On 04/19/2010 10:46 AM, Nathan wrote: > I wonder if there might be a subtle bias playing into these reviews. > Perhaps if reviewers begin with the assumption that the article was > written by amateur hobbyists, that influences the outcome. If Lindsey > went back to them and let them know that the articles had been written > or comprehensively reviewed by recognized experts, would that alter > the results?
It's an interesting question, but I think it might influence their description more than their actual opinion, i.e. that if they knew it was written by a PhD in their field, they would phrase their disagreement differently, but might still not like the article. Some of these comments are almost exactly the comments a survey article will typically get in peer review! Almost nobody likes the survey article that someone else has written: it invariably over-emphasizes unimportant issues, under-emphasizes the key issues, is missing important results in the field, includes results of questionable reliability, etc. (Happens with textbooks, too; almost everyone has a gripe about how the standard textbook in their field misrepresents things.) -Mark _______________________________________________ WikiEN-l mailing list [email protected] To unsubscribe from this mailing list, visit: https://lists.wikimedia.org/mailman/listinfo/wikien-l
