Background: Peer reviewers are usually unpaid and their efforts not formally acknowledged. Some journals have difficulty finding appropriate reviewers able to complete timely reviews, resulting in publication delay. Objectives and methods: A survey of peer reviewers from five biomedical journals was conducted to determine why reviewers decline to review and their opinions on reviewer incentives. Items were scored on 5-point Likert scales, with low scores indicating low importance or low agreement. Results: 551/890 (62%) reviewers responded. Factors rated most highly in importance for the decision to accept to review a paper included contribution of the paper to subject area (mean 3.67 (standard deviation (SD) 86)), relevance of topic to own work (mean 3.46 (SD 0.99)) and opportunity to learn something new (mean 3.41 (SD 0.96)). The most highly rated factor important in the decision to decline to review was conflict with other workload (mean 4.06 (SD 1.31) ). Most respondents agreed that financial incentives would not be effective when time constraints are prohibitive (mean 3.59 (SD 1.01)). However, reviewers agreed that nonfinancial incentives might encourage reviewers to accept requests to review: free subscription to journal content (mean 3.72 (SD 1.04)), annual acknowledgement on the journal's website (mean 3.64 (SD 0.90)), more feedback about the outcome of the submission (mean 3.62 (SD 0.88)) and quality of the review (mean 3.60 (SD 0.89), and appointment of reviewers to the journal's editorial board (mean 3.57 (SD 0.99)).
In another study of medical reviewers, REF found that the most important motivations for accepting review requests were contributions of articles, relevance of articles to the reviewer's own work, and opportunity to learn something new.
Why do peer reviewers decline to review? A survey
Journal of epidemiology and community health
Journal of epidemiology and community health
Medicine