The main difference between “registered reports” and “results-free peer reviews” is timing of data analysis.  With registered reports, plans are registered and reviewed before data are collected and analyzed.  With results-free peer reviews, everything is completed, but the reviewers are blinded to the results.  In this blog post, Saloni Krishnan discusses his experience with results-free reviewing and weighs the pros and cons versus registered reports:

“I just had my first pre-registered and results-free peer review paper published at BMC Psychology (Krishnan, Watkins, & Bishop, 2017, BMC Psychology).  There’s more about why the journal is trying this format here. It’s a brave new world of open science out there, and I thought it’s worth trying to have some discussion about how this process differs from a standard submission, and whether it’s worth trying. I’ve consequently summarised my experience of this format, and a few takeaways for future pre-registered studies.”

To read more, click here.

SALONI KRISHNAN