{"id":61369,"date":"2022-02-05T12:09:08","date_gmt":"2022-02-05T17:09:08","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/world.edu\/?p=61369"},"modified":"2022-02-15T19:18:15","modified_gmt":"2022-02-16T00:18:15","slug":"how-does-open-assessment-renew-the-scientific-conversation","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/world.edu\/how-does-open-assessment-renew-the-scientific-conversation\/","title":{"rendered":"How does open assessment renew the scientific conversation?"},"content":{"rendered":"

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\nThe polarization of the discussions but also the scale of the public health issues in the debate on the scientific reliability of\u00a0<\/span>preprints<\/span><\/em>\u00a0have not always allowed the general public to grasp the importance of the peer review process \u2013 also called \u201cevaluation\u201d \u2013 for the functioning of the scientific community.<\/span><\/p>\n

The publishing model in today’s academic world is increasingly tightly regulated in most disciplines.\u00a0The rules to which it is subject are intended to promote the transparency of publications by subjecting them to a complex editorial circuit which involves different people who are more or less independent of each other.<\/span><\/p>\n

The classic evaluation<\/strong><\/h4>\n

Authors submit their draft articles to entities called\u00a0<\/span>\u201cjournals\u201d<\/span><\/a>\u00a0\u00a0;\u00a0at the origin of these are found both learned societies formed into associations, research teams, university presses and\u00a0more or less generalist and more or less powerful independent commercial publishers (\u00a0<\/span>publishers ).<\/span><\/em><\/p>\n

True collective entities,\u00a0<\/span>journals<\/span><\/a>\u00a0are organized into centers of responsibility, or committees, and take charge of two essential stages in transforming a text into a published scientific article: the evaluation stage (\u00a0<\/span>reviewing<\/span><\/em>\u00a0) and the editorial preparation stage ( spelling corrections, standardization, layout, etc.).<\/span><\/p>\n

The evaluation stage<\/span><\/a>\u00a0, which conditions the acceptance or rejection of the article, is fundamental.\u00a0Journals are responsible for setting up conditions so that this evaluation guarantees an \u201cobjective\u201d treatment of the texts submitted to them, avoiding conflicts of interest and personal settling of scores.<\/span><\/p>\n

This evaluation must also offer authors the opportunity to significantly improve their texts, not only to make them publishable, but also, through them, to advance all scientific knowledge on a given subject.<\/span><\/p>\n

For all these reasons, in a highly competitive and sometimes frankly toxic general academic context, the preferred framework for expertise is double-\u00a0<\/span>blind peer review<\/span><\/em>\u00a0: the author does not know the names of the people evaluating his text and vice versa.\u00a0As for the expert, he or she is chosen from the academic world in view of his or her own work and experience on the subjects covered in the article.<\/span><\/p>\n

This general anonymity, associated with the confidentiality of the content of the evaluation (the expert reports are directly communicated to the author but are not made public), is considered by a majority of the academic world as the best guarantee of a sound and effective evaluation.\u00a0It is also the one that is at the heart of the \u201cprestige economy\u201d specific to scientific publications and which recent studies have shown allows publishing houses to exert a\u00a0<\/span>significant influence on scientific research<\/span><\/a>\u00a0.<\/span><\/p>\n

New formats<\/strong><\/h4>\n

The double-blind evaluation is not without flaws.\u00a0It did not impose itself in the scientific community until late, in the 1970s. It is not uncommon for it to lead to lapidary, even frankly violent criticisms \u2013 a fault facilitated by the anonymous dimension of the exchanges in which it takes place. ‘registered.\u00a0Authors and reviewers may feel frustrated at not being able to exchange \u201cbetween responsible adults\u201d.<\/span><\/p>\n

Other forms of peer review are beginning to gain in importance in the scientific community, according to two principles: on the one hand, that of transparency, on the other hand, that of distribution.\u00a0Transparency consists in the author or evaluator knowing each other’s names and being able to dialogue.\u00a0The distribution makes it possible to open the proofreading not to a restricted circle of experts specifically sponsored by a journal, but to anyone wishing to immerse themselves in the article to read it again and comment on it.<\/span><\/p>\n

All of these new forms of evaluation correspond to what is known as\u00a0<\/span>open peer review<\/span><\/em>\u00a0, which has acquired platforms such as\u00a0<\/span>hypothes.is<\/span><\/a>\u00a0to implement these principles.\u00a0The European e-learning platform FOSTER also offers a complete online course for training in open evaluation, a sign of the growing interest in\u00a0<\/span>this new way of evaluating<\/span><\/a>\u00a0.<\/span><\/p>\n

Open peer review formats have several advantages:<\/span><\/p>\n