This paper develops a model of evolving standards for academic publishing. It is motivated by the increasing tendency of academic journals to require multiple revisions of articles and by changes in the content of articles. Papers are modeled as varying along two quality dimensions: q and r. The former represents the clarity and importance of a paper's main ideas and the latter its craftsmanship and polish. Observed trends are regarded as increases in r-quality. A static equilibrium model in which an arbitrary social norm determines how q and r are weighted is developed and used to discuss comparative statics explanations for increases in r. The paper then analyzes a learning model in which referees (who have a biased view of the importance of their own work) try to learn the social norm from observing how their own papers are treated and the decisions editors make on papers they referee. The model predicts that social norms will gradually but steadily evolve to increasingly emphasize r-quality.
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Paper provided by National Bureau of Economic Research, Inc in its series NBER Working Papers with number
7805.
Length: Date of creation: Jul 2000 Date of revision: Handle: RePEc:nbr:nberwo:7805
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Find related papers by JEL classification: A14 - General Economics and Teaching - - General Economics - - - Sociology of Economics D70 - Microeconomics - - Analysis of Collective Decision-Making - - - General
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