Peer review is designed to assess the validity, quality and often the originality of articles for publication. Its ultimate purpose is to maintain the integrity of science by filtering out invalid or poor quality articles.

From a publisher’s perspective, peer review functions as a filter for content, directing better quality articles to better quality journals and so creating journal brands.

REP uses the double blind review method in the review process of all studies. Both the reviewer and the author are anonymous in this model.

Steps of REP Peer-Review Process

1. Author submit the paper (referred as manuscript).

2. Initial Review - Journal editor screens the manuscript and decides whether or not to send it for full peer review. Only after clearing the initial screening is the manuscript sent to field editors.

3. Preliminary Review -  The field editors evaluate the introduction,  literature, method, findings, results, discussion  parts of the studies in detail with respect to the publishing policies and scope of the journal as well as originality. As a result of this process, those studies that are found unacceptable are returned within four weeks the latest together with the field editor report. And the studies which are deemed appropriate are assigned to reviewers.

4. Assigning Reviewers- Reviewers are assigned according to the content of the studies and their subject of expertise. Review process normally takes two to four months to complete depending on the number of rounds the reviews need to take place. Reviewer then submit the review in comments sheet to the journal, with a recommendation to accept, reject, minor, moderate and major revision before it is reconsidered. Reviewer can express his willingness to review a revision of the paper or not.

5. When at least two (2) reviews are received from reviewers, field editors evaluate the reviews and submit the final decision and comments to REP.

6. Based on the review comments and final decisions made by field editors, REP then make the final decision of acceptance/rejection of the manuscript.

7. All rejected manuscripts are then permanently closed and authors are informed about the decision.

8. For accepted papers, authors are then asked to revise manuscript according to reviewers comments and submit the final version within the given time period.

9. All final submitted papers are then published in REP as soon as they become ready after typesetting as Open Access Publications (OAP).

Finally, journal editors or the journal’s editorial board consider the peer reviewers’ reports and make the final decision to accept or reject the manuscript for publication.