Peer-reviewed studies in fitness journalism are the process of rigorously evaluating articles, studies, or other scholarly work submitted by authors within fitness journalism by other experts in the same field of knowledge.
This process serves two main functions:
- Peer-reviewed studies act as a filter to ensure that only high-quality research is published, especially in reputable fitness journals. Reviewers determine the quality, relevance, and novelty of the research.
- Reviewers provide authors with recommendations on how to improve their fitness articles and identify errors that need to be corrected before publication.
Peer-reviewed studies are widely used when publishing fitness articles in scientific journals. In addition, when publishing scientific monographs and textbooks, it is also necessary to obtain the required number of reviews from specialised fitness experts.
In general, the whole process can take lots of time, but you can save it if you get help from research paper writing services where professional reviewers work.
Features of peer-reviewed studies
Peer-reviewed studies primarily imply a competent evaluation of the work, while an opinion piece or a white paper is an impression or opinion. Here are the features that a peer-reviewed study should have:
- Peer-reviewed studies are objective and impartial.
- They offer a critical analysis of an article: a detailed analysis and assessment of the work by form, content, features of the composition, the author’s skill and style of presentation, and highlighting the strengths and weaknesses.
- Peer-reviewed studies contain point-by-point comments.
- They offer a reasoned evaluation of the entire work.
- Peer-reviewed studies have their own target audience.
- They are written by outside fitness experts, a qualified specialist with the appropriate education, who have not only real and scientific ideas about the topic of the work but also their own publications on a given issue.
- Both candidates and doctors of science act as reviewers.
- Peer-reviewed studies are made of articles, dissertations, monographs, and educational and fitness literature.
- They can be 3,000 – 10,000 words long.
The importance of peer-reviewed studies in fitness journalism
Ensuring scientific accuracy
Peer-reviewed studies published in indexed journals guarantee truthful information that can be relied upon. Experts in fitness check them, which serves as confirmation that the published materials are original and correspond to common sense and the subject matter in which the research was conducted.
Combatting misinformation
Peer-reviewed studies are always about fact-checking. Fact-checking is the process of collecting, analyzing, and evaluating data to verify its veracity. It involves using multiple sources of information and criteria to help an expert determine whether a fitness article is true.
Reviewers who perform fact-checking identify and debunk misinformation. It helps to prevent the spread of false facts. The process involves not only analyzing texts but also assessing the context in which facts are presented and verifying sources.
Building trust with readers
One of the most important aspects of the quality of a scientific text in general and, especially, a peer-reviewed study is a correct citation.
Its purpose is to provide the reader with enough information so that they can find the source and conduct a critical analysis on their own without relying only on the opinion of the author of the article. When fitness journalists cite peer-reviews research, they build trust with their audience.
Requirement for peer-reviewed studies
Requirements for the reviewer
- The reviewer must have sufficient competence and knowledge in the field of fitness.
- The reviewer must provide an objective and impartial assessment of the research presented in the article.
- The reviewer undertakes not to use information related to the author’s text of the publication in their own interests, for their own benefit, the benefit of other persons or organizations, causing harm to other persons, or discrediting other persons.
- The reviewer must provide clear justifications, indicating the reasons for non-compliance of the reviewed research with the requirements (if any) in order to improve the quality of the publication.
Review procedure
- Assigned reviewers are qualified specialists in the fitness subject of the reviewed materials and have published articles on the subject of the reviewed material over the past 3 years.
- The reviewer can recommend the fitness article for publication, advise revising it, or not recommend it for publication.
- Usually, an article not recommended for publication by the reviewers is not accepted by fitness journals.
Review form
A peer-reviewed study must reflect, in accordance with the requirements:
- General characteristics of the article
- The research problem
- The correspondence of the problem to the problem of the journal section
- The relevance of the problem presented in the article
- Characteristics and assessment of the article content
- The validity of the conclusions
- Comments on the presentation and format of the article material
- A conclusion on the possibility of publishing the presented material.
A peer-reviewed study is written in free form. It evaluates the theoretical or applied significance of the research, the personal contribution of the author of the article to solving the problem under consideration, the scientific nature of the material presented, the reliability and validity of the conclusions, the logic and accessibility of the presentation, and mastery of the scientific style.