Is open peer review the fairest system? No

Anonymity creates a safe place

Open peer review is associated with the risk that an inferior paper written by a senior authority in the field may receive a “soft” or generous review from a junior reviewer who either seeks to curry favour or fears an honest review would lead to payback at some future time.1 2 Van Rooyen and colleagues’ classic randomised controlled trial found a 5% greater positive recommendation among identified reviewers (open) than among anonymous reviewers (closed). Although that difference seems unremarkable, the authors of that study, undertaken at …