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| Peer Review |
Not-to-miss news today about sociologist Mark Regnerus's recently published study which claims to prove that children raised by "gay" parents have problems children raised in traditional households lack (I've blogged about the study previously here, here, here, and here):
As Scott Rose reports at New Civil Rights Movement, Zack Ford at Think Progress, and Alvin McEwen at Holy Bullies and Headless Monsters, over 200 professors in the fields of sociology and psychology, along with practicing therapists, have written a joint letter to James Wright, editor of Social Science Research, the journal that published Regnerus's study, to ask searching questions about how the journal handled Regnerus's article. Scott Rose provides the text of the letter along with the names of the signatories.
One of the matters about which Regnerus's peers in the academic fields of sociology and psychology are asking: how did it happen that Regnerus's study seems to have rushed thorough the review process of Social Science Research far more quickly than is usually the case? As the letter states,
We question the process by which this paper was submitted, reviewed, and accepted for publication. The paper was received by the journal on February 1, 2012. A revision was received on February 29, and the paper was accepted on March 12. This suggests that the peer review process and substantive revisions occurred within a period of just five weeks. According to the peer review policy of the Social Science Research website hosted by Elsevier, the first step of the review process is an initial manuscript evaluation by the editor. Once deemed to meet minimum criteria, at least 2 experts are secured for a peer review. The website states that, “Typically manuscripts are reviewed within 2-3 months of submission but substantially longer review times are not uncommon” and that “Revised manuscripts are usually returned to the initial referees upon receipt.” Clearly, Dr. Regnerus’ paper was returned to him very quickly, because he had time to revise the manuscript and get it back to the journal by February 29th. Further, it appears that a second substantive peer review may not have occurred as the paper was accepted just two weeks after the revision was submitted.
The five-week submission to acceptance length was much shorter than all of the other articles published in the July 2012 issue. The average period of review for papers published in this issue was more than a year and the median review time was more than ten months. As we note below, there are substantial concerns about the merits of this paper, and these concerns should have been identified through a thorough and rigorous peer review process.
Regnerus's scholarly peers are asking Social Science Research to "publicly disclose the reasons for both the expedited peer review process of this clearly controversial paper and the choice of commentators invited to submit critiques." As the letter notes, those the journal invited to peer-review Regnerus's paper prior to its publication have not published in the field of either LGBT issues or parenting.
The scholars sending the letter requesting public disclosure of the reasons for the expedited peer review process and the choice of commentators also note that they have "substantial concerns about the merits of this paper and question whether it actually uses methods and instruments that answer the research questions posed in the paper." The letter concludes,
The publication of this paper and the accompanying commentary calls the editorial process at Social Science Research, a well-regarded, highly cited social science journal (ranking in the top 15% of Sociology journals by ISI), into serious question. We urge you to publicly disclose the reasons for both the expedited peer review process of this clearly controversial paper and the choice of commentators invited to submit critiques. We further request that you invite scholars with specific expertise in LGBT parenting issues to submit a detailed critique of the paper and accompanying commentaries for publication in the next issue of the journal.
As Scott Rose points out, the questions these scholars are asking are particularly acute when one considers that the Regnerus paper was immediately touted by the anti-gay National Organization for Marriage as "proof" that gay parents are inferior parents, and when one considers that Robert George of NOM is a senior fellow at the Witherspoon Institute, which provided $35,000 in funding for Regnerus's project. It's hard to avoid wondering if this paper was rushed to print without adequate peer review to provide fodder for anti-gay groups like NOM to use as the 2012 U.S. elections approach.
This letter is big news. Motivating a substantial group of peers like the one writing this letter to make such a public statement is not particularly easy in the academy, where making controversial public statements of any sort can imperil tenure at some institutions, and where people are usually circumspect about openly questioning the scholarship of a peer.
What has happened with Regnerus brings to mind the apology that Dr. Robert Spitzer recently issued to the LGBT community for publishing a shoddily conducted research study that claimed to provide evidence that gay "cures" work. As Spitzer's apology notes, his study did not have substantial reason to come to such a conclusion, and he now recognizes that he has been party to harm to many people as a result of the poorly conducted study--and the way it has been used as a weapon by the political and religious right.
But here's the most important link between the Regnerus story and the Spitzer story: as Benedict Carey notes in a New York Times article about Spitzer to which the preceding link points, Spitzer's flawed study was published by his friend Dr. Kenneth Zucker in the Archives of Sexual Behavior without peer review. As a result, once it was published, the study was mercilessly critiqued by scholars in the field who noted that Spitzer's study relied on first-person accounts of people who claimed to have been "cured" of homosexuality, and who were reporting years down the road about their "cure," and with no strong controls in place to determine precisely what a gay cure is. Or, indeed, whether their self-reporting was reliable.
Peer review is an essential component of academic publishing. It assures scholarly soundness in papers published in well-respected journals in a given field. It's particularly important in science-based fields like sociology, since scientific discoveries and paradigms depend on the input of communities of scholars that test research and theses via public conversation.
Rushing a study heavily funded by right-wing foundations, a study with obvious political applications, through the peer review process is tantamount to sin in the academic community. It is a highly unusual act. And the scholars asking why this happened in Regnerus's case have every right to be concerned about what has gone on with this study. They need to be concerned, since allowing highly regarded academic journals to establish this kind of precedent undermines the credibility of their academic field.
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