Talk:Independent review

Define independent review

This stub currently lacks focus as it doesn't define what independent review is in relation to peer review. Natrually, some secondary sources would likely provide a framework.

PMID 10048944 is a letter in Environmental Health Perspectives that suggests "independent review" of industry-sponsored research that has not been published in peer reviewed literature; the clear impliucation is that a more vaild interpretation of the data can be acheived by those "independent" of the relevant companies.

PMID 9233526 used "independent review" in a clinical trial: radiological findings were reviewed by the study group and verified by practitioners that were not part of the "peer review group". PMID 10996520 also discusses "independent review" in the context of clinical trials. — Scientizzle 15:06, 22 July 2010 (UTC)

The review process in general

I need help organizing the following articles:

• peer review
• anonymous peer review
• "science by press conference"
• independent review (which I just made this week)

These treat different aspects of the process by which scientists hold each other accountable to produce accurate, "true" results.

There are also occasional lapses or abuses, where (it has been claimed) the scientific method has not been followed, or the pre-publication peer review system has not worked properly.

Sometimes researchers will publicize their results directly to the public ("science by press conference") to get attention from the public, in an attempt to avoid subjecting their work to scrutiny by other scientists (who might easily find a flaw they're hoping the press and public will overlook. There are some clear examples, as well as some disputed examples of this in recent years.

• It might not be the best example, but around 15 years ago an astronomer reported that an asteroid "might" hit the earth in a few decades. I remember the incident because 2 or 3 movies about asteroids heading for earth came out around that time. The usual route for disseminating discoveries about asteroids is to send a "telegram" (?) to the main international astronomic body, so that other astronomers can correlate your observations with theirs. But this time, the Harvard astronomer went to the media, and his announcement was front page news. Another astronomer correlated the Harvard man's observations with other records and proved definitively that the asteroid would not even come close, but the good news got a lot less publicity than the bad news.

In other cases, when a theory is so far from the mainstream (or directly counter to it), a scientist might find that anonymous peer review unfairly rejects his work - not because of any failure to follow the scientific method, but simply because it seems obviously flawed to the reviewers - or because they are so biased against it that they dismiss it without actually studying it.

• Continental drift - other scientists delayed any consideration of this theory for decades
• Germ theory of disease - the biography of Semmelweiss shows how refusal to look at another scientist's work can end in tragedy.

I bring all this up, because there are NPOV issues as well as just being clear. --Uncle Ed (talk) 13:20, 23 July 2010 (UTC)

Redirect

I propose to redirect this to Peer review. As it stands, it is not clear at all how IR differs from PR (nor do I see this going in a direction where it would become different, it's not a distinction I have ever heard of). The Semmelweis example is not pertinent, by the way, because peer review was not a common feature for journal publication at that time. --Crusio (talk) 08:16, 25 July 2010 (UTC)

I disagree with the redirect, until and unless all the information in this article is first merged into Peer review. The principle of other scientists independently reviewing one's work is not the same as anonymous peer review. Nor is peer review, as practiced by journal publishers, the only way that scientists check each other's work. --Uncle Ed (talk) 19:23, 25 July 2010 (UTC)

• Of course you're welcome to add all sourced NPOV info from this article into the one on peer review ("... a generic term that is used to describe a process of self-regulation by a profession or a process of evaluation involving qualified individuals with the related field. Peer review methods are employed to maintain standards, improve performance, and provide credibility"). If IR is different from PR, then this stub certainly does not succeed in showing that. Do you have any references for this stuff? --Crusio (talk) 22:08, 25 July 2010 (UTC)

• As none of the material in this stub is sourced and no references seem to be forthcoming, I will proceed with the redirect. --Crusio (talk) 00:55, 29 July 2010 (UTC)

Undo redirect

Crusio, you only waited 4 days before redirecting this article. That was not enough time for me to get other writers to fix the problems you noted. So I'm going to undo your redirect. I'll check back in a few days, and if no one (but you) objects, I'll go ahead. --Uncle Ed (talk) 17:40, 13 August 2010 (UTC)

• Uncle Ed, nothing happened in those 4 days and it took you 3 weeks to get back here, not really inspiring much confidence that more will happen this time. I suggest you develop this in your user space first, adding sufficient reliable sources, and move it out here when and if it gets ready for prime time. For now, I am not convinced that anything can be written here that is not yet covered in peer review or could not be better be handled by editing that article (which needs a lot of cleanup and editing anyway). --Crusio (talk) 08:50, 14 August 2010 (UTC)

I agree with Crusio. I am not aware of any RS's which discuss this concept or term independently from peer review. A new page should already contain refs to justify it. Crusio's suggestion is reasonable: Develop the article (with refs) before creating it. In only little information is available, it can be added to existing pages.— James Cantor (talk) 16:05, 14 August 2010 (UTC)

I don't see how this warrants its own article either, or differ significantly in scope from peer review. However, let's continue the discussion at Talk:Peer review#Merge proposal. Headbomb {talk / contribs / physics / books} 17:35, 14 August 2010 (UTC)

Even though all 3 of you disagree, I undid the redirect, so that the article will be in category:peer review. We need to make sure that this info gets put into the proposed, consolidated article. But since Peer review "needs a lot of cleanup and editing" I don't know how long that will be. In the meantime, having the article out in the open facilitates the merge. --Uncle Ed (talk) 23:23, 16 August 2010 (UTC)

• I am surprised that you ignore the opinions of others so easily. I guess "if no one (but you) objects, I'll go ahead" just meant "I'll go ahead anyway". As for merging any of the "info" from this unreferenced/unsourced stub elsewhere, peer review is bad enough as it is, we don't need to merge even more unsourced opinions into that. --Crusio (talk) 12:49, 17 August 2010 (UTC)

I'm not ignoring your opinion. I thought about it a lot, but then I decided that I didn't agree. You seem to be using your own definition of "peer review" and your own idea about how science works.

The lack of sources for ideas which I have seen elsewhere does not mean either that (A) they are my own opinions or (B) they should be removed from the article. The usual procedure is not to hide bad writing with a redirect but to use fact tags, or even to do a little googling oneself.

There is disagreement, within the scientific world, about how science is done and should be done. I intend to describe all sides of this agreement fairly. I'm not going to leave out the parts you disagree with. --Uncle Ed (talk) 13:13, 17 August 2010 (UTC)

• Ed, you wrote this stub, so if you want to convince me that these are not just your opinions, you'll have to come up with some sources. Otherwise what you are saying about me above just applies to yourself. There are three opinions above that conflict with yours, not just mine. --Crusio (talk) 13:26, 17 August 2010 (UTC)

I've added some sources. Please help me by collaborating.

But whether any of the three opinions above "conflict with mine" is editorially irrelevant. I want the article to express a balance of ideas, regardless of what I think is good and proper (see WP:NPOV).

Are there any ideas or opinions about independent review mentioned on this talk page which you feel should be included in the article? --Uncle Ed (talk) 14:26, 17 August 2010 (UTC)

• In some contexts, as linked here, this article seems irrelevant – the term most commonly means a review set up by a governing body to produce a report independent of that governing body. Is this article going to be drastically revised so that it no longer refers to peer review? . . dave souza, talk 14:46, 17 August 2010 (UTC)

Sorry, Dave, I have already replied in two other places. I didn't check this talk page before replying on my user talk page. Worse, I tried to "move" the discussion to the CRU email talk page, with the result that this one link is being discussed in 3 separate places!

I'm glad to find out that an independent review can be set up by a governing body. I don't think I mentioned that in the Independent review article. (I was concentrating on reviews by unaffiliated groups.) Where can I find out more about this?

I wouldn't describe my planned future revisions as drastic, and I certainly don't conceive of eliminating mention of peer review. On the contrary, there's a suggestion here that we define what independent review is in relation to peer review.

It is the consensus of 4 editors that the Independent review article should be merged into Peer review. But I'll need help doing the merge. Do you have any time? --Uncle Ed (talk) 15:19, 17 August 2010 (UTC)

I'm not sure that "peer review" is an appropriate place to redirect this. After all, an "independent review" does not have to be related to an academic subject...the fact that the article's coverage doesn't match it's title is beside the point here. I think audit is a far better target. Though, honestly, I think this is just a flawed dicdef, and as such should be dealt with at AFD. Guettarda (talk) 15:29, 17 August 2010 (UTC)

An article in Physician's News Digest [1] says that there's a need for independent review, because the peer review process is broken. The article describes the difference between the two types of review. Why don't we each take a glance at this article? --Uncle Ed (talk) 15:55, 17 August 2010 (UTC)

• That article doesn't seem to have anything to do with scientific (or medical) research, which "peer review" and this stub you are creating are mostly about. (You even say so in the lead). --Crusio (talk) 16:48, 17 August 2010 (UTC)

Ed, as I said, dicdef. And an inaccurate one at that, since "independent reviews" can occur in any field. Guettarda (talk) 17:33, 17 August 2010 (UTC)

Well, since you're repeating myself, I'm probably missing something. I am going to suspend editing this article until I've studied WP:dicdef. While I'm "gone", please don't delete the article: I'd rather it be moved to User:Ed Poor/independent review. Fair enough? --Uncle Ed (talk) 20:18, 18 August 2010 (UTC)

Parallel discussion

The focus of the peer review article, and how it should relate to this one is unclear. See Talk:Peer_review#Clean-up_needed. Tijfo098 (talk) 01:59, 23 October 2010 (UTC)

Purpose of an independent review

I've heard that one purpose of an independent review is to deal with accusations that scientific work, e.g., research on a new drug, has been biased (as by financial interests). A pharmaceutical company's claims may not necessarily be accepted by a government vetting agency unless some person or group - with no financial stake in the issue - goes over the data and procedures. This relates to reproducibility in the sense that scientific findings generally do not become part of the scientific consensus immediately upon publication. Having passed peer review is only the first step. Now, other scientists read the journal article and try to make sense of the new information.

We need to clarify the role of independent review in major controversies. Perhaps it's not just a case of a company or university asking an ad hoc board to be set up for something. Or maybe there's no hard and fast distinction between peer review, independent review, and replication of results. I'm not a professional scientist; I'm just thinking about what I read in the back of the Worm Runner's Digest when I was an undergraduate. --Uncle Ed (talk) 15:37, 13 May 2011 (UTC)