Do gender, nationality, or academic age affect review decisions? An analysis of submissions to the journal Biological Conservation

Abstract

Recent papers have considered whether the present system of single-blind reviewing results in bias against women or other groups of authors in biological journals. If so, double-blind reviewing might be an alternative approach that avoids such bias. We investigated the effects of gender, nationality (English-speaking countries only), academic age, year of review, and handling editor on the decisions made on a sample of 1856 papers submitted to the journal Biological Conservation between 2004 and 2007. There is no evidence of differences in acceptance rates among genders, nationalities, academic age, or year, nor is there evidence for interactions among these factors. Individual handling editors differed in the proportions of papers that they accepted, rejected following review, and rejected without review, but did not show biases based on any of the factors we examined. Overall, we did not find evidence supporting a change in the present review system, although the low rate of acceptance of papers from certain non-English-speaking countries is an issue that needs to be addressed. We believe that these types of audits of the editorial system are necessary, so that all submitting authors feel that the editorial process is fair, unbiased and rigorous.