Peer review blinding practices of highly ranked dental journals: analysis and discussion

Abstract

Objectives To evaluate the type of peer review blinding used in highly ranked dental journals and to discuss the influence of the blinding approaches on the peer review process. Methods All 91 dental journals classified by impact factor (IF) had their websites scrutinised for the type of peer review blinding used for submissions. If the information was not reported, the journals were contacted to obtain the information. Linear and logistic regression were applied to evaluate the association between type of peer review blinding and IF. Results The selected journals reported the following peer review blinding approaches: single-blind (N = 36, 39.6%), double-blind (N = 46, 50.5%), transparent (N = 2, 2.2%) and open (N = 1, 1.1%). Information from six (6.6%) journals was not available. A linear regression analysis demonstrated that journals with lower IFs were associated with double-blind review (p = 0.001). A logistic regression suggested lower odds of association between single-blind peer review and journals with IFs below a threshold of 2 (odds ratio 0.157, confidence interval 0.059 to 0.417, p <0.001). Conclusions The majority of highly ranked dental journals had single- and double-blind peer review; journals with higher IFs presented single-blind peer review and those with lower IFs reported double-blind peer review.