How to respond to reviewer comments

So you have to respond to reviewer comments? Welcome to academia! Below I provide some suggestions has to how to approach this.


  1. Feel free to use this template

  2. If an Associate Editor or Editor provide comments, strongly recommend to do your very best to implement these. Often these are based on the Editor's own review of your paper. The editorial team (often the Editor-in-Chief alone) makes a decision on the balance of the reviews and their own assessment -- not individual reviewers.

  3. Try your best to implement the suggestions as best as you can: even if comments seem 'absurd' or 'mean' to you, suggest try to take on the feedback and implement it in some way. Reviewers are of course not always right, but more often than not you'll find there is learning that can be gained from implementing the comments.

  4. If you get annoyed when reading the comments, suggest to draft your response, leave it for a while, and then come back to it later. The "art of the unsent angry letter" is relevant here :-)

  5. Respond to ALL comments made by the reviewer, even if they are the positive or neutral ones where they summarise your paper or say what has been done well. [Reason = helps to ensure the reviewer feels they have been 'heard']

  6. Where you cannot implement the change or disagree with some suggestion and rebut it, suggest to start with something like "We agree this is an important issue. When...." [Reason = start by agreeing with the reviewer, as opposed to contradicting them, it'll go down better]

  7. When drafting reviewer responses, suggest to keep these things in mind:

      • ALWAYS thank the reviewer at the start for their feedback and time and be as nice as possible even if you are feeling frustrated [Reason = being polite goes a long way]

      • Where you take on the feedback and make change, consider starting with "In line with the reviewer's suggestion, ..." OR "Thank-you for this suggestion, we have implemented it on page ..... " [Reason = if make it clear to the reviewer that you took on their feedback, it is easier for them to tick this off]

      • When you update or add text in the manuscript, add this to the response in inverted commas so it is clear what the change is and the reviewer doesn't need to go to the manuscript to search for it [Reason = saves the reviewer time and therefore better for you]

      • State where (e.g. line numbers or page number and paragraph number or section sub-heading) changes have been made. [Reason = saves the reviewer time and increases their confidence that the change actually has been implemented]

  8. Suggest to have the reviewer comment starting with "Reviewer: " and your response starting with "Author response: ". The reason for this is that some journal portals require you to copy/paste the response into plain text. In this case, differences in formatting (colour etc) will not be retained.