For reviewers

The goal of peer review is to obtain a fair and meaningful assessment of the scientific quality of a manuscript. We ask that you keep the following in mind.

  1. The acceptance criteria are correctness, significance, and clarity. For elaboration on these criteria, see the Editorial Policies.
  2. When to accept, revise and resubmit, or reject. If the manuscript offers a significant technical or conceptual contribution, then recommend “accept”. If a manuscript is below the threshold, but you can identify exactly what is necessary to raise it above the threshold, then provide precise criteria in your report, and recommend “revise and submit”. Otherwise, recommend “reject”.
  3. Self-evaluation. Please be frank about the depth of scrutiny and confidence of the assessments, stating for example ‘I have not checked all the details of the proofs in Section 4’ or ‘I do not feel fully competent to judge the significance of the purported applications to chemistry’. This will help the editor determine if further review is required. Such remarks can go in separate text fields and do not have to be transmitted to the authors.
  4. Conflicts of interest. Reviewers should declare to the handling editor any potential conflicts of interest. Reasons for conflict of interest may include close collaboration with the authors within the past two years, personal relations with the authors (e.g. a family member), concurrent competitive research, professional co-dependence, and financial co-dependence.
  5. Deadlines. Compositionality does not impose deadlines on reviewers. However, if you anticipate taking longer than the standard 30 days to submit a review, please inform the editor as soon as possible.
  6. Option to unblind. By default, reviewer identities are not revealed to the authors. We are, however, happy to support an unblinded, open review process, where the authors are aware of reviewer identities. If you are interested in participating, please let your handling editor know. Note that if the authors choose a double-blind peer review process, their choice will take precedence.
  7. Reviewer acknowledgments. As a gesture of appreciation, Compositionality may acknowledge reviewers on its website. These acknowledgments are not linked to individual articles. You can choose to opt out; if so, just let your editor know.