Position on peer reviewing

1. General position
1. The present position defines the procedure and rules for writing peer reviews, and procedure for decision-making on publication of manuscripts which come to the Editorial Board of journal «Zhurnal Srednevolzhskogo Matematicheskogo Obshchestva» (hereinafter - the Journal).
2. Peer review is carried out in order to select the most actual and original scientific materials which are of interest to the world scientific community.
3. Manuscripts corresponding to the subject of the Journal and satisfying all the rules for accepting manuscripts adopted in Journal are accepted for peer review.
4. The Edition peer reviews all materials received by the editorial board that correspond to its subject matter, with the aim of their expert evaluation. All submitted to the journal manuscripts undergo the procedure of one-sided blind peer review. Peer Reviewers are provided for expertise of the manuscript with information about the authors. Information about the peer reviewers (name, position, place of work, contacts) are not communicated to the author.
5. All reviewers are recognized experts in the subject of the peer-reviewed materials and have publications on the subject of the peer-reviewed article over the past 3 years. Reviews are stored in the publishing house and in the editorial office of the publication for 5 years.
6. The peer reviewer should not be a co-author of peer-reviewed work, as well as an employee from a structural department, where he works, is in graduate school or doctoral studies. He also should not maintain scientific cooperation with the author at the moment on the topic of the article.
7. Manuscripts are reviewed on a voluntary and free basis. Peer Reviewers are notified that the manuscripts sent to them are the intellectual property of the authors and relate to information not subject to disclosure.
8. Payment from authors for peer reviewing articles is not charged.
9. The maximum review period in each individual case is set individually, and usually is about 3 months from the moment of receipt of the article by the journal.
10. The editorial board of the publication sends copies of reviews or a reasoned refusal to the authors of the submitted materials, and also undertakes to send copies of reviews to the Ministry of Education and Science of the Russian Federation upon receipt of a corresponding request by the editorial office of the publication.
11. Reviews are stored in the publishing house and in the editorial office of the publication for 5 years.
2. Review contents
1. The review should contain a highly qualified and reasonable analysis of the manuscript material and give it an objective assessment. The comments and suggestions of the reviewer should be reasoned.
2. The review may be prepared in free form with the user-optionally covering the following provisions:
   – the title of the manuscript;
   – name of authors;
   – conformity of the manuscript to the Journal;
   – clarity of statement of scientific problems;
   – relevance of a scientific problem;
   – scientific novelty, originality and scientific (practical) significance of research;
   – the correctness of application of theoretical and methodological basis of the study;
   – the validity of findings;
   – clarity, informative title of the article;
   – the quality of annotations (completeness and brevity reflect the content of the manuscript);
   – the correct choice of keywords;
   – completeness and representativeness of the registration of the bibliographic list;
   – general assessment and reviewer`s comments (if any).
3. In the final part of the peer-review «Conclusion of a recommendation for publication or rejection» should contain one of the following recommendations:
   1) the reviewer recommends to accept the article for publication without revision;
   2) the reviewer recommends the article for publication, subject to comments (without re-review);
   3) the reviewer recommends the author to remove comments and send the article for re-review;
   4) the reviewer recommends reject an article.
3. The procedure for peer review and making a decision on publication
1. The decision on the choice of peer reviewers for the expertise of the manuscript is made by the editor-in-chief or Deputy editor-in-chief. Two peer reviewers are assigned to expertise each manuscript.
2. Communication between the peer-review and the author (s) of the manuscript is carried out through the editorial office of the journal.
3. The Editorial Board sends the manuscript of the article and the recommended peer review form in electronic form to the designated peer reviewers, as well as notifies them that the signed and certified review must be sent in electronic form to the address of the Editorial Board at the appointed time.
4. If the peer review contains recommendations for correcting and finalizing the manuscript, then the editorial board sends the author the text of the review with a proposal to take them into account when preparing a new version of the manuscript or to provide a reasoned answer to comments.
5. The author must state all the changes made in the manuscript to eliminate comments in a separate letter and send it to the editorial office of the journal along with the corrected manuscript. If the author does not agree with any comment, he must provide a reasoned answer to the comment and state it in the attached letter.
6. All correspondence between the peer reviewer(s) and the author is forwarded to the editorial board of the journal.
7. The decision to publish or to send for additional review of the manuscript is made at a meeting of the editorial board on the formation of the next issue of the journal.
8. If a positive decision is made, the editorial office of the journal informs the author about the admission of the material without revision to publication, indicating the issue (number) of the journal.
9. If the peer reviewer and the author have different points of view on a comment, the editorial board may send the manuscript for additional peer-review. The final decision on the publication of the manuscript is made by the editorial board of the journal.
10. A manuscript not recommended for publication by a decision of the editorial board is not accepted for re-consideration. A refusal to publish is sent to the author by e-mail.