Reviewers Guidelines
Assignment of the submitted manuscript to the reviewer is facilitated through an online editorial system, by which the Editor(s) and reviewers are connected via email notifications, including the timetables and review due dates. To simplify the review process, each selected reviewers receive an email with basic data about the manuscript and simple instructions on what to do with the provided links. The email notifications contain a URL link to the assigned manuscript and stepwise instructions describing the actions needed for each step. The reviewers are also asked to declare any conflicts of interest before accepting the review. The manuscripts will generally be reviewed by two or three expert reviewers to make a fast and perfect decision in due time. Since the final decision is mainly made based on reviews, the reviewers need to note whether the assigned manuscript is scientifically strong enough and whether the quality of the writing is acceptable.
The selected reviewer receives a review request generated through the editorial system and is expected to either agree to provide a review or decline, by pressing the “Will do the review” or “Unable to do the review” link in the online editorial system. The manuscript is accessible by clicking on the link in the email notification, or after accepting the review or logging in to the provided profile. When a Reviewer agrees to review the manuscript, he/she is asked to submit the review within a certain time frame, which ranges from 3 to 4 weeks.
Reviewers can directly insert their comments/corrections on the manuscript review version (PDF) and/or in Microsoft Word (.doc/.docx). To insert a comment on PDF files, please use Comments & Markup of the Adobe Acrobat/or Acrobat Reader. Comments in Microsoft Word files should be highlighted using Track Changes and associated Commenting tools in the Review Menu. Reviewers are expected to focus on the scientific quality of the manuscript, its general style (See Guideline to the authors), and clear academic writing. Reviewers are not responsible for thorough linguistic editing; instead, providing a report indicating the requirement for linguistic editing is greatly appreciated. The Authors have to make all English linguistic and grammatical corrections to their manuscripts before submission. In the case of carefully written manuscripts, the efforts by the reviewers to spot very small stylistic errors and misspellings are greatly appreciated.
The report by the reviewer should start with a very brief summary of the strengths and weaknesses of the manuscript. Then they are asked to add their constructive comments on originality, novelty, structure, citing the previous research, discussion on the new findings, quality of illustrations, etc Journal of Insect Biodiversity and Systematics (JIBS) follows a double-blind peer-review process. Please make sure to delete the name, initials, or any other signs that can reveal the identity of the reviewer in the Options section of your Word or PDF processor.
A series of standard online questionnaires is accessible to be answered by the reviewer to answer. Further comments can be addressed to the Author (s) and/or to the Editor-in-Chief/ Subject Editor through the online forms. Associated files (corrected/commented manuscript, reviews on a separate text file, and additional files supporting the reviews) can be submitted by clicking on the Browse button, then selecting and uploading.
The reviewer’s decision will be finalized by selecting a recommendation with five options: 1. Accept, 2. Minor revision, 3. Major revision, 4. Reject, 5. Reject, but with resubmission recommend. The submitted review cannot be changed or withdrawn after submission. Once a Reviewer submits the review of a manuscript, he/she will receive an email and acknowledgements from the journal asking to forward the message to reviews@webofscience.com. Then it will have appeared in their Publons profile shortly (if he/she is already registered in Publons – Web of Science). The automatically reported reviews also need to be confirmed by the reviewers subsequently.
Some critical issues, including the low scientific quality, contradiction with the journal’s scopes, or poorly written text, are the main reasons for the rejection of a manuscript.
It is upon the Editor-in-Chief/or subject Editor to decide to either accept or reject the manuscript according to the comments by all reviewers. In many cases, the manuscript is sent back to the author(s) for minor or major revision based on the Reviewer’s comments. The author(s) need to revise their manuscript according to the comments or to provide relevant reasons/pieces of evidence and references, as to why each of the comments/correcting points is not acceptable. The revised version of the manuscript should be submitted by the author(s) in due time (maximum 60 days). Providing a response letter including the brief answer to each comment by the reviewers (Response to Reviewers.pdf) is also necessary at the time of submission. When necessary, during a second review round, a representative reviewer (upon his/her claims or to be selected by the Editor-in-Chief) may be asked to evaluate the corrected version of the manuscript by the author(s) against their recommendations submitted during the first review round.
The Reviewer may have access to the information on the manuscripts that they reviewed through their profile.
Before starting your review, please review our reporting requirements outlined below:
General questions for the referee to appear in the report
Ethics and responsibilities for the Reviewers
The double-blind peer-review process helps us to ensure fair peer reviews free from biased considerations or conflict of interest. In the case of well-known authors, the selected reviewers should even state they have no conflict of interest before accepting the review. Otherwise, he/she should inform the editor and decline to review. Accordingly, the review should not be influenced by the non-scientific issues that come from the origin of the manuscript (ethnical, nationalities, political, religious, etc). In case of the incompatibility of the subject of the article with the expertise of the reviewers, they must announce it to the editorial office at the earliest opportunity. We encourage the invited reviewers to provide some details and accurate information about the area of their expertise. It is clear that the impersonation of another person can be considered serious misconduct. The reviewers are invited to perform accurate and impartial reviews within a certain time period. The comments and suggestions by the reviewers should be explicit, transparent, and non-inflammatory, avoiding derogatory or libelous comments. The insulting or uninformative reports by the reviewer(s) will be rescinded. The reviewers have to strictly avoid disclosing the unpublished information before publication. They also should not use the data/information/ideas obtained from the manuscript for their own and/or third parties’ advantage.