Prepare manuscript files for double-anonymous peer review
Prepare a journal-specific anonymous manuscript package, check author details across files and keep a complete master with a clear restoration record.
About 7 min read · Allow extra time for the practical checks
Start with the target journal’s author instructions, preserve a complete master manuscript, and make a separate review copy using those instructions. Check the whole submission package, including supplementary files and the PDF supplied to reviewers. Removing names from the first page is only one part of the task.
This guide concerns preparing files for a journal that requires double-anonymous review. It does not guarantee that nobody can infer authorship from the research. Confirm the review model when you check a journal’s scope and submission requirements, before preparing the upload files.
Record what this journal asks you to submit
Write a short file plan from the journal’s current instructions: what reviewers receive, where author details belong, and how identifying statements should be handled. Use the journal’s actual file labels. A separate title page, an anonymous manuscript and a complete non-anonymous manuscript are not interchangeable names for the same upload.
Taylor & Francis’s guidance describes preparing complete and anonymous manuscript copies. Cambridge’s guidance generally places important identifying details in a separate title-page file and directs authors to the chosen journal’s instructions. These are publisher-specific starting points, not a universal upload recipe.
Keep a dated note of the instructions you followed. If the submission form asks for something that appears to conflict with them, ask the editorial office a precise question about that file or field. Do not solve the conflict by silently omitting required information.
Preserve the master and track review-copy changes
Work on a saved copy. Taylor & Francis warns that removing identifying document information can be irreversible. Keep the complete master available for later production and for checking what you changed.
Use a small restoration record with three columns: location, change made for review, and complete wording retained in the master. That record is your working aid; it is not automatically another submission attachment.
Suppose a paragraph contains an institution name that the journal requires you to mask. Record that location and the permitted replacement. Do not rewrite the study setting as a different place or remove methodological detail simply because it seems identifying. Where masking would make the work unclear, get instructions about how to present it.
Audit the package, not just the first page
The following exercise is wholly fictional. The journal’s stated instructions are assumed for the example; they are not rules for your submission. The file names and institutional wording are invented.
| File or location | Problem found in the fictional package | Action to check against the journal’s instructions |
|---|---|---|
| review-copy.docx, running header | Author surname remains after names were removed from page one | Remove the identifying header from the review copy and retain the complete master |
| title-page.docx | Affiliation is absent because the writer removed it from every file | Restore the verified affiliation in the file designated for author details |
| figure-2.pdf | A laboratory name appears inside the figure | Prepare a permitted review version and keep the original figure separately |
| response-to-reviewers.docx | Signature includes the author’s name | Check the response file as part of the review package, not just the revised article |
| Submission preview | The wrong manuscript version was selected for reviewers | Correct the file selection and inspect the regenerated preview before submitting |
Treat each row as a separate decision. Fixing the header does not check the figure; uploading the right title page does not establish which manuscript reviewers receive. Add an owner and a checked/not-yet-checked note when co-authors divide this work.
Cambridge explicitly includes supplementary material and figures in its anonymisation guidance, and asks authors to check revised response files. Its advice also retains self-references while using third-person wording. Do not automatically delete every citation to your own work: follow the journal’s specific treatment and keep the references usable for review.
Revise a self-reference without changing the research claim
A first-person reference to earlier work needs a different decision from an author name on a title page. Cambridge’s guidance says to use third-person wording for an author’s previous research while keeping those references available for reviewers to check. Apply this approach only where it fits the target journal’s instructions.
Consider this wholly fictional passage. The names, year, earlier study and current project are invented; the citation is a teaching example, not a real publication:
In our earlier study, we grouped service requests by channel (Alvarez & Chen, 2024). In the current study, we apply those groups to a new set of requests.
Assume that Alvarez and Chen wrote both studies and that the fictional journal requires ordinary, unredacted references with third-person descriptions of earlier work. A review-copy revision could read:
Alvarez and Chen (2024) grouped service requests by channel. In the current study, we apply those groups to a new set of requests.
The revision removes the explicit link between “our earlier study” and the named authors. It retains what the earlier study did, which study supplied the grouping, and how the current study uses it. The word “we” in the second sentence describes the current work; this example does not turn the prior-work instruction into a ban on all first-person writing.
Compare two tempting edits. Deleting the citation would leave the borrowed grouping without its source. Changing “grouped” to “validated” would introduce a research claim that the original passage did not make. Neither change is needed to make the earlier-work sentence third person. Changing the year or substituting somebody else’s name would also make the citation inaccurate.
Keep a decision record alongside the complete master:
| Location | Review-copy decision in this fictional case | Check before final submission |
|---|---|---|
| Background paragraph 2 | Describe the earlier study in third person | The activity and citation still match the master |
| Reference list, Alvarez and Chen entry | Keep the complete reference under the assumed journal rule | The in-text citation still connects to that entry |
| Current-study sentence | Retain the description of applying the groups | The revision has not changed the method or claimed a new result |
A record can say “retained; no restoration needed.” Do not automatically reverse every review-copy edit after acceptance: a clearer third-person sentence may still be suitable. Restore material only where appropriate for the final version, using the complete master and the journal’s production instructions.
If the real journal instead specifies masked citations or another treatment, this worked wording is not your upload rule. Record that instruction and prepare the required version. Do not copy a solution from one publisher into another submission without checking.
Check document information and the exported view
Inspect identifying headers and footers as well as visible author details. Taylor & Francis also calls for checking identifiers stored in document files. Use the inspection facilities appropriate to your software on the saved review copy, then inspect the result. A tool reporting that it removed one category of information does not establish that you checked every attachment.
Read the final review PDF or submission preview if the system provides one. Search for the author names and institution terms you intended to remove, then look through the pages. A visual pass can catch a wrong cover page or figure label that a narrow text search misses. This is a suggested checking method, not a promise of complete anonymisation.
Keep disclosures and identifying details available in the location the journal requires. An anonymous review copy is not a reason to conceal information from editors or invent replacement facts. For uncertain handling of an ethics, funding or repository statement, ask about that statement rather than applying a generic deletion rule.
Finish with a file-by-file handover
Before submission, compare the file list with your plan. Confirm the version, intended audience and completed checks for each file. Save the submitted copies and the restoration record so that a later revision starts from a known package.
When a revision arrives, repeat the package check. Newly inserted figures, author comments and the response to reviewer comments need attention alongside the revised manuscript. An earlier clean copy cannot establish that the next version is ready.
