Peer review is an essential part of the publication process and it ensures that Journal of Research in Applied Linguistics (RALs) maintains the highest quality standards for its published papers. All manuscripts submitted to RALs undergo a double-blind peer-review process by at least two reviewers, who are asked to evaluate the quality of the manuscript and to provide a recommendation to the Editor-in-Chief on whether a manuscript should be accepted, revised, or rejected with a turn around time of about 3 weeks.

Reviewers’ Responsibilities

The role of the reviewer is vital and bears a great responsibility in ensuring the integrity of the scholarly record of RALs. Every reviewer is expected to perform manuscript evaluation in a timely, transparent, and ethical manner, following the COPE Ethical Guidelines for Peer Reviewers.

If RALs' Editor-in-Chief has invited you to review a manuscript, please consider the following:

1. Reviewing a manuscript critically but constructively and preparing detailed comments about the manuscript to help authors improve their work
2. Reviewing multiple versions of a manuscript if necessary
3. Providing all required information within established deadlines
4. Making recommendations to the editor regarding the suitability of the manuscript for publication in the journal
5. Declaring to the editor any potential conflicts of interest with respect to the authors or the content of a manuscript they are asked to review
6. Reporting possible research misconduct
7. Suggesting alternative reviewers in case they cannot review the manuscript for whatever reasons
8. Treating the manuscript as a confidential document
9. Not making any use of the work described in the manuscript
10. Not communicating directly with authors, if somehow they identify the authors
11. Not identifying themselves to authors
12. Not passing on the assigned manuscript to another reviewer
13. Ensuring that the manuscript is of high quality and original work
14. Informing the editor if he/she finds the assigned manuscript is under consideration in any other publication to his/her knowledge
15. Writing a review report in English only

What should be checked while reviewing a manuscript for RALs?

1. Novelty
2. Originality
3. Reliability and validity
4. Valuable contribution to the science
5. New aspects to the existing field of study
6. Ethical considerations
7. Structure of the article and its relevance to Authors’ Guidelines
8. Recency of references provided to substantiate the content
9. Grammar, punctuation, and spelling
10. Academic misconduct

Reviewers’ Potential Conflicts of Interest

We expect reviewers to declare any potential conflicts of interest and email the journal Editorial Office if they are unsure if something constitutes a potential conflict of interest. Possible conflicts of interest include (but are not limited to):

• Reviewer works in the same institute as one of the authors;
• Reviewer is a co-author, collaborator, joint grant holder, or has any other academic link, with any of the authors within the past three years;
• Reviewer has a close personal relationship, rivalry, or antipathy to any of the authors;
• Reviewer may in any way gain or lose financially from publication of the paper;
• Reviewer has other non-financial conflicts of interest (political, personal, religious, ideological, academic, intellectual, commercial, or any other) with any of the authors.

Reviewers should disclose any conflicts of interest that may be perceived as bias for or against the paper or authors.

Please kindly note that if reviewers are asked to assess a manuscript they previously reviewed for another journal, this is not considered to be a conflict of interest. In this case, reviewers should feel free to let the Editorial Office know if the manuscript has been improved or not compared to the previous version.

Reviewers’ Declaration of Confidentiality

Until the article is published, reviewers should keep the content of the manuscript, including the Abstract, confidential. Reviewers should also be careful not to reveal their identity to the authors, either in their comments or in metadata for reports submitted in Microsoft Word or PDF format.

For further guidance on writing a critical review, please refer to the COPE Ethical Guidelines for Peer Reviewers.

Web of Science Reviewer Recognition Services

[Web of Science Registration Link]

Additionally, please forward the review completion email from RALs, which will be sent to you after you have reviewed the manuscript, to reviews@webofscience.com.