VIDEO: What is the future of peer review in ecology?

At the 2016 BES Annual Meeting in Liverpool, a lively panel debate was held on the future of peer review in ecology. Following my previous post summarising the debate, we now have a video of the full session, which can be viewed here:

Peer review is critical to the research process but has also been the subject of much ongoing criticism and debate. How the process of peer review is changing with new advances in technology, how we ensure quality, fairness and impartiality in peer review, how we reach the next generation of reviewers and how we acknowledge or reward review effort are topics widely discussed by the scientific community. Many peer review models and experiments have emerged across scientific disciplines with the aim of improving the review process, but they often lead to more questions than answers.

The panel debate, organised by the BES Publications team discussed some of these issues and provided an opportunity to seek the views of the BES community on peer review, as well as gathering suggestions for how we could improve or make changes. The audience were engaged participants in the peer review process. Many were currently serving on editorial boards of journals, while others were early career researchers, wanting to find out more about peer review.

The debate was chaired by Jane Hill, Professor of Ecology at the University of York, Chair of BES Publications Committee.

The panel members were:

• Allen Moore, Distinguished Research Professor at the University of Georgia, Editor-in-Chief Ecology and Evolution
• Patricia Morse, Managing Editor American Naturalist
• Elizabeth Moylan, Senior Editor at BioMed Central
• Andy Robinson, Senior Vice President and Managing Director, Society Services at Wiley
• Nate Sanders, Professor of Macroecology at the University of Copenhagen, Senior Editor Journal of Animal Ecology

The debate covered a diverse range of topics including integrating pre-registration into current publishing practices, making data available to reviewers, making reviews available to readers, thinking about how we can make the best use of the researcher’s time during peer review and harnessing the enthusiasm of early-career researchers to engage in the peer review process.

At the BES, we are very keen to explore new ways to improve the peer review process. If you would like to get involved, add your voice to the debate using #BESPeerReview.