WIKIMEDIA, AREYNRefereeing or reviewing manuscripts for scientific journals is at the heart of science, despite its occasional imperfections. Reviewing is a check of quality, originality, impact, and even honesty for papers submitted to scientific journals. Unfortunately, referees are sort of like sperm donors: they are anonymous and their pleasure, if any, is in the process, not the result. No one acknowledges their contributions, except perhaps in small print at the back of a journal at the end of the year. Who in their right mind would want to referee? It takes lots of time to do well and gets no credit. The result is a refereeing crisis.
Various methods have been suggested to improve the situation. Some of these suffer from an approach that punishes reviewers for poor performance, rather than rewarding them for their hard work. Others involve complicated systems of payment or reciprocal altruism where reviewers are rewarded with access to journals that they may or may not be interested in submitting papers to.
I believe being asked to referee reflects one’s true standing in a field. Journal editors will always try to get the most knowledgeable and competent referees possible. I would suggest we build on existing impact measurements to encourage enlightened self-interest. For authors, we have a measure of impact, such as the commonly used h-index, a reflection of publications and citations. For journals, we have impact factors. ...
