A family of open access journals will reward its peer reviewers by paying them in ¡°tokens¡±?that can be redeemed as discounts towards publishing costs.

The move by PeerJ comes amid long-running debate about how to recognise the contribution of researchers at a key stage of the academic publishing process, which is typically unremunerated and is still often conducted on behalf of subscription, for-profit periodicals.

PeerJ, which publishes a series of open access journals, said that scholars would earn 10 tokens for each submission they review, equivalent to a $100 (?74) discount on an article processing charge.

Tokens will have no expiry date and can be ¡°stacked¡± to maximise discounts. Co-authors will be able to pool tokens and put them towards a single submission, the publisher said.

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¡°By fairly incentivising engagement and contribution we hope that more academics and researchers will sign up to review submissions made to our seven journals,¡± said Pete Binfield, PeerJ¡¯s publisher and co-founder. ¡°We know that our contributors¡¯ time is valuable, and we think they deserve to be rewarded for their contributions.¡±

Academic editors will also earn tokens for handling contributions. In addition, contributors will be able to transfer their tokens to other PeerJ users to help them with publication fees.

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A similar model was trialled in 2016 by Veruscript, a London-based publisher of science and humanities journals.

Meanwhile Publons, an online platform that allows academics to record and receive credit for their peer review activity, was acquired in 2017 by Clarivate Analytics.

chris.havergal@timeshighereducation.com