Peer Review

The following types of contribution to the HKS Misinformation Review are peer-reviewed: Articles, Research Notes, and Literature Reviews. Letters to the Editor may also be peer-reviewed at the discretion of the editors. Commentaries are not usually peer-reviewed. Nevertheless, even commentaries, particularly if they present technical information, may be peer-reviewed at the discretion of the editors.

The HKS Misinformation Review uses double-blind review, which means that both the reviewer and author identities are concealed from the reviewers, and vice versa, throughout the review process. To facilitate this, authors need to ensure that their manuscripts are prepared in a way that does not give away their identity.

In line with our mission, we strive to assign peer reviewers to manuscripts as quickly as possible upon submission. Each manuscript is assigned at least two reviewers. Reviewers are typically given 7 working days to review manuscripts. Review criteria include: validity and reliability of the research instrument; clarity and coherence; and practical significance of results. Reviewers can recommend either minor revisions (expected to be completed within 2-3 weeks), or rejection. No manuscripts are accepted for publication without requesting revisions.

For any general questions and comments about the peer-review process, the journal, or its editorial policies that are not addressed here, we encourage you to contact us at misinforeview@hks.harvard.edu.

Editorial Decisions

Final editorial decisions are made by the HKS Misinformation Review Editorial Committee. Although we seriously consider the reviewers’ advice, we do not always follow the majority recommendation. We try to evaluate the strength of the arguments raised by each reviewer and by the authors, and we may also consider other information not available to either party.

We may go back to reviewers for further advice, particularly in cases where reviewers disagree with each other, or where the authors believe they have been misunderstood on points of fact. We therefore ask that reviewers be willing to provide follow-up advice as requested. When reviewers initially agree to review a paper, we consider this a commitment to review subsequent revisions as well. However, editors will not send resubmitted papers to the referees if it seems that the authors have not made a serious attempt to address the referees’ criticisms.

We invite authors to revise manuscripts when peer reviewer evaluations suggest that a paper could be publishable if it were improved by revision and clarification. However, the invitation to revise does not guarantee publication. The Editorial Committee assesses how the reviewers’ comments have been addressed and decides whether to: a) accept the manuscript (either as is, or pending very minor revisions), or b) to reject the manuscript. Given our compressed publication timeline, we do not offer multiple rounds of revision. If a paper shows promise, but is deemed not to be ready for publication after the first revision, the committee will move to reject it.

Plagiarism and Text Recycling

Plagiarism is unacknowledged copying or an attempt to misattribute original authorship, whether of ideas, text, or results. Plagiarism can be said to have clearly occurred when large chunks of text have been cut-and-pasted without appropriate and unambiguous attribution. Such manuscripts would not be considered for publication in the HKS Misinformation Review. Aside from wholesale verbatim reuse of text, due care must be taken to ensure appropriate attribution and citation when paraphrasing and summarizing the work of others. “Text recycling” or reuse of parts of text from an author’s previous research publication is a form of self-plagiarism. Here too, due caution must be exercised. When reusing text, whether from the author’s own publication or that of others, appropriate attribution and citation is necessary to avoid creating a misleading perception by the reader of a unique contribution.

We assess all such cases on their individual merits. When plagiarism becomes evident post-publication, we may correct or retract the original publication depending on the degree of plagiarism, context within the published article, and its impact on the overall integrity of the published study.

Duplicate Publication

Material submitted to the HKS Misinformation Review must be original and not published elsewhere. Duplicate publication occurs when an author reuses substantial parts of his or her own published work without providing the appropriate references. This can range from publishing an identical or almost identical paper in multiple outlets, to only adding a small amount of new data to a previously published paper. If a manuscript has been published previously or will appear elsewhere soon, it will not be considered for publication in the HKS Misinformation Review. 

Preprints

The HKS Misinformation Review encourages posting of preprints of research manuscripts on preprint servers, authors’ or institutional websites, and open communications between researchers whether on community preprint servers or preprint commenting platforms. Preprints may be posted at any time during the peer review process. Posting of preprints is not considered prior publication and will not jeopardize consideration at the HKS Misinformation Review.

Authors should disclose details of preprint posting, including DOI and licensing terms, upon submission of the manuscript or at any other point during consideration at the HKS Misinformation Review. Once the preprint is published, it is the author’s responsibility to ensure that the preprint record is updated with a publication reference, including the DOI and a URL link to the published version of the article on the journal website.

Conference Proceedings

Publishing work in conference proceedings is common in some research communities. The HKS Misinformation Review will consider submissions containing material that has been published in a conference proceedings paper. However, the submission should provide a substantial extension of results, methodology, analysis, conclusions, and/or implications over the conference proceedings paper; the final decision on what constitutes a substantial extension is made by the Editorial Committee. Authors must provide details of the conference proceedings paper with their submission including relevant citation in the submitted manuscript. Authors must obtain all necessary permissions to reuse previously published material and attribute it appropriately.

Open Access Policy

The HKS Misinformation Review is committed to real and immediate open access for academic work. All of our articles are free to access immediately from the date of publication. We do not charge our authors any fees for publication or processing, nor do we charge readers to download articles. The HKS Misinformation Review is free to all at any time and in perpetuity. Thus, we depend upon the financial underwriting provided by our funding partners, the goodwill of our editorial team, and the continuing support of our network of peer reviewers.

The HKS Misinformation Review also operates under the Creative Commons License CC-BY. Under Creative Commons licenses, authors retain copyright to their articles. The CC-BY license is the most open license available and considered the industry ‘gold standard’ for open access. A CC-BY license allows for the reproduction of articles, free of charge, for non-commercial and commercial use and with the appropriate citation information. All authors publishing with us accept these as the terms of publication. 

Data Sharing Policy

Data, code, and related files used to replicate the results in the manuscript can be uploaded in any format to the Harvard Dataverse. However, we recommend that tabular datasets be uploaded either as an R data frame, an SPSS file, or a CSV file. The Harvard Dataverse recognizes these formats as tabular data and automatically generates summary statistics and provides variable information, which allows users to better understand the data. Interactive demonstrations can also be uploaded to the Harvard Dataverse.

Data are important products of the scientific enterprise and at the HKS Misinformation Review we believe that they should be preserved and usable for decades in the future. The HKS Misinformation Review requires, as a condition for publication, that all data necessary to replicate published results should be archived in the Harvard Dataverse repository (https://dataverse.harvard.edu/), within IRB restrictions.

If code has been used in the study, then that code should be deposited with the data. It is highly recommended that, whenever possible, the code be open source. In those cases where sensitive data cannot be made available in the repository, exceptions may be granted at the discretion of the editor-in-chief.  

By default, data deposited in the Harvard Dataverse will be given a Creative Commons 0 waiver, thereby allowing it to be reused for any purpose, including commercial, with the expectation that the data will be cited when reused. If data has already been deposited in a repository other than the Harvard Dataverse, then the author is required to deposit the data into the Harvard Dataverse and add a link to the original dataset. If a dataset is larger than 1TB, please contact the editor-in-chief. Once a dataset is deposited in the Harvard Dataverse, the data citation must be listed in the paper’s references.

Archiving and Preservation Policy

To guarantee long-term digital preservation, content published in the HKS Misinformation Review is deposited in DASH, Harvard’s central, open-access repository.

Policy for Corrections, Revisions, or Retractions of Published Articles 

Any person may make a request for the correction, revision, or retraction of a published article by emailing the Editorial Desk (misinforeview@hks.harvard.edu). Valid grounds for a correction, revision, or retraction exist when, in the opinion of the Editorial Committee, a paper contains one or more substantive errors of fact that significantly impact the conclusions of the paper (not simply a disagreement on matters of opinion). Any corrective action is at the discretion of the Editorial Committee and will be taken only upon written documentation of evidence of such a substantive error.

Appeals and Complaints

Generally, the editorial decisions are not reverted. However, authors who think that their manuscript was rejected due to a misunderstanding or mistake may seek an explanation for the decision. Appeals must give sound reasoning and compelling evidence against the criticism raised in the rejection letter. A difference of opinion as to the interest, novelty, or suitability of the manuscript for the journal will not be considered as an appeal. The EIC and other relevant editors will consider the appeal and the decision thereafter taken by the journal will be deemed final. Acceptance of the manuscript is not guaranteed even if the journal agrees to reconsider the manuscript, and the reconsideration process may involve previous or new reviewers or editors and substantive revision. Authors who wish to make a complaint should email the EIC at misinforeview@hks.harvard.edu.

Allegations of Misconduct

In case of allegation(s) of misconduct such as plagiarism, falsification of data, and fabrication of data, the aggrieved party may launch a formal complaint to the Editor-in-Chief at misinforeview@hks.harvard.edu. The EIC shall acknowledge the receipt of complaint and initiate investigation in line with relevant guidance from written policies and procedures of the Committee on Publication Ethics (COPE), where applicable.

General Complaint

Any person may contact the HKS Misinformation Review with detailed written description of the concern, and information supporting the concern at misinforeview@hks.harvard.edu.