Publishing in top journal is becoming increasingly difficult. Cutting edge research is often being disregarded for reasons related essentially to FORM rather than CONTENT. Paradoxically, we tend to think that it is novel ideas and novel findings that are the substance of scientific publications, yet they often get rejected on the basis of the wrong FORM rather than the quality of CONTENT. What are your opinions?
Most journals do the technical screening and Many articles do not pass this step. For example at Elsevier, between 30 percent to 50 percent of articles don't even make it to the peer review process. Elsevier journals rejects the article and the author can re-submit after correcting the format.
I think that content is more important but as authors we have to pay attention to the requested format and write the article as it is guided by the author's guides.and make sure that article conforms to the Guide for Authors
I have attached a link to Eight reasons I rejected your article from Peter Thrower, PhD, is Editor-in-Chief of Carbon, the international journal of the American Carbon Society, and Professor Emeritus of Material Sciences and Engineering at Penn State University:
1. It fails the technical screening.
2. It does not fall within the Aims and Scope.
3. It's incomplete.
4. The procedures and/or analysis of the data is seen to be defective.
5. The conclusions cannot be justified on the basis of the rest of the paper.
6. It's is simply a small extension of a different paper, often from the same authors.
7. It's incomprehensible.
8. It's boring.
http://www.elsevier.com/connect/8-reasons-i-rejected-your-article
Dear Mohamed some 'top' journals reject scientific work without reading the content.
After 24 hours their automatic robot send you a polite but useless comment , however not in terms of facts but in terms of what Wittgenstein called nonsens. Besides, are those journals still ' top ' or are those journals but a PR-instrument for the editorial board?
Most journals do the technical screening and Many articles do not pass this step. For example at Elsevier, between 30 percent to 50 percent of articles don't even make it to the peer review process. Elsevier journals rejects the article and the author can re-submit after correcting the format.
I think that content is more important but as authors we have to pay attention to the requested format and write the article as it is guided by the author's guides.and make sure that article conforms to the Guide for Authors
I have attached a link to Eight reasons I rejected your article from Peter Thrower, PhD, is Editor-in-Chief of Carbon, the international journal of the American Carbon Society, and Professor Emeritus of Material Sciences and Engineering at Penn State University:
1. It fails the technical screening.
2. It does not fall within the Aims and Scope.
3. It's incomplete.
4. The procedures and/or analysis of the data is seen to be defective.
5. The conclusions cannot be justified on the basis of the rest of the paper.
6. It's is simply a small extension of a different paper, often from the same authors.
7. It's incomprehensible.
8. It's boring.
http://www.elsevier.com/connect/8-reasons-i-rejected-your-article
«It's boring» says more about the reader than on the writer... doesn't it ?
Dear Maria,
According to Prof. Thrower, It is boring means:
- It is archival, incremental or of marginal interest to the field
- The question behind the work is not of interest in the field.
- The work is not of interest to the readers of the specific journals.
Hi Mohamed,
I am the editorial board member of various academic publishers and scholarly journals including Elsevier, Canadian Center of Science and Education, Scientific Research Publishing Inc, etc.
To the best of my knowledge, a quality paper has not been rejected due to inappropriate format.
Generally reviewers evaluate contribution to existing knowledge, organization and readability, soundness of methodology, evidence supports conclusion, and adequacy of literature review; and provide their opinion as either of
Excellent, accept the submission
Good, accept the submission with minor revisions required
Acceptable, revisions required
Resubmit for review, major revisions required
Decline the submission
Therefore, if your article has a proper central thesis, the theoretical background is coherent, and the results and discussion are significant; while your paper suffers from syntactic errors, usually the journal proofreader apply some minor modifications or an editor asks the author to resubmit their manuscript.
In our new paper "Subben's checklist and the quality of articles in OR" - https://www.researchgate.net/publication/268520561_Subben%27s_checklist_and_the_quality_of_articles_in_OR - the second table there adds to this story. "News value" is only one factor - there are several others.
Article Subben's checklist and the quality of articles in OR
I also think that rejecting because of FORM is a bad practice - if there is something very good in there, and the reviewers/editorial board can see that, then they simply ask the author(s) to rewrite it so that the very good message is no longer hidden.
The rejection of a paper should be on the basis that the paper is no good enough for the journal. Not only form and contend should be taken into account but all usual criteria. The question is not well posed!
Top journals reject papers on for many reasons. Papers may be refused for methodology, for statistical analysis, for content, for plagiarism, or for any other reason.
In synthesis, the paper will be rejected if you are not acquainted with any of the editors!
I believe that the down-vote was due to my frase "The question is not well posed". Thus I must give a further explanation. The question as formed is not well posed since a journal does not reject a paper either of content or form. The question is formed in such a way that we have to choose, either form or content! My answer was that there are standard criteria of rejecting a paper, which include content and form. The issue here is not just content or form but rather the quality of paper. If the paper has some essential result to report and the form or even content is not as it should, the referees will try to change both so that a publishable paper will result.
I think that top journals should reject papers only on the basis of content and novelty.
Content is more important than form, but sometimes, form can be still important: e.g. most journals will reject a too long paper (e.g. 50 pages), and also, if the language is not good enough (e.g. 5 typos in the abstract). On the other hand, of course, a paper in the right form but with weak content (e.g. no novelty, poor data, ignoring most important studies already published...) will be also rejected.
I always ask my PhD students - while they are "fresh" - to read a good book on HOW to write scientific articles. I feel that it is absolutely essential that they are informed early on about the big difference between what they wrote in their MSc thesis, and all the additional requirements that enter when you write a scientific article for publication in a good journal.
My favorite so far is "Handbook of Writing for the Mathematical Sciences" by Nicholas Higham. It not only describes how to write well, what not to forget and mistakes that one should NOT make. It explains the whole process, from technical report to a final publication and gives very good advice on every step of the way. I do not know if it also talks about predatory journals and the like - I read the first edition which does not include discussions on those points - but perhaps the new one does. In any case, with respect to the question of HOW to write a correct and honest paper, Higham's book is the best. Give the book to every new PhD student as a gift - they will have very good uses of it!
You are right dear @Tiia. Content is much more important than form. When content is good one, editing brings the paper to the point of publishing! "Rejection is the norm in academic publishing. Even researchers at the top of their field have experienced rejection. Several peer-reviewed studies have investigated the reasons that journals reject papers. Listed below are the most common rejection reasons cited in these studies."
http://www.editage.com/insights/most-common-reasons-for-journal-rejections
There were many good answers in some related threads. Dear @Mohamed, I will be free to attach some! It may be useful!
https://www.researchgate.net/post/As_a_reviewer_when_do_you_propose_to_reject_the_paper_without_letting_them_to_revise_it_Which_flaws_should_it_have
https://www.researchgate.net/post/When_does_a_rejection_of_a_scientific_paper_become_beneficial_to_the_author_Have_you_experienced_a_rejection_that_worked_out_for_your_good
https://www.researchgate.net/post/How_far_are_scientists_willing_to_go_to_publish_their_rejected_articles_or_scientific_reviews
Good journals with high impact factor can afford to select on their own criteria. One of these may be observance of formal requirements. If the author does not care and does not wish to do at least some of the re-editing work, he/she does not qualify. Some may be annoyed by that, but this is how life works.
Content is more important than form, but it is also important to implement the guidelines dictated by journals. It does not takes much time to write in correct format anyway! (a small percentage of total time spent. The journals generally ask for re-submit and it will delay the publication decision.
The attached link is interesting to read as it discusses the : Causes and Remedies of Manuscript Rejection
http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC3035881/
Back in 2002 two authors submitted their work on Graphene and got rejected from a top journal. The same authors went on to win the Nobel prize in 2010!
Dear @Mohamed, some novel ideas are not easy to be accepted by many specialists including leaders in the field. The work of Galois was also not accepted at the beginning and it was later discovered the importance of the theory.
Content is more important than form. It is essential to follow the guidelines provided by the journals. It does not takes much time to write in correct format anyway. Language needs to be concise as it can put the reviewer off if the paper is poorly constructed.
Adherence to form is often arbitrary, and while some importance needs to be accorded to factors like linguistic clarity and structural cohesion, it is the content that is really important. Unoriginal and bland content in perfect form carries little meaning. Thus rich content is a fundamental pre-requisite that should not be compromised for trivial stuff like style guides, in-text citation and referencing details. A journal can suggest format-based changes but one that rejects a paper on grounds of form when the content is worthwhile, is a pity to the spirit of research.
I think that you raise an important question. But is also depends on the field. I think hat there are less rejections in physics than in economics. In natural sciences it is obvious if you describe new interesting phenomenon or not, if your math is correct or wrong, and linguistic issues play less role (eve papers with bad English can be published). The problem of social sciences it that there is often no unique truth. It means that some papers with good English and interesting problems may be rejected for formal reasons, like the mentioned above "does not fall within the Aims and Scope". Top journals typically have rejection rate of above 90%, which means that if there are suddenly 50% of good papers, 4 of 5 will be rejected, for formal reasons described by Mr. Behrouz.
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