Author: Paul Woods
Affiliation: Nature Astronomy
Country: UK
Co-Author(s): Marios Karouzos
Affiliation: Nature Astronomy
Country: UK
Title: Investigating gender bias in peer review at Nature journals
A variety of studies have demonstrated the existence of gender bias within academia and academic publishing. In particular, in astronomy and planetary science, studies have shown that papers with female first authors are cited 10% less than other papers[1]; women-led telescope time proposals are unfairly judged; there are fewer women recipients of prestigious prizes[2]; and representation and participation in conferences is lower for women than men[3]. Here we investigate potential gender bias during the peer-review process using anonymised data on papers related to astronomy and planetary science submitted to the high-impact journals Nature, Nature Astronomy, Nature Geoscience and Nature Physics. Using this unique data set, we look into possible gender bias from editors (in selecting which papers are sent out to referees) and from referees (in their recommendations of which papers are accepted for publication). The data indicate that there is no negative bias towards corresponding women authors either from editors or referees. Indeed, acceptance rates for women-led papers are higher than those for men-led papers across all four journals. In theory, such an analysis could be extended across all of the Nature Research journals, which cover subjects as diverse as genetics and photonics.
References
[1]: Caplar, N., Tacchella, S. & Birrer, S. Nat. Astron. 1, 0141 (2017).
[2]: Knezek, P. Nat. Astron. 1, 0151 (2017).
[3]: Schmidt, S. J. & Davenport, J. R. A. Nat. Astron. 1, 0153 (2017).