Commenting and editing are sometimes assumed to help writers hone their skills and improve their writing, but there may be more to the story than editors and authors expect.

Past research has shown that peer editing can strengthen writing and may even help authors refine their writing abilities. However, new findings may indicate that it’s not as cut-and-dry as many may think; the type of peer editing applied has potential to improve or impair writing.

THE RESEARCH

In the study “Online Peer Editing: Effects of Comments and Edits on Academic Writing Skills,” four researchers affiliated with universities across the globe, Han Zhang, Galina Shulgina, Mik Fanguy, and Jamie Costley, studied a group of 76 graduate students working on journal articles. The students peer-reviewed each other’s work in pairs, and the research team analyzed the types of review provided (comments or edits) and how effective each type was for the authors.

For the purpose of the study, commenting was defined as “leaving suggestions to identify the strengths and weaknesses of their peers,” while editing referred to “inserting and/or deleting text written by other students” (Zhang et al. 2022, 2). While both methods of review are intended to help students improve their writing, the study’s data indicated that the comments helped the writers, while the edits hindered them. 

Comments allow authors to “critically review and revise their writing from the audience’s perspective, thereby developing their independent thinking skills and self-directed learning.”

Zhang et al. (2022)

Comments correlated positively with higher writing scores. Current and past research suggests that comments are helpful because they allow students to “critically review and revise their writing from the audience’s perspective, thereby developing their independent thinking skills and self-directed learning” (Zhang et al. 2022, 2). Writers can develop critical thinking skills as they consider whether they agree with the comment. They can also choose how to adjust their writing based on how the comment would impact the overall quality of their work.

Edits, on the other hand, correlated with lower writing scores, possibly due to the lower level of cognition and commitment involved in authors’ accepting or rejecting edits. Alternatively, when peer editors are tasked with editing a lower-quality paper, they may be unable to understand the paper well enough to provide substantive comments. Consequently, the editors address numerous sentence-level issues, and the authors may become overwhelmed or upset by the volume of the edits.

THE IMPLICATIONS

The data indicates that students write better papers when they receive more comments and fewer edits. These findings could influence how editors are taught their craft; emphasizing the importance of communicating with the author, not just fixing their work, can help editors to build relationships of trust with their authors.

The researchers’ findings consider not just the logical, but also the emotional side of improving writing through review. When authors are given a chance to understand their audience’s perspectives through comments, they are enabled to interact with those ideas and adapt accordingly. Editors who take time to articulate their thoughts through comments are also more likely to gain an author’s trust. However, when authors receive edits without comments, they may feel overly criticized, misunderstand the purpose of the edits or the edits themselves, or thoughtlessly accept the changes—all of which could contribute to a lower overall quality of work.

As the researchers describe, “Edits often only highlight mistakes, which makes students perceive them as direct criticism, which may be harmful for subsequent improvement of students’ writing, lower their sense of psychological ownership, or lead to conflict” (Zhang et al. 2022, 2). Careful use of edits and generous use of comments may contribute to building better writing and better writers, which is, after all, one of the primary goals of editors.

To find out more about peer review styles and implications, read the full article:

Zhang, Han, Galina Shulgina, Mik Fanguy, and Jamie Costley. 2022. “Online Peer Editing: Effects of Comments and Edits on Academic Writing Skills.” Heliyon 8 (7). https://doi.org/10.1016/j.heliyon.2022.e09822.

—June Cazier, Editing Research

FEATURE IMAGE BY RON LACH

Find more research

Read more about the importance of communication between editors and authors in Elena Shvidko’s (2015) article: “Beyond ‘Giver-Receiver’ Relationships: Facilitating an Interactive Revision Process.” Journal of Response to Writing 1 (2). https://scholarsarchive.byu.edu/journalrw/vol1/iss2/4. 

Take a look at Melissa M. Nelson and Christian D. Schunn’s (2008) article about the most effective forms of feedback: “The Nature of Feedback: How Different Types of Peer Feedback Affect Writing Performance.” Instructional Science 37 (4): 375–401. https://doi.org/10.1007/s11251-008-9053-x.