What do we want to see addressed by a reviewer?

1. What do we want to see addressed by a reviewer?
1) Context of the manuscript – if everything is
convincing, is it an important contribution
2) Content of the manuscript – are the conclusions
convincing

2. Context of the manuscript
• Is the manuscript presented appropriately in the context of the
published literature?
• Is it novel, and if not, is previous literature properly described (in
introduction and discussion) ? Does it provide a major advance over
the authors’ previous work?
• Does it contradict published literature?
• Does the discussion integrate the findings into existing knowledge?

3. Content of the manuscript
• Is the study design appropriate? E.g. N, controls…..
• Are the methods appropriate for the questions asked? Are they
sufficiently well described?
• Are the models appropriate for the questions asked?
• Are scientific guidelines of the journal and general standards
followed (statistical analyses, ARRIVE….)
• Are the results convincing? Especially qualitative results.
• Are conclusions supported by results?
• Is the discussion related to results? Does it address limitations?
Does it simply restate results or discuss them?

4. What you don’t have to worry about
• Spelling and grammar
• Editorial guidelines (reference style, figure numbers…)