No good journal editor would accept an obviously biased review of a manuscript. If a prejudiced review WERE accepted, then it is not worthwhile publishing in such a journal.  Blind peer review is probably preferable but in all likelihood it would give the same results as open peer review.  This is because we are usually judged on what we say, not on who we are.  Caveat auctor: let the author beware where he submits his manuscripts.

Similar types of questions have been asked before - and the 'default' seems to usually come back to the fact that blind review is probably better than open review. One of the reasons that journals should employ multiple reviewers (preferably three) for each submitted manuscript is to 'filter out' the possibility of one odd or biased review. 

Good reading on this topic: http://scholarlykitchen.sspnet.org/2010/11/30/weighing-the-costs-and-benefits-of-open-peer-review/

Thanks Ivo for this link you added. From the article, I have seen the ups and downs of both sides. But the conclusion is very interesting. If longer time would mean more openness, I think I will prefer that.

I hope other people will contribute, especially to help some of us that are growing.

An open peer review would eliminate bias, reviewer's misconduct and harm. For those reasons I  raised the issue of  requesting  journals to adopt a policy allowing authors to have the right to disqualify reviewers.

Blind peer-review looks better, but not always is a fair game: in many research communities is extremely easy, when not unavoidable, the fact that the author ends up somehow giving a number of details of his academic twists that can lead very easily to either know who can be or to locatehim quite precisely. In those cases, not all reviewers behave as unbiased persona, and can tend to favor or punish a certain kind of authors. We should not be too naive about peer reveiwing.

Thanks Peter for your insightful contribution. As a student (early career researcher), I am learning from these contributions and I quite agree with you that open review is better. If a reviewer is not willing to reveal his/her identity, something may be wrong. Though as some contributors noted, open review may take longer time but I will rather wait than to have bad reviews.

As a co-editor of a journal, I'm interested in this discussion. I'm puzzled by Peter Howgate's suggestion "for submitted papers to be sent to reviewers with the authors' names and places of work deleted", because that's what we mean by blind peer review in our journal, and I thought that was what it meant everywhere. It doesn't always work, because an author may be recognised by someone with a knowledge of his/her methods, field of speciality, opinions, or previous publications. We keep trying for it none the less. Sometimes I fiddle with the references to provide a truly anonymized version of the draft.

Technology has made its presence felt in almost every sphere of human activity and I believe there is hardly any sphere which is exception to it. We have already experienced a global Open Access Movement in the form of open access publishing or open source software's and surely the areas which have potential to be explored on open access platform will follow the suit. I am sure the way open access publishing has become the order of the day, Open Review will be the order of tomorrow.

I am a firm believer in value to blind reviews, so long as the process is double blinded, because it does impose some degree of distance (objectivity being non-existent right?) between the author and reviewer. Am a little less of a a fan of the one-way process and indeed, even in the former, think it might help to divulge all identities, after the final decisions are taken. 

Under the most ideal circumstances the blinded review allows for the work to be evaluated on its own merits rather than any relationships – good or bad – between the two parties. Of course complete blindness is neither realistic nor even wholly desirable, because presumably the same attributes that make the reviewer an expert on the subject would also enable the person to detect style and maybe guess who the writer is, especially in small fields (being self-referential). But that is why we should have multiple peer reviewers, and the ultimate decision rest with the editor, who, I feel should take a a decisive role in the process. For instance, when the reviews are clearly personal or show signs of bias due to reasons other than the content of the paper, then the editor should not pass it on to the author. Surely there would be others – yea ir naysayers – whose opinions are less biased? Even if all the reviews are unanimous, it might be more politic to refrain from forwarding those with personal or other irrelevant comments back to the author.

Well said Neeraja. But do you think all editors have the whole time on earth to do this thorough job as you mentioned or is your opinion based on ideal situations? I have seen editors that mentioned that they have enormous duties and as many manuscripts are sent, they may not have time to do it the way you just listed . In that case, the authors, especially unknown ones may not receive the same treatment given to the established ones in the same field.  

Thanks Emeka, I'm speaking of what ideally 'should' be that what probably is most times. Pity that. Regardless, editors, the good ones (and I've worked with quite a few) anyway generally know enough to only send the useful reviews to the author, and also to keep the decision in their own hands. I work as a book reviews editor for a journal which I think has a double blinded process, since authors are asked to not mention their name on the manuscript and only on a separate cover page. Also the same journal also allows remarks to be categorized - for author and confidential for the editor.  But not all journals are created equal. And not all editors either.

But I'm digressing from the original point of the post which was the open vs. blind review. Open reviews to me seem more like online discussions once a piece is published. And if you think about it, a piece generates enough comments on an open review probably deserves publication anyway. Unless of course it's based on wrong premises in which case the editor shouldn't be putting it up for review anyway.

Just my several bits worth ...

Neeraja, your comments are quite insightful. Some of these things are ideal anyway. If blind review is done the way its name sounds, this question wound not have been asked.

@Emeka: very interesting report!

IN my "very conclusion" I am pursued that "peer review" is  a job "per se"!

Contract-mission-renumeration...and control of this job!

I know...it sounds unfeasible. BUT been a peer reviewer who puts weight on the publishing balance is not only matter of "expertise"

The first "conflict on interest" of a reviewer -since expert in the same field!- would be in fact competition on the subject/research!

So I do not have the solution, but I think first it would be wised to list "the problematic"!

KR to all

Been on both sides. As a reality check, would support the blind review. Works in most cases. BUT when it doesn't work, it's actually up to the EDITOR to put a red flag on a particular review. As a reality check again, I'd say that in ... a number of times the editor would let it go and won't be able to catch it!! One may blame editors for it. To some extent, it's also true. Some editors are better than the others, some are more diligent, some are willing to put extra time. But, wait a minute, if you substitute "the editor" for "the reviewer" it would also be true!

The point is that the current review system is based on the present society, with the existing modus operandi. So, one would taste equally both good and bad apples in both baskets (i.e., editors and reviewers). Perhaps, more scrutiny is put when selecting the editors as oppose to reviewers.

I've seen attempts of some journals to change the blind review to the open one, at least as an option...It doesn't appear as a popular idea based on what I've seen.

So, do we have panacea? Hm, multiple reviewers + good editors. But somebody would say,  multiple reviewers + good reviewers... I accept both, because it's the same pool of people. I don't see the new system as a feasible alternative at the current stage. Perhaps, later when we become  better and wiser..   

Dear Dr.Emeka W. Dumbili

It is always better to have 'blind double peer review' as individual whims and fancies will be kept away in this system. Open peer review may have positive or negative influences. So, blind peer review system is very much important to ensure quality academic and scientific scholarly publications.

Thanks for your Answer. I recently had one paper peer-reviewed and accepted via open system, and I think I will prefer it to blind review for personal reasons. I was able to know who reviewed the paper and their academic background. My area of research is substance use (alcohol, drugs, etc.). Although a sociologist, my papers can be published in any social sciences or public health journal. The way in which psychologists see things are different from the way sociologist do. In this paper I referred to, it was clear that some of the comments I have received from journals that operate blind review are due to bias or misunderstanding of what I wrote due to a lack of sociological knowledge.  

There are pros and cons.

Here are some pros:

1) Some people might not wish to write reviews when their names are exposed.

2) Anonymity allows people to express their opinions freely.

3) Anonymity prevents personal friction, instead of nurturing amicable interactions amongst scientists.

Here are some cons:

1) Anonymity enables SOME people to write wrong, or superficial, or personally affected reports, without being accountable for their flops.

2) Anonymity prevents open discussion, which, unfortunately, has suffered a lot in recent decades.  years ago, science was far more open.

Whether reviews should be anonymous or not is important.  However, I see the problem elsewhere at present.  It seems to me that the publication system may be doomed to crash.  There is so much published, that journals cannot cope with the pressure.  As a result, they sometimes  resort to the help of reviewers whose time, or expertise, or both are limited.  (And this happens even with the most respectable journals!)  This lowers the level of some reviews, and allows for the publication of wrong or poorly written papers.  One of the consequences of this situation is the emergence of preprint libraries, or scientific social networks, where people simply deposit their papers, and the formal publication process becomes secondary.  Formal publication is important for young people, but not so much for people who have an established career.  Electronic networks allow for free and open discussion in a manner that was quite normal in the old days of science.

Open discussion and mutual criticism are essential for progress in research.

For this reason, I, personally, would prefer a review system, in which the identity of reviewers is exposed.  Any other option, e.g., anonymity of both authors and reviewers, allows for hiding behind a shield...

Dear Yair,

Your view is explicit and I very much appreciate it. I strongly want to know who reviewed my papers. I will also want my identity to be exposed to authors that I review theirs. Thanks.

Biases is the human error, very difficult to control. Best way is the blind review.

To avoid biases blind peer review is better.

Just adding an update or some new perspectives on this old question. Right now I'm an editor for a project where we're using an open review system, and actually it's working very well. A few caveats though--it's a very specific/niche type of project--bibliographic rather than argument/discovery based papers (my primary field is history of science) --which means that the critiques are by and large identification of bibliographic gaps or recommendations for additional sources to add. Basically, the contributions to this collections are not rejected--reviewers basically have to decide how much revision or modification they need. All in all this open system works well for the reviewers' comments are available for public view as well as wall the stages of the bibliographies and accompanying essays. There were concerns at first about the open nature of the project but given it's ambit, it is an approach that has worked.

Many thanks Neeraja Sankaran for adding this new insight.

Theoretically, whether you use blind or open peer review should not matter as far as the quality of the research is concerned. I´ve also seen degrees of blindness and degrees of openness used, and their use proves my point.

Though the quality of the manuscript should be the only aspect to be taken into account, I agree with the majority that blindness seems to be the better option to avoid this kind of manipulations. However, on occasions, my impression is that, as Nelson Orringer comments, complete blind peer review is not always the case.

María Luz, if you are an expert in your field, you will at once recognize the research style of the top researchers, so 100% blind peer review is not always

possible!

Yes, Nelson, that's what normally happens! We're more transparent than we think we are. Every researcher has his or her style and particular way of approaching a subject, so...?

MariLuz, as Cervantes says, "Peor es menealla", con perdón: better to accept this transparency as a fact, and operate journals with such a fact in mind when daring to advertise blind peer review.

@Nelson That's a fact!!!

Apologies in advance if some of this is repetitive...

Being a part of an endeavor that is using open peer review, I can attest to it's value in many respects. In our case these reviews are not only mutually open--i.e. between the reviewers and authors as well as editors who make these assignments, but are also made publicly available, and this is immensely useful for following the development of the papers. But I will add the caveat that this system works ONLY if the paper is basically acceptable and needs improvement. As I said this situation is of a rather specific kind. Even here, we do not publicize the reviews of papers deemed unacceptable.

To me both systems have their respective pros and cons. The most unfair (and least useful) type is the single blind, where the author is known but the reviewers remain anonymous. That's when there is potential for abuse (alas humans are a petty lot sometimes and use such opportunities for power games and vendattas). But sometimes the unblinding is inadvertent, for instance when the authors "out" themselves by using first person in the article (which I don't think is a trangression) and then self-cites carelessly. Writers, when doing this please submit a cleaned up copy with a note to editor that certain sentences will be changed for the final copy. Editors should also be careful to anonymize papers properly before sending along for review, to keep the integrity of the paper intact.

Many thanks Neeraja Sankaran for your comments. As you rightly noted, both have their positive and negative sides.

See also these discussions:

https://www.researchgate.net/post/Which-i-more-suitable-for-scientfic-journals-blind-peer-review-or-open-peer-review-or-combination-between-the-two

https://www.researchgate.net/post/Why_is_peer_review_blind

https://www.researchgate.net/post/Open_peer-review_is_full_transparency_possible

https://www.researchgate.net/post/Is_blind_peer-review_honest_Does_it_help_or_disfavor_achieving_an_objective_review_of_journal_papers

https://www.researchgate.net/post/Are_you_in_favor_of_open_peer-review_or_blind_peer-review

My feeling is that reviews of papers should either be double blinded or open. Basically I don't like the one-sided system where an anonymous reviewer knows who the author is. That is the system most open to abuse I think.

They could bring that to the attention of the editors. The reviewer obviously had a conflict of interest that disqualified her or him from reviewing the article. Most journal editors are open to considering such appeals.