[turnersr]

In your review, did you suggest the definition and explanation that they used? In this situation, would have an acknowledgment at the end have been enough? In my mind, it seems like you all had a conversation and the authors took up your suggestions as the reviewer.

[atrettel]

No, I did not suggest the definition and explanation as content for them to use. I was trying to explain a concept that they discussed incorrectly multiple times in the paper. It is an advanced concept that might not even appear in graduate-level courses on the subject, so I can understand why they did not understand it fully. That said, I did not give them permission to copy my words there. If there are any particular changes I want the authors to do I put them in quotes. This wasn't in quotes. It was an explanation for their own benefit so that they can correct the mistakes in the paper (by re-writing it).

Once I re-read the submission I wanted to reject it immediately, but I realized that I should get a second opinion first. So I contacted the editors, who agreed that it was blatant plagiarism. Hence, they rejected the paper once I recommended rejection in my second review. So this wasn't just a conversation where I made some suggestions and the authors used them. Even the editors thought it was plagiarism once they looked at it.

An acknowledgment would be impossible because the review was single-blind. The reviewers knew the identities of the authors but not the other way around. What the authors should have done was just re-phrase where they used the term in the paper. They didn't even need to copy my explanation, to be frank. The paper would worked fine without the paragraph they copied. If they just re-phrased the relevant parts no other changes would have been needed and this whole thing could have been avoided.

[wombatmobile]

> What the authors should have done was ...

In the absence of an explicit directive or request from you, given that the authors are from a different culture, how do you expect them to know what was required by them?

I don't mean to be snarky or accusative. Your comment was thoughtful, articulate and detailed, which tells me you are a sophisticated communicator.

[atrettel]

It's a fair question. They were foreigners submitting to an American journal, so there is always the possibility for some sort of cultural misunderstanding in addition to any language difficulties. Nonetheless, the journal's submission process provides authors with a page listing ethical standards they have to follow, and it says that plagiarism of any form is not allowed. In fact, this journal's particular set of standards even mentions that authors cannot copy anything obtained during the peer review process without the "explicit permission" of the reviewer. So I just expect them to follow the rules that they were told about when they submitted the paper.

[chaps]

So, I understand how it's plagiarism, but I'm still not following why your suggestion, with the goal of helping them get their paper accepted, wouldn't be acceptable to copy/paste. It was to them and only to them, so it's not like it's a piece of substantial work from another team. Seems to be an extreme form of following the letter of the rule, and not the spirit of the rule. But, I'm not an academic so I don't really understand this sort of lack of discretionary allowance..

[ganafagol]

I'm fully on board with fighting plagiarism down to that level.

But that said, I've often times wondered if this requirement of having to "rewrite in your own words" may do a lot of harm too. It obfuscates that things that people are talking about are actually exactly the same, or make it fuzzy what the exact differences are.

In a particular academic CS area I've witnessed people reproduce again and again the essentially identical description of setting and assumptions, but in being afraid of plagiarism accusations, they over and over re-formulate things which made it nonobvious that things are the same as from other authors or even from their own earlier work.

[widforss]

They could just cite someone else with proper references.

[dan-robertson]

My understanding is that something like the following happened:

1. authors submit a paper with expository sections about (eg) some materials being flammable and others inflammable

2. reviewer tries to explain that they have incorrectly understood the meaning of the terms, explains the meaning carefully and maybe suggests the terms they might mean.

3. Authors copy in the explanation and maybe replace incorrect usages with weird tortured phrases

4. Rejection

Obviously this description reads a little bit silly and things were probably more nuanced in practice. I think I’m probably also being uncharitable towards the authors in the example.

[tremon]

3. Authors copy in the explanation verbatim

4. Rejection

5. Authors replace terms in verbatim copy with weird tortured phrases

6. Authors submit to other journals, get published

[peterkelly]

"If there are any particular changes I want the authors to do I put them in quotes. This wasn't in quotes." (atrettel, 2021)

This is a very subtle distinction and it sounds like being more explicit about it would have been a good idea.

[foldr]

Acknowledging anonymous reviewers is common in my (erstwhile) field. “An anonymous reviewer suggests the following definition of…” I have to say that it seems odd to me to regard this as plagiarism.

[a9h74j]

Based upon your description around plagiarism, I doubt a customary end-credit "to an anonymous reviewer" could have been enough.

[adaml_623]

Not 100% sure but I believe the word confidential implies that the review should only have been read by the editor(s) and not passed on to the authors.

[pottertheotter]

A review is the written feedback authors receive from the journal reviewer. The reviewer can recommend that the authors revise and resubmit, based on the review comments. Usually the review is not published with the final piece, which is what was meant by “confidential review”.