Timeliness, and Objective & Constructive Suggestions in Review Ethics: A Case study of the Review Documents of Journal of Information Processing and Management (JIPM)

Review or peer-review in scientific journals is one of the effective processes in improving the quality of scientific publications which adhere or pay attention to ethics in this process can strengthen journals and improve the decision-making process for editor in chiefs. In this study, paying attention to peer-review ethics in the Journal of Information Processing and Management (JIPM) evaluated in two dimensions of “timeliness” and “objective and constructive suggestions” dimension. For this purpose, the reports and review files in the period of October 2017 to December 2020 analyzed qualitatively with a deductive or directed content analysis approach in MaxQDA V. 2020. The results showed that the average duration of peer review was 28 days and this period is not significantly different between the five domains of the journal research domains. In addition, in the dimension of “objective and constructive suggestions”, more attentions were paid to the sub elements of “providing useful and constructive feedback to improve the clarity of manuscript” and “request supporting evidence(s) from the authors for their claims” than other sub elements. Also, “comments based on valid scientific and technical criteria” had the least amount of consideration in this dimension. Research results from two perspectives can improve the editor in chief’s decision. First, in terms of “timeliness”, the JIPM was in a relatively good position. Also, peer reviewers in the five domains did not perform the same for the sub elements of the “objective and constructive suggestions” dimension. This can be related to the nature of the articles in these subject areas and, the subject knowledge and moral literacy of the peer reviewers in these areas.