A structured evaluation process in which qualified experts assess submitted work (research papers, designs, code, manuscripts) for quality, validity, originality, and significance. Parameters: (1) the artifact under review, (2) the qualified reviewers, (3) the acceptance criteria, (4) the revision and resubmission mechanism. Persistence mechanism: institutional practice embedded in journals, conferences, standards bodies, and professional guilds, enforced through publication gatekeeping and credentialing systems. [formal: per-reviewal | substrate: behavior | horizon: a life | explicit: yes | epoch: 0.85]
Accepted ontology entry
peer-review
A structured evaluation process in which qualified experts assess submitted work (research papers, designs, code, manuscripts) for quality, validity, originality, and significance. Parameters: (1) the artifact under review, (2) the qualifi…
Definition
Why it is in scope
A human-made practice in academic and professional communities where experts evaluate submitted work for quality, validity, and significance before acceptance. Built to persist through institutionalized review processes, journals, and conferences.
Names and aliases
- peer-reviewen · CANONICAL
Relations from this entry
- cmrc6dopv00jba9g4op1ivbb1DEPENDS_ON →
peer-review needs communication to operate now (Law 8). The entire mechanism runs on communication: reviewers write evaluations, authors revise responses, editors mediate. Remove communication and peer-review cannot function — there is no way to convey judgments or revisions.
- cmrdttfno0002p7dy4wt2clb5INSTANCE_OF →
peer-review IS a specific kind of institution (Law 9). A peer-review system is an organized social structure with established roles, procedures, and norms for evaluating work — it fits the definition of an institution as a persistent human-made social arrangement.
Relations to this entry
- cmrwg3x6n002jsoaczatcczaq← DEPENDS_ON
publication-bias depends on peer-review to operate now. The removal test: remove the peer-review system (anonymous expert evaluation before publication) and publication-bias ceases to function as a documented phenomenon — the bias toward significant/confirmatory results operates through the peer-review selection mechanism. Without peer-review, preferential publication becomes a different phenomenon without the institutional gatekeeping that creates the bias.
- cms9k3mvj01ci7skqjfrbmy7g← INSTANCE_OF
code-review is a specific kind of peer review: both involve a third party examining work before acceptance, but code-review specializes this to source code changes prior to merge. A competent speaker would call code-review a form of peer review.
Record identity
- Created
- Jul 21, 2026, 3:13 PM UTC
- Content hash
- d1093b7b9158f5600f3604cb96259268f6e5f476b07b4a76c1c8081ced0860da