Triple-masking v Double-masking: a Trial of Scientific Publication in Public Health
试验速览
- 阶段
- 不适用
- 状态
- 招募中
- 发起方
- 入组人数
- 1,500
- 试验地点
- 1
- 主要终点
- Difference in the proportion of manuscripts submitted within the six-month window that are accepted for publication (i.e., not rejected at any stage); risk difference, unadjusted
研究概览
简要总结
The trial is designed to determine whether knowledge of the identity of the authors, their institutions and of the reviewers of a given article submitted to American Journal of Public Health impacts the final editorial decision. The concept of triple masked editorial process (where editors are unaware of author identities and affiliations in addition to the authors' and reviewers' identities being masked from one another) compared to a double masked process (only authors' and reviewers' identities are hidden from one another; editors are aware of author and reviewer identities) has not been formally tested in a scientific journal, and particularly not in medicals social science, or public health journal. Triple-masking is expected to lead to greater acceptance of articles submitted overall because it will neutralize biases against some authors and reviewers because of who they are or the institutions they are related to.
The triple masked editorial process, in which the editors, the authors and the reviewers ignore their respective identities will be compared to a double masked, in which the editor knows the identity of the authors and reviewers, because double masked is currently the editorial process used by the American Journal of Public Health.
Even though only manuscripts are randomized, the trial will collect information about the identity of the authors (eg, genes, race/ethnicity, seniority) and the reviewers to be used for secondary analysis. In this sense it is dealing with human subjects and has obtained an exemption from the Institutional Review Board of Queens College.
详细描述
Aim:
To determine whether masking (i.e., triple-masked: editors, authors, reviewers) or not (i.e., double-masked: authors, reviewers) the identity, seniority, gender, race, ethnicity, and institutions of the authors and of the reviewers to the editors leads to a greater proportion of accepted manuscripts compared with double-masked review. Additionally, we will conduct exploratory analyses to determine whether the differences are related to the identity, seniority, gender, race, ethnicity, and institutions of the authors and of the reviewers.
Trial design: two group, parallel, superiority trial with 1:1 allocation
Study setting: The trial will solely take place at the American Journal of Public Health in a virtual capacity. All submissions will be electronic via the Editorial Manager (https://www.editorialmanager.com/ajph/default2.aspx). Eligible manuscripts in the blinded editorial process arm will be masked electronically before being entered in the trial by the editorial assistant, who will also place all manuscripts in Dropbox folders to be accessed by the editors. The questionnaire that will be sent to all authors, reviewers, and editors is housed in Survey Monkey and will be administered via email and/or text messaging by someone external to the trial.
Inclusions: All eligible, new submissions (research, notes from the field, non-commissioned editorials, analytic essays, systematic reviews) for the regular issue and supplements from September 5, 2023 to March 1, 2024.
研究设计
- 研究类型
- Interventional
- 分配方式
- Randomized
- 干预模型
- Parallel
- 主要目的
- Other
- 盲法
- Triple (Participant, Care Provider, Investigator)
盲法说明
Masking securities: Editors will be restricted from accessing the editorial manager for the duration of the project. Additionally, since articles won't be assigned to editors, they won't be able to see anything from their immediate accounts. This should block them from the masked information and preserve the integrity of the project. Editors will be able to search for reviewers with specific expertise from an external, cleaned nominative version of the editorial manager database. They won't however know who, from the reviewers selected, accepted the invitation and wrote the review. In this sense, reviews' authorship will be masked to the editor.
入排标准
- 性别
- All
- 接受健康志愿者
- 否
入选标准
- •New submissions
- •Article formats: research articles, notes from the field, non-commissioned editorials, analytic essays, systematic reviews
排除标准
- •Resubmissions
- •Article formats: Commissioned editorials, book reviews, Letters to the Editor, Public Health of Consequence editorials, Editor's Choice.
结局指标
主要结局
Difference in the proportion of manuscripts submitted within the six-month window that are accepted for publication (i.e., not rejected at any stage); risk difference, unadjusted
时间窗: full duration of the study, 6 months, from September 5 2023 to March 1 2024
Primary outcome
次要结局
- Secondary outcome(full duration of the study, 6 months, from September 5 2023 to March 1 2024)