Guidelines for Reviewers

The journal Eleutherna: Journal of Psychology and Behavioral Sciences has a wide catalog of reviewers coming from all the fields of Psychology and Behavioral Sciences.

Basic philosophy of paper review

The purpose of the review process is to improve the quality of the manuscript under review, and of the material that is eventually published. A conscientious review is a time-consuming task but is essential to assure the quality of the journal. The Editorial Board of the Journal strives to ensure that review is fair, unbiased and timely. Decisions to accept or reject a manuscript for publication are based on the importance, originality, and clarity, and the study’s validity and its relevance to the aim of the journal.

Step 1^st

Before the acceptance of the invitation to review

Before the acceptance or the rejection of the invitation to review, reviewers must consider the following questions:

• Does the article match the reviewer’s area of expertise? The reviewers must accept the review invitation only in the case that they can send a high-quality reviewer report.
• Does the reviewer have potential conflicts of interest? (Including cases of competition, cooperation or any other relationship with any of the manuscript authors). In any case, the reviewer must disclose this to the Associate Editor when he/she responds.
• Has the reviewer enough time to complete the review process? Given that reviewing manuscripts presupposes enough effort and time, before the reviewer commits, he/she must make sure that they can meet the deadline (within 4-6 weeks of receiving the manuscript). In case the reviewer wants to accept the invitation but needs more time to complete the review, he/she must contact the Editor-in-Chief.

The reviewers’ response to the invitation must be immediate, even if they decline. A delay in their decision at this stage slows down the review process and means more waiting for the author. If you reviewer declines the invitation, it would be helpful if he/she could provide suggestions to the Editor-in-Chief for alternative reviewers with a similar area of expertise, by attaching their full name and surname and other related contact information.

Step 2^nd

Manuscript review

If the reviewer accepts the invitation to review the manuscript, he/she must treat the materials he/she receives as confidential documents. Reviewers must retain confidentiality at all stages of the review process. This means that reviewers must take care of the whole review process and they can’t share any of the materials related to the manuscript under review with anyone, and they cannot use any information in their own research/work without prior authorization from the Editor-in-Chief.

Reviewer access to the manuscript: The review process will be managed via the electronic journal platform. To access the paper and deliver their review, reviewers must click on the link in the invitation email they received which will bring them to the submission/reviewing system. If the reviewers experience difficulties accessing the paper, they might contact the Associate Editor.

Reviewer familiarization with the journal-specific guidelines: Before writing the review, the reviewer must familiarize themselves with the journal-specific guidelines related both to the aim of the journal and to the guidelines for authors.

Manuscript review process: The basic points for the manuscript review process are summarized as follows:

• The connection of the manuscript with the field of Psychology and Behavioral Sciences: To what extent does the manuscript contribute in a fertile and productive dialogue in the field of Psychology and Behavioral Sciences? To what extent does the manuscript address issues related to the readership of the journal and the journal per se? To what extent does the author of the manuscript show the connection between the manuscript with the field of Psychology and Behavioral Sciences?
• The originality of the manuscript: To what extent does the author’s view introduce a new perspective in the field of Psychology and Behavioral Sciences? Ιf the author’s perspective echoes views that have already been published, is this recognized by the author(s) in the manuscript?
• The organization and coherence of the manuscript: To what extent does the organization of the manuscript into sections / sub-sections reflect clearly and completely the content of them? To what extent does the organization of the manuscript is coherently structured and sequenced in a way to help the readership of the journal to follow the flow of the authors’ thought(s)? To what extent do the authors support the topic under investigation with clarity? Are the author(s)’ arguments convincing and thorough?

The reviewer report will help: a) the Editor-in-Chief of the journal to decide whether the manuscript will be accepted or not for publication, and b) the author(s) to improve the text of their manuscript. For these reasons, the total review, the general and the specific comments of the reviewers are essential.

The reviewer report should be divided into two parts:

1. Comments to be read only by the Editor-in-Chief, and
2. Comments to be read by both the Editor-in-Chief and the authors.

Regarding the comments for only the Editor-in-Chief, these must give the Editor-in-Chief the reviewer’s recommendation for the manuscript and, more importantly, the reasons behind it. These usually have to do with the manuscript’s scientific soundness, novelty, quality, importance, and suitability for the specific journal.

Regarding the comments for both the Editor-in-Chief and authors, the reviewer report may start with the summary of the manuscript after your first reviewer reading. Then, in a numbered list, the reviewer may explain each of the issues he/she found that need to be addressed. This list may be divided into two sections: major issues and minor issues. Indicatively, in the section of major issues, he/she may include problems with the study’s method or analysis. Next, in the section of minor issues, he/she may include tables or figures that are difficult to read, parts that need more explanation, and suggestions to delete unnecessary text.

In general, reviewers’ comments to the authors must be honest, constructive and polite. Reviewers’ comments must be as complete and detailed as possible without including personal information of the reviewer. The reviewer must explain and support his/her review with arguments and references as necessary to help the Associate Editor and the author(s) to fully understand the argumentation of his/her comments. Reviews should be conducted fairly and objectively. The review of a manuscript must be fair and objective. Specific comments that cite line numbers are most helpful. If the reviewer feels unqualified to address certain aspects of the manuscript, then he/she must include a statement to identify these areas.

Personal criticism of the author is inappropriate. If the research reported in the manuscript is flawed, criticize the science, not the scientist. Personal criticism is likely to lead an author to ignore useful comments, thus making the review less useful.

Below, there are (indicatively) some questions which must be considered in the course of the review process of research and a theoretical paper:

Questions for research papers:

• Why is this research important?
• Do the title, abstract, key-words, introduction, and conclusions accurately and consistently reflect the major point(s) of the paper?
• Is the writing concise, easy to follow, and interesting, without repetition?
• Is the research ethical and have the appropriate approvals/consent been obtained?
• Is the aim, the hypotheses and the topic under investigation clearly stated?
• Are the participants, the inclusion and exclusion criteria clearly described and stated?
• Are the methods and the participants’ recruitment described clearly?
• Is the presentation and description of the results of the study clear?
• Are appropriate statistical analyses and application of statistical methods used?
• Are the results supported by data? Can the results be verified easily by examining tables and figures?
• Is there an in-depth interpretation of results?
• Are the limitations of the study presented with clarity?
• Are the advantages and the drawbacks of the study discussed in relation to previous relevant studies? Is there a discussion and interpretation of different conclusions?
• Are the implications of the results (both from the theoretical and the empirical perspective) discussed? Are the applications of the results discussed?
• Are the perspectives for future research discussed?
• Are the references cited to support the manuscript?
• Does the manuscript comply with the Journal Guidelines for Authors? Is the topic of the manuscript matches the journal's aim? Is this research relevant to the audience targeted by the journal?
• Consider the length of the manuscript, relative to the content. Should any portions of the paper be expanded, condensed, combined, or deleted?

Questions for review papers:

• Does the literature review refer with clarity to a research hypothesis or topic?
• Are the limitations of the review stated clearly?
• Is the methodology of the review described clearly in a way to be applicable by other researchers?
• Are the criteria of inclusion and exclusion stated clearly?
• Is it possible that other relevant studies have not been included?
• Are the methodology of analysis and the data synthesis coming from relevant studies described clearly?
• Are the results of the review described adequately? In the case that the review refers to studies, are the results of one study similar to those of another? If not, are variations between results coming from different studies described and interpreted?
• Is there a logical flow between the results and the conclusions of the review?
• To what extent do the authors develop their perspective through a critical way to the previous relevant literature or, also they address it critically to their text?
• Are the advantages and the drawbacks of the literature review discussed in relation to previous relevant reviews? Are the limitations of the literature review presented with clarity?
• Does the literature review describe the perspective for future research?

After writing the reviewer report, the reviewers must make their recommendation to the manuscript under review while taking into consideration the following four categories:

Accepted without revisions: The manuscript adheres to the basic criteria of scientific soundness, originality, quality, importance and suitability for publication of the manuscript in Eleutherna: Journal of Psychology and Behavioral Sciences.

Accepted with minor revisions: Minor revisions are recommended for manuscript which requires a few small changes to adhere to the publication criteria. Minor revisions can be clarified by the reviewers and they can be done by the author(s) with little effort. Reviewers create a numbered list of suggested corrections and they send it to the Associate Editor. The manuscript ordinarily does not require further review.

Accepted with major revisions: Major revisions are recommended for manuscript which requires major changes to adhere to the publication criteria. Reviewers create a numbered catalog of suggested corrections and they send it to the Associate Editor. Author(s) have to answer whether they are interested in continuing, and whether they are willing to do the suggested revisions. The manuscript most likely requires further review.

Rejected in the present form: The manuscript cannot be potentially published, or significant revisions are required.

The final decision for the publication of the manuscript is taken by the Editor-in-Chief of the Journal. The Associate Editor will take into consideration all views and may ask for one more view, or he/she may ask for a revised version of the manuscript before he/she reaches to the final decision. The journal’s submission system will provide the reviewers with an update of the final decision.

Step 3^rd

After finalizing the review

The reviewers must not forget that even after finalizing their review they must treat the article and any linked files or data as confidential documents. This means that reviewers can’t share any of the materials related to the manuscript under review with anyone and they cannot use any information in their own research/work without prior authorization from the journal’s Editor-in-Chief.

Once reviewers have delivered their review, they will have the opportunity to receive acknowledgement of their contribution in the review process. The journal platform provides a private profile page, certificates, and Editor-in-Chief’s recognition of the reviewers’ contribution.

Finally, we take the opportunity to thank all reviewers sincerely for their scientific adequacy and soundness and for the time they invest to give their valuable input and feedback to the reviewed manuscripts. In this way, they all contribute to the qualitative upgrade of Eleutherna: Journal of Psychology and Behavioral Sciences. We expect the maximization of all reviewers’ response to the achievement of even higher objectives.

Guidelines for Librarians

We encourage research librarians to list this journal among their library's electronic journal holdings.
This journal's publishing system (OJS) is open source (see Open Journal Systems).

References

• https://www.springer.com/authors/manuscript+guidelines?SGWID=0-40162-6-1261021-0
• https://www.springer.com/gp/authors-editors/authorandreviewertutorials/howtopeerreview/writing-a-reviewer-report/10286416
• https://www.elsevier.com/reviewers/how-to-review
• www.hjn.gr/odigies-kritwn/