Some journal publish their overall acceptance rate, which is generally quite low (if you ignore predatory journals...). So, it is common to get rejected and sometimes it is the research which isn't good enough being published.

Rainer Duesing what do you mean by predatory journals? Yes I have seen what I think is a weak paper accepted in a journal, and then my stronger paper not accepted. Very disappointing

Predatory journals promise you a peer review process, but are only interested in their profit. https://predatoryreports.org/

Reasons for a rejection are manifold and I think one cannot list them exhaustively. But it may that you chose an journal which does not fit perfectly with your content, your paper is not well written, the study has not been conducted properly (e.g. samling protocol), the content is not relevant enough and so and and so forth.

I would take the reviewer comments very seriously and rework the paper.

Dear Sharon Xuereb ,

Looking at your other profile here on RG https://www.researchgate.net/profile/Sharon-Xuereb you fortunately have published exclusively in journals with a genuine and legit reputation (by the way look at https://help.researchgate.net/hc/en-us/articles/14292803187473-Duplicate-profiles when you want to merge the two profiles). As indicated by Rainer Duesing there is when we look at the academic publishing world unfortunately an entire ecosystem of questionable journals and publishers out there. This is related to phenomena such as predatory, hijacking, paper mills, selling authorships etc. Search these terms here on RG or have a look at great sites like https://retractionwatch.com and https://pubpeer.com/static/about

Back on topic. Rejections are indeed frustrating but inevitable since every journal has a certain acceptance rate which is (with a few exceptions) never 100%. There are numerous factors involved:

-Editors who think that they can estimate the perceived importance of a paper and subsequently desk reject submissions

-The quality of the peer reviewers

-Popular titles have an overload of submissions, sometimes a smaller (subscription based) journal gives you a fairer chance to get your manuscript accepted (although the time between submission and publication can be quite long because of the limited network of reviewers)

-Some open access journals like PLoS One specifically mention that they only check the scientific rigor of the manuscript (and not the perceived importance/impact) this increase the chance for a fair peer review

-Etc.

Be sure that rejections are frustrating and a well-recognized problem here on RG see for example:

https://www.researchgate.net/post/How-many-rejections-have-you-usually-received-before-publication-When-your-paper-was-rejected-how-did-you-deal-with-the-frustration

https://www.researchgate.net/post/How-do-you-emotionally-deal-with-your-paper-rejection

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

Best regards.

PS. The mentioned predatoryreports site is in my view not the most reliable source for info, see my reply of March 13th, 2023, here https://www.researchgate.net/post/Expert_opinion_required_Are_all_MDPI_journals_predatory_Should_one_avoid_publishing_read_and_cite_articles_published_in_MDPI or

https://www.researchgate.net/post/What_is_your_opinion_about_this_reporthttps_predatoryreportsorg_news_f_list-of-all-mdpi-predatory-publicationsfbclidIwAR2FbGSY4Dktl4X8GWkcfgAuB

Hello Sharon Xuereb. As Rainer Duesing noted, there can be many reasons for rejection of a manuscript. But I think it only fair to add that on occasion, the main reason may be that unqualified (or rushed) reviewers provided lousy reviews. ;-)

I remember one occasion where I was so put out by lousy reviews that I wrote my own review of the reviewers. (A slightly redacted version is attached.) I honestly cannot remember if I sent it to the action editor or not. But I'm sure that writing it helped me deal with the frustration of being rejected on the basis of such poorly done reviews. The manuscript in question did eventually get published in the 3rd journal we tried, IIRC. In hindsight, returning to one of Rainer's points, the first journal (whence came the lousy reviews) was not the most appropriate journal for it despite the fact that we had published an earlier article on the same general topic in that journal. (I ended up wondering how we ever managed to get the first article published in that journal.)

I remember another occasion where one reviewer essentially said "publish as is" and another reviewer (of the same ms for the same journal) demanded major revisions.

So yes, dealing with reviewers and editors can be (very) challenging. As Rainer said, you have to take the reviews seriously--unless their is clear evidence the reviewers did not read your ms carefully, I would add!--and learn what you can from them about how to make the revised version of your manuscript better. Good editors can help by giving you some hints about which reviewer comments they consider most important. But they will likely try to do so in a way that does not offend the reviewers, especially as they may need or want to ask those folks to review for them again in the future.

Finally, bear in mind that you are not the first author, nor will you be the last author to deal with this problem! I hope this helps. ;-)

Bruce Weaver hahaha, yes this is true, reviewers do also have very subjective opinions and sometimes personal agendas.

I remember a case where one reviewer wrote that the paper would perfectly fit into the journal topics, whereas the other had a completely different opinion: the paper wasn't bad, but would not fit into the topics of the journal and should be rejected..... *sigh*.

In another case, a colleague of mine tried to publish a new algorithm to automatically remove artifacts from the EEG signal. One reviewer was relentless and came up with even more issues in every iteration. It turned out that this reviewer was from a competing lab, which worked on a similar algorithm, and he tried to delay the publication! Very frustrating!

@ Sharon Xuereb and all attendants

There is a general cause of paper rejection:

IGNORANCE of the subject

by PEER REVIEWERS and EDITORS

BUT there is a heavy general cause of WRONG papers publication:

You can find WRONG papers published

• in "non-predatory" journals, such as Quality Engineering, ... , Quality and Reliability Engineering International, ... ,

Have a look at my questions...

An interesting discussion on a perennial theme! I've uploaded an updated copy of an internal publication I used to give my doctoral students and post-docs making their first attempt at a journal article. It's very basic, but you may find it informative. Look for 'Writing for Publication' in my uploads list.

Here is a direct link to the document Devi Jankowicz described:

Technical Report WRITING FOR PUBLICATION (Originally prepared as an internal ...

The worst part about having a manuscript rejected is having to re-format it all for a different journal.

Tell me about it - changing a reference list from Harvard to APA ....

Rob Keller thanks for noticing that I had a double profile. Unfortunately I cannot log in to the old profile anymore, so asking ResearchGate for help.

Thanks for sharing everyone. I once had one reviewer saying the lit review was amazing ... and the other reviewer said it was too long and meandering ... go figure ... at least I can see it's not just me experiencing this.

Sharon Xuereb, yes agreed. Harvard to APA is grim as it requires careful attention to minutae. But Harvard or APA to Chicago (Notes & Bibliography) style– aaaargh! And then there's the Pure Numeric system... worse again– an utterly different system requiring attention to the body of the text as well as the reference list.

Sharon Xuereb and Devi Jankowicz why don't you use a citation program like Endnote or Mendeley to organize and cite your references?!?! These programs do not only change the in text citation format, but also the format of the reference list! This is much less prone to errors, as compared to manual changes and these programs do it on the fly with a button click. No effort! Additionally, they help you to organize you bibliography and you can load the citations directly into the program as a file, so no need to write them by hand. Google scholar alone offers 4 different file types for downloading the citation. I promise you, this will save you A LOT OF time and effort!!!

Rainer Duesing , I do use Endnote when I prepare the article for its original submission: very useful indeed. But new versions of Endnote offer different facilities, do things slightly differently, and so I have to manually check the outcomes provided by the Endnote robot in any case. Sometimes it's faster to make all the changes manually.

Where I do find Endnote peerless is in the maintenance of a complete database of all my references down the years, whether I've actually cited them or simply read them. (And locating and creating them in the first place is simplified by using the online library search mode: such a boon!) The Groups facility is a wonderful way of remembering which items in my database I've recommended to my different doctoral people.

If they are quick enough to reject there is no problem. Sometimes you can miss the concept of a journal it is normal. Using citation programs is very helpful in a few minutes you can reorganize it. if your institution provide endnote it is so good . otherwise ( also for indipendent researchers ) mendeley is quite promising. Honestly my biggest concern is the publishing fee. For the ecological science Q1 Q2 journals charge between 1300 - 4500 $ . So if you are at the begining or mid carrier you are not able to effort this much money without you are lucky enough to have a good team. This is so unfair for developing countries or also smaller institution with hard working researchers.

At least with the journals I deal with, re-formatting of references is the least of my worries. It seems like every journal has it's own set of requirements as to which sections should be in the manuscript, word counts, table formatting, font styles for headings, capitalization... all kinds of stuff.

I know it's asking too much of the world, but it would be a better world if there was like a universal-manuscript-format, that could be used, and then the final paper could be formatted to the journal's specifications. Like a Mendeley for the whole manuscript.

@ Sharon Xuereb, Rainer Duesing, Rob Keller, Sal Mangiafico

Dear Sharon,

You can ask S. Chakraborti how he could publish WRONG papers in several good Journals (not predatory!) and learn from him the tricks… for publication.

As I said before, there is a heavy general cause of WRONG papers publication:

Obviously, the problem does not interest anybody…

@ Sharon Xuereb, Rainer Duesing, Rob Keller, Sal Mangiafico

Dear Sharon,

I just find the following… (see yesterday…)

Call for Papers

Call for Papers for a special Issue on: " New developments on Statistical Process Monitoring and Control "

Guest Editors:

· S. Chakraborti (Chair of the editorial board of the special issue), Un. of Alabama, USA

· … Brazil

· … Peru

· … Brazil

Statistical monitoring of the quality of products and services have always been of fundamental importance for companies to remain healthy in an increasingly competitive market. The research and applications in the area of statistical process monitoring and control (SPMC) is undergoing several changes that accompany significant technological innovations in real applications, such as artificial intelligence, …. utilized to improve the efficacy of quality control and monitoring methods, such as control charts.

In this new scenario, there is an increase in interest and demand both by academics and practitioners in the field of statistical process monitoring and control and researchers have been studying new strategies to enhance the efficiency of several control charts, such as charts by variables or attributes, with known and unknown parameters, for monitoring the mean and the variability of univariate or multivariate processes, with or without correlation.

The aim of this special issue is to capture some of the new trends and studies in this field. The goal is to identify recent research and new subjects in the area, as well as future areas of interest. Original methodological contributions along with applications and case studies are of interest. The special issue is targeted towards Brazilian and international researchers who work on these topics, to build possible collaborations.