It’s Mostly issues regarding finding a suitable reviewer

Good question

The main reason of prolonged period in review process of manuscript is when the reviewers are not doing their work in time. Some times the reviewers are responding. Then the editor has to change the reviewer. Again it takes time,

Yes, it takes too long to publish research. But, the lead time for publishing is completely understandable.

• Published research should advance the field it's in. This takes time and expertise to evaluate.
• Published research should be correct, because incorrect results can derail the efforts of thousands if they are not quickly detected and addressed.
• It takes domain expertise to evaluate research for correctness. That's time and energy from people who would rather be working on their own research and publication.

Ideally there would be an oracle you could apply to research which would give thumbs up / thumbs down, and it could be released electronically the next day. Unfortunately that's just not reasonable.

Being able to publish more quickly would have undesirable side effects:

• The impact of the average research paper would probably drop, because it can be published with lower friction and therefore more incrementally.
• The number of publications would probably go up, as more people are able to get their work published in more places. There would as a corollary need for more 'good' publishers.
• Keeping up with the state of the art would require more effort for people in each field.  Less time for doing new research.

Sometimes, it is because of the lack of reviewers for your specialty. If the editor invites reviewers and they turn the offer down because of busy schedules, s/he keeps on looking for qualified reviewers and this take a great deal of time.

At other times, you may offer to review a paper because you felt earlier upon accepting the request that you were slightly free. Yet, some emergent and indispensable academic assignment pops up and you have to write to the editor for an extension of the review period. All these contribute to the delay.

However, sometimes, what will make the waiting period seem too long, is the absence of communication between the editor and the authors about the review state of the paper. Editors are advised to periodically communicate any new developments to authors.

Also, URLs for tracking of manuscripts must be provided by all journals (unfortunately some new but rigorous journals don't have, which is very disturbing to young researchers and make them restless while waiting for a decision regarding their paper). Best regards

What is the cause of prolonged period in review process of manuscript?

Possible reasons include:

I think, the time taken for acceptance or rejection of a manuscript depends on the availability of the reviewers.

1. journal receiving too many manuscripts

2. Too few reviewers willing to take up the responsibility. This is not paid work hence fewer volunteers.

3. Sloppy habits within the editorial system

Good responses provided. I agree with all the contributors.

It’s Mostly issues regarding finding a suitable reviewer

You as an author may not be choosing the right reviewer (right journal).

Regards,

Emad

Opinions acknowledged. .cheers. .

Sometimes, editors request reviewers to review manuscripts. Some will accept and review, other will not respond (or will respond and take a long time before sending the manuscript back). After a particular time frame, the manuscript will to be sent to another reviewer, if no response from the initial reviewer. Also, some journals have a lot of manuscripts to review.

Generally, manuscripts sent to high impact journals usually take a long process (levels of review, correction, editing, gallery proof etc.) and can even be more than a year before final publication.

Most often, high impact factor journals takes even more than a year to publish an article. Some journal editors has a time frame given to their reviewer ranging from 3-6 months. I have also witnessed some sound Elsevier journal publishing an article within three month. In my opinion i think is just unnecessary delay, slow review process and nonchalant attitude of some editors.

Non availability of relevant reviewer is the main reason

Valuable responses

Interesting answers .... good question

Two years' review is my record. I even forgot the submission.

Hakan. .that's sad....

According to the answers, the main reason for the prolonged period in review process of manuscript is finding suitable reviewers and the delay of the evaluation of the reviewers; what can be do? Is it possible to support the reviewers? How?