It is important to take the comments because they are often in favor of the manuscript, but sometimes some comments may not be understood as intended by the researcher and better clarification and then take what is said to you after the discussion
Reviewers top priority is to help authors improve the quality of their papers. Therefore, we need not be enraged or downhearted when reviewers' comments on our papers seem harsh. Sometimes, many reviewers do not use English as a native language and may not genuinely desire to hurt with their words. It is said that sometimes to be cured of a particular illness, you may need to swallow the bitter pill. Authors should view the directives and suggestions of reviewers as genuine views to help tune your thoughts better.
Thus, we need to respond to every concern raised by the reviewer in our cover letter, POINT BY POINT. If it happens that we do not agree with a comment made by a reviewer, we must respectfully mention it and give our reasons.
Of course, reviewing the papers of our peers is a wonderful privilege carried out with clear intentions to improve their papers and make them better for global readership as we equally learn and advance in our knowledge while maturing in the research experience.
Let us all support the selfless efforts of reviewers by responding favorably to their evaluation comments respectfully. Best regards
Following the useful comments and modifying the paper as per the comments. Always reviewers want to help the authors to improve their papers. In case they dont follow or justify properly, then the reviewer may reject the paper.
What are the best tips for responding to reviewer comments on your manuscript?
You can consider the following:
Read reviewer's comments with an open mind - even though some reviewers' critiques are negative, if you feel frustrated, don't give up or respond straight away to any critique but give yourself a short break to recover.
Respond / clarify to all the questions / points raised by each reviewer - this includes answers, clarifications, artifacts like instrument / survey questionnaire, data set etc. according to the rows & words hi-lighted by reviewers.
Change your manuscript accordingly based on the reviewers' comments / your clarification answers provided above.
If some reviewers commented you didn't review certain literature or cite certain articles especially those articles authored by reviewers, you need to perform those needed literature review & cite accordingly or if you find that certain citations are not needed, please provide justification - please be noted the interactions between you and each reviewers will be observed by the journal editor(s) for any needed arbitration.
Resubmit your revision on time for the subsequent reviews. There might be numerous rounds of reviews & amendments before final decision to accept or reject your manuscript. Regardless what, you need the perseverance & be objective.
Learn & improve as much as you can from each reviewer's comment so that you don't repeat the same mistake in future other manuscript writing. Personally I find that the more effort I put in to improve current manuscript based on reviewers' comments, the less review comment / negative critique I receive from other reviewers in future manuscript submission.
Always remember it is alright that whatever changes you'd made yet the manuscript is still rejected - because you can use the rejected improved manuscript for other journal submission.
I can not post any word after the respected full answer of our colleague Dr.Han Ping Fung, thank you very much sir for sharing your excellent comment, I will convert your seven points into a simple lecture to my postgraduate students with full respect to your copyrights, Sir.
Many times, Reviewer comments are very constructive and I have experienced in improvement of manuscript significantly. My opinion, please acknowledge reviewer in your paper because of their valuable time and insightful comments.
Well, Sometimes it is not so easy , since you have to juggle between contradicting points of views of different reviewers. However, if you want the article to be published, it is important to evaluate whether it is the editorial board decision that you covered the reviewers concerns in a satisfying way, or whether they return it to the reviewers. If there are contradictions between the reviewers, it is wise to gently point that out to the editors