NOTES TO REFEREES:

First, thank you very much for accepting to be a referee of JOS. We would like to point out briefly the duties of a referee.

There are three main components of the refereeing task: speed, confidentiality, and thoroughness. To some extent, these may contradict each other, and the following notes may assist you.

1. Speed

Unless the article is of exceptional length or complexity, your report should be sent within two weeks of receipt of the article. If you are unable to fulfil your role, please inform the journal secretariat. You may also suggest an alternative reviewer.

2. Confidentiality 

Manuscripts are to be handled with utmost confidentiality. In rare instances, if you intend to engage in discussions about the article with a colleague, we kindly request prior notification to the journal. It is your responsibility to ensure that the article is only seen by that person and not read by others. The names of person who helped with the review must be declared so that they can be associated with the article in our records. Under no circumstances should a copy of the manuscript be retained.

The editors do not disclose the identity of reviewers to authors. However, if you wish to correspond directly with the author, initial contact should be made through the Editor or the secretariat.

3. Thoroughness

It is helpful to keep the following points in mind:

(a) Is the study original and new?

(b) Is the work sound and technically up to date? Are the conclusions firmly based on observations or justifications given?

(c)) Is the abstract an adequate summary of the paper? Abstracts should, as far as possible, be 'informative' rather than 'illustrative'.

(d) Is the literature adequately and correctly cited?

(e) Is the manuscript as efficient as possible in terms of presentation?

The following additional points should also be carefully considered:

(f) Is the article presented in the correct category, or should it be rewritten in a shorter form?

(g) Does the article contain tables, examples, or other lengthy matters which, while worth preserving, may be of interest only to a very small number of readers?

(h) Is the use of language satisfactory? You may make suggestions for minor corrections when returning your review report. If any, ambiguous passages should be identified for the author to improve.

Finally, if you have suggestions that would make the article more accessible to a wider readership, please include them in your report.

4. Ethical considerations

Please let us know if you feel that there is any real or perceived conflict of interest in carrying out your review, or if there are any elements against academic/publication ethics that you have identified in the article.

Referees are not expected to accept responsibility for the accuracy of every inference, argument and detail of every manuscript.