes something is borderline and can depend on "taste". Again, it's about setting expectations. 5/n
Sometimes, maliciously bad decisions are made for political reasons or to push someone's own work. This happens in every work environment and shouldn't be used as an argument that the system is broken. Some bad apples don't change the entire picture. 6/n
None of this means that we shouldn't work hard to improve the process and make sure that it's as good and fair as possible. This is extremely important to the field. But let's keep in mind that it's not as bad as people say. 7/n
Finally, let's remember that it cannot ever be perfect and objective. It involves people and individual taste, and this is inherently subjective. But, in large numbers and over time, it does basically work. n/n
