DOI: 10.3897/ese.2026.e182718

Authors: Mario Malički, El Mehdi Ferrouhi, Hristina Prodanova, Seda Yilmaz Semerci, Taras Kotyk, Siphamandla Mncube

Abstract: Introduction: The number or percentage of journals publishing review reports or reviewer names remains unknown in today’s scholarly milieu.Methods: In January 2025 we sent a survey to all members of the European Association of Science Editors (EASE), followed by 2 reminder rounds, with 16 questions related to their journals, including type of peer review, availability of post-publication commenting, journal discipline, articles access type, and the manuscript submission system used by the journal. Survey responses were verified by checking the information listed on the journals’ websites.Results: A total of 84 participants completed the survey out of the 668 emails sent (of which 83 bounced, and 125 were unopened), leading to a response rate of 14% (84 out of 585 working or non-bounced emails), or 18% (84 out of 460) if only opened emails are counted. After data cleaning, information on 71 unique journals was collected, of which only 2 described their peer review type using the National Information Standards Organization (NISO) 2023 peer review taxonomy. Of the 71 journals, one published review reports with reviewer names and one without. Four journals allowed post-publication commenting on their websites. A little over a third of the journals used the Open Journal System (n = 22, or 31%) as their submission platform, were health sciences journals (n = 23, or 32%), were published by institutional publishers (n = 25, 35%), and more than half operated as Diamond open access (n = 42, 59%).Discussion: Only two journals in our survey published review reports alongside articles, and of the two, one published reviewer names (used open peer review) and one did not (transparent peer review). Additionally, only two journals described their peer review process on their websites using the NISO taxonomy. More research is needed to determine barriers and interventions for greater adoption of open and transparent peer review and the NISO taxonomy.

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DOI: 10.3897/ese.2026.e165929

Authors: Janaynne Carvalho do Amaral

Abstract: In July 2023, version 3.0 of standard terminology for peer review was published by the National Information Standards Organization. The terminology approaches four aspects of the peer review process: identity transparency, reviewer interacts with, review information published, and post-publication commenting. Using examples of open peer review models with public participation implemented by open access journals covering different subjects, the inclusion of two new categories in the next version of the terminology is proposed herein: manuscript review and pre-publica-tion commenting.

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