A topic in research methodology
Blind?
The use of the term blind means that people involved in peer review are working with manuscripts and/or referee reports without being told who wrote them.
There are three common modes of reviewing in research
In one mode the reviewers know who wrote the paper, and the authors are told who reviewers their paper. That is quite rare.
In single-blind reviewing, the reviewers know who wrote the paper, but their reports are provided to authors anonymously.
In double-blind reviewing the reviewers do not know (or at least, are not told, they may deduce this if the work is part of a well-known research programme that an authors has been working on for some time) who wrote the paper, and the authors are not told who reviewed the work.
Which is the best system?
There are advantages and disadvantages to each of these systems.
Anonymity is meant to avoid bias against/for certain authors (work is judged on its merits regardless of whose work it is). A downside here is that it is sometimes difficult for reviewers to judge plagiarism – this manuscript seems to copy the unacknowledged ideas of X, but then, it may be from X!
As the identify of reviewers is protected, they are assumed to be able to give an honest report without fear of consequences, but ther is also an argument that reviewers should be expected to stand by their reports and this will make them more careful and circumspect (especially when criticism of certain types of work or approaches might be seen by others in the community as a bias).
There are undoubtedly differences between fields. In some areas of work the community is so small that reviewers and authors recognise each other form their writing (in which case being explicit may be better than guessing at identifies). In some disciplines knowledge proceeds by criticism of ideas which may be impeded by anonymity – it may help an editor more if the author and referee are having an open dialogue through the review process.
Many research journals do use double-blind reviewing, and so require authors to 'blind' the manuscript (in effect prepare the manuscript so the reviewers are reading it 'blind' to who prepared it).
My introduction to educational research:
Taber, K. S. (2013). Classroom-based Research and Evidence-based Practice: An introduction (2nd ed.). London: Sage.
