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A 2018 investigation found that peer-review work was unevenly distributed across regions and that editors were having to invite more researchers to secure reviews. It raised a warning about reviewer fatigue, but the evidence does not show that fatigue alone caused declining response rates or review delays.
What the 2018 investigation measured
Publons released its Global State of Peer Review 2018 in September 2018 in collaboration with ScholarOne and Web of Science. It combined a survey of more than 11,800 researchers with submission, review and publication data from those services. The report organized its analysis around who reviews, how efficient peer review is, what is known about review quality and what may shape its future.
The survey was not presented as a random sample representative of every researcher worldwide. Its regional comparison used report-defined groups: “established” regions were the USA, Germany, Italy, Spain, France, the Netherlands, Sweden, Canada, the UK and Japan; “emerging” regions were China, Brazil, Turkey, India, Iran, South Korea, Malaysia and Poland. Those labels describe the report’s 2018 framework, not universal or current classifications.
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Where the report found an imbalance
The report calculated 1.95 reviews per manuscript submission in its established regions, compared with 0.66 in its emerging regions. Nature summarized the finding as researchers in developed countries writing nearly two reviews for every paper they submitted—almost three times the rate for researchers in emerging nations.
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These are aggregate ratios, not measures of every scholar’s workload. Nor do reviews per submission and invitations per completed review mean the same thing: the first compares review contributions with submissions, while the second reflects how many invitations editors need to send to obtain a review. The report also found that editors had to invite more researchers to secure each review, pointing to a recruitment challenge alongside the regional imbalance.
In the report’s foreword, Publons cofounder Andrew Preston argued that the disparity harmed the development of non-Western researchers by limiting opportunities to encounter emerging research, learn journal expectations, build relationships with editors and strengthen critical-analysis skills. That is Preston’s interpretation of the consequences, rather than a causal effect independently established by the regional ratios.
Why “reviewer fatigue” is not a complete explanation
Evidence from ecology and evolution journals
A 2017 study tracked invitations at six ecology and evolution journals from 2003 through 2015. At four of the six, the average share of invitations that led to submitted reviews fell from 56% in 2003 to 37% in 2015. The authors found that a scholar’s probability of accepting an invitation declined as the number of invitations received in a year increased. However, average invitations per prospective reviewer and the share of reviewers invited more than once a year changed little. Their conclusion was that “reviewer fatigue is not likely the primary explanation for this decline.” These results concern six journals in one field, not a global rate.
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A 2015 analysis of American Political Science Review invitations issued in 2013 found that 14.1% of declines cited “too many requests” and 24.8% cited being “too busy.” Together, those categories made up 38.9% of declines, but the authors cautioned that combining them likely overstates fatigue, while the narrower “too many requests” category may understate it. Scholars also declined because of conflicts of interest, insufficient expertise, having reviewed the paper before, travel, administrative duties and personal circumstances. These figures describe one journal and one year, not reviewer behavior across disciplines.
What the findings do—and do not—say about efficiency
The 2018 report raised concerns about obtaining reviews, and Chemistry World reported that about one-third of surveyed researchers were dissatisfied with the time taken to review a manuscript. That is evidence of dissatisfaction among respondents, not a direct measure of how long all manuscripts take or proof that fatigue caused delays.
The studies cannot be combined into one global trend: they differ in date, discipline, journal coverage and measure. The 2018 report’s regional ratios describe contributions relative to submissions; the ecology and evolution study tracks invitation outcomes over time; and the political science analysis records reasons for declines at one journal. Taken together, they support concern about reviewer recruitment and workload distribution, while leaving the causes of lower response rates multifactorial and context-dependent.
Independent reader supportYour contribution helps us test, update, and keep practical guides available for everyone.What a fair response would need to consider
The findings point to a system-level problem, not a simple prescription. Any proposed change to peer-review practice should be assessed for the quality of its evidence, its effect on workload, fairness across regions and career stages, review quality, and time to decision. The studies described here do not establish that one intervention is more effective than another.
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