(16.05) Double-Blinded versus Single-Blinded Peer Reviews in Endocrine Research: Does It Matter?

To examine whether double-blinded peer review is associated with more diverse authorship characteristics compared to single-blinded review in endocrinology journals.

 

Methods:

Three endocrinology journals with comparable scope and impact factor were selected for comparison (one double-blinded, two single-blinded). Using PubMed and the journal websites, we manually retrieved the full names of first and last authors of all original research manuscripts published in English within the first 6 months of 2019 and the first 6 months of 2022 (n=678 single-blinded, 122 double-blinded). Reviews, guidelines, case series and case reports were excluded. Information was collected on authors’ academic rank (trainee, instructor/assistant professor, associate professor, full professor, other), U.S. institution rank based on the 2023 U.S. News & World Report (above 20^th, below 20^th) and H index for U.S.-based last authors only ( < 20, ³20). Gender and race/ethnicity associated with authors’ names were predicted using publicly-available algorithms (GenderAPI and REthnicity, respectively). We conducted univariate analyses to determine associations between peer-reviewed journal blindness and author characteristics.

Results:

Gender distributions were similar for both first and last authors in single- versus double-blinded journals. In univariate analyses, double-blinding was associated with a significantly higher proportion of publications having last authors with Hispanic and Asian names (Hispanic:19.7% double-blinded vs 9.9% single-blinded; Asian: 51.7% double-blinded vs 41.6% single-blinded; p< 0.001), and a higher proportion of publications with first and last authors from U.S. academic institutions (41.8% double-blinded vs 20.8% single-blinded, p< 0.001, and 42.6% double-blinded vs 21.6% single-blinded, p< 0.001, respectively). Double-blinding was associated with a lower proportion of last authors with full professor rank compared to single-blinding (48.4% vs 62.7%, p=0.032). When restricting the cohort to publications with U.S.-based authors only, double-blinding was significantly associated with a lower proportion of both first (38.6% double-blinded vs 60.3% single-blinded, p=0.013) and last authors from the top 20 ranked U.S. institutions (43.6% double-blinded vs 59.6% single-blinded, p=0.025) and with last authors with H index ³20 (55.8% double-blinded vs 82.6% single-blinded, p< 0.001).

 

Discussion/Conclusion:

Conclusion: Our findings indicate that double-blinding is associated with more diverse authorship representation in endocrine journals, suggesting potential for double-blinded reviews to facilitate objectivity, ultimately improving publication equity.