Experience with NIH Peer Review

Researchers' Cynicism and Desire for Change

Dados Bibliográficos

ID11638130
AutoresGilbert W Gillespie (autor correspondente), D E Chubin (0000-0003-2535-3825), George M Kurzon
Ano1985
Volume10
Fascículo3
Páginas44-54
Data de publicação1985-07-01
Peer ReviewedSim
Open AccessSim
TipoARTICLE
PeriódicoScience Technology & Human Values (JOURNAL)
Identificadores do periódicoISSN: 0162-2439 • E-ISSN: 1552-8251
EditoraSAGE Publishing (PUBLISHER • US)
DOI10.1177/016224398501000306
OpenAlexW2033046212
IdiomaEN
Citações recebidas7
Referências citadas2

In the United States, peer review is central to the process by which many government agencies select research proposals for funding.' Although several different agency versions of peer review are practiced,2 they share one characteristic: Scientists judge both the potential value of proposed research projects and the ability of proposers to perform the studies. The premise is self-fulfilling. If scientists identified as peer specialists are best qualified to judge the scientific merit of proposals, then peer review becomes a tool of science policy; it both affects how policy is implemented and how decisions on public funding of research are justified. Many scientists strongly support peer review, at least in the abstract.3 Critics of peer review, however, often suggest that the abstract conception does not hold in practice. There are difficulties, they argue, in defining who are peers and therefore who is capable of evaluating a proposed study.4 Reviewers may be unable to remain disinterested when research funds are scarce and they are com

Aesthetics · Art · Cynicism · Peer review · Political science · Sociology · Law · Psychology · Research, Science, and Academia · scientometrics and bibliometrics research · Social Psychology