Research articles authored by women spend significantly more time under review than papers authored by men, according to a new study from scholars at the University of Nevada, Reno.
In an examination of over 7.75 million articles published in biomedical and life sciences journals, the authors found that women-authored papers spend 7.4 percent to 14.6 percent longer (7 to 15 days) under review than male-authored papers. This finding held true for papers with women first authors, women corresponding authors, and all-women teams. Additionally, the gender gap holds even after controlling for a number of factors, including specific journal, date of publication, number of pages, and number of co-authors.
According to the research team, their findings suggest that for every 50 papers published by a woman, she will have spent on average 350-750 days longer than her male peers waiting for editorial decisions and/or revising her manuscripts
“Women are underrepresented in academia, especially in STEM fields and senior positions, which seems to be due to women having to face more obstacles than their male peers throughout their careers,” said lead author David Alvarez-Ponce, associate professor of biology at the University of Nevada, Reno. “Our analyses contribute to documenting one of these obstacles.”
While the longer review period for women-authored articles was found in most biomedical fields, there were several disciplines in which the trend was reversed, including biology and women’s health.
“This gives us hope that the gender gap in review times can be reduced in the future,” said Dr. Alvarez-Ponce. “We can learn from those fields in which female researchers don’t experience longer review times and try to export the good aspects of their academic culture to other fields.”