Peer Review
The evaluation of scholarly work by independent experts in the field before it is accepted for publication.
Peer review is the process by which journals and conferences ask independent experts to evaluate a manuscript before publication. Reviewers assess the soundness of methods, the support for claims, and the contribution to the field, then recommend acceptance, revision, or rejection. Common variants include single-blind review, where reviewers know the authors, and double-blind review, where neither side is identified.
For a thesis writer, peer review is a first filter on source quality: a peer-reviewed article has survived expert scrutiny that a blog post or press release has not. It is not a guarantee, since flawed work does pass review, so you must still appraise methods yourself. Knowing how review works also prepares you for your own trajectory, because examiner reports and journal revisions follow the same logic of expert critique and response.
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