In my opinion, peer review failed me this year. Although I submitted all of my papers to the class one drive, I found that none of my peers ever really gave me any constructive criticism. On top of this, none of my peers even looked at the rough draft of my third paper. However, I didn’t let my personal dismay sour the taste of peer review in my mouth. In contrast, I actually think I became a great reviewer this semester.
One example of a good comment I made in the paper above is:
“This would be a lot more effective if you were to explain why these two matter. In other words, what qualifies them to speak on this? A little background”
This was in reference to when the author introduced the authors she was discussing in her paper. Without a proper introduction that explains who these authors are and why they are qualified, their quotes don’t mean much when implemented into this author’s paper. For this reason, I think this comment was very constructive.
Another example of a constructive comment I made is:
“Your claim here is clear. However, this feels very similar to the focus of paper 2. I might suggest focusing more on the compromise aspect of this prompt and the mixing of Ma’s ideas with Lukianoff and Haidt”
This was in reference to this authors thesis. In my opinion, her thesis responded to the prompt of paper 2 rather well, but not paper 3. By reminding her of the compromise aspect of prompt 3, I felt this comment was constructive and concise.
All in all, I’ve come a long way as a peer reviewer throughout this semester. In the past I’ve reviewed my peers’ papers. With that being said, my review would always be as simple as “this is good” or “good job”. I take pride in my (now) constructive peer review comments.
