Scientific Peer Advisory and Review Services, American Institute of Biological Sciences, 950 Herndon Parkway Suite 450, Herndon, VA, 20170, USA.
Washington State University, 14204 NE Salmon Creek Avenue, Vancouver, WA, 98686, USA.
Sci Eng Ethics. 2020 Apr;26(2):761-782. doi: 10.1007/s11948-019-00123-1. Epub 2019 Jul 29.
Scientific peer reviewers play an integral role in the grant selection process, yet very little has been reported on the levels of participation or the motivations of scientists to take part in peer review. The American Institute of Biological Sciences (AIBS) developed a comprehensive peer review survey that examined the motivations and levels of participation of grant reviewers. The survey was disseminated to 13,091 scientists in AIBS's proprietary database. Of the 874 respondents, 76% indicated they had reviewed grant applications in the last 3 years; however, the number of reviews was unevenly distributed across this sample. Higher review loads were associated with respondents who had submitted more grant proposals over this time period, some of whom were likely to be study section members for large funding agencies. The most prevalent reason to participate in a review was to give back to the scientific community (especially among frequent grant submitters) and the most common reason to decline an invitation to review was lack of time. Interestingly, few suggested that expectation from the funding agency was a motivation to review. Most felt that review participation positively influenced their careers through improving grantsmanship and exposure to new scientific ideas. Of those who reviewed, respondents reported dedicating 2-5% of their total annual work time to grant review and, based on their self-reported maximum review loads, it is estimated they are participating at 56-87% of their capacity, which may have important implications regarding the sustainability of the system. Overall, it is clear that participation in peer review is uneven and in some cases near capacity, and more needs to be done to create new motivations and incentives to increase the future pool of reviewers.
科学同行评审员在资助项目选择过程中发挥着不可或缺的作用，但关于科学家参与同行评审的程度和动机的报道却很少。美国生物科学学会（AIBS）开发了一项全面的同行评审调查，以研究资助评审员的动机和参与程度。该调查分发给 AIBS 专有数据库中的 13091 名科学家。在 874 名回应者中，76%表示他们在过去 3 年中评审过资助申请；然而，在这个样本中，评审的数量分布不均。更高的评审工作量与在这段时间内提交更多资助提案的回应者有关，其中一些人可能是大型资助机构研究小组的成员。参与评审的最常见原因是回馈科学界（尤其是在经常提交资助申请的人当中），而拒绝评审邀请的最常见原因是缺乏时间。有趣的是，很少有人表示来自资助机构的期望是评审的动机。大多数人认为评审参与通过提高资助技巧和接触新的科学思想，对他们的职业生涯产生了积极的影响。在参与评审的人中，受访者报告将他们总工作时间的 2-5%用于资助评审，并且根据他们自我报告的最大评审工作量，估计他们的参与度达到了他们能力的 56-87%，这可能对系统的可持续性产生重要影响。总体而言，很明显，同行评审的参与程度参差不齐，在某些情况下接近能力上限，需要采取更多措施来创造新的动机和激励措施，以增加未来的评审员队伍。
