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DecentPeeR: A Self-Incentivised & Inclusive Decentralized Peer Review System

Johannes Gruendler, Darya Melnyk, Arash Pourdamghani, Stefan Schmid

TL;DR

It is shown that the DecentPeeR system, DecentPeeR, incentivizes reviewers to behave according to the rules, i.e., it has a unique Nash equilibrium in which virtuous behavior is rewarded.

Abstract

Peer review, as a widely used practice to ensure the quality and integrity of publications, lacks a well-defined and common mechanism to self-incentivize virtuous behavior across all the conferences and journals. This is because information about reviewer efforts and author feedback typically remains local to a single venue, while the same group of authors and reviewers participate in the publication process across many venues. Previous attempts to incentivize the reviewing process assume that the quality of reviews and papers authored correlate for the same person, or they assume that the reviewers can receive physical rewards for their work. In this paper, we aim to keep track of reviewing and authoring efforts by users (who review and author) across different venues while ensuring self-incentivization. We show that our system, DecentPeeR, incentivizes reviewers to behave according to the rules, i.e., it has a unique Nash equilibrium in which virtuous behavior is rewarded.

DecentPeeR: A Self-Incentivised & Inclusive Decentralized Peer Review System

TL;DR

It is shown that the DecentPeeR system, DecentPeeR, incentivizes reviewers to behave according to the rules, i.e., it has a unique Nash equilibrium in which virtuous behavior is rewarded.

Abstract

Peer review, as a widely used practice to ensure the quality and integrity of publications, lacks a well-defined and common mechanism to self-incentivize virtuous behavior across all the conferences and journals. This is because information about reviewer efforts and author feedback typically remains local to a single venue, while the same group of authors and reviewers participate in the publication process across many venues. Previous attempts to incentivize the reviewing process assume that the quality of reviews and papers authored correlate for the same person, or they assume that the reviewers can receive physical rewards for their work. In this paper, we aim to keep track of reviewing and authoring efforts by users (who review and author) across different venues while ensuring self-incentivization. We show that our system, DecentPeeR, incentivizes reviewers to behave according to the rules, i.e., it has a unique Nash equilibrium in which virtuous behavior is rewarded.

Paper Structure

This paper contains 18 sections, 5 theorems, 30 equations, 3 figures, 3 tables.

Table of Contents

  1. Introduction
  2. Design Goals
  3. Contribution
  4. Related Work
  5. System Design
  6. System Setup
  7. Blockchain-Based Implementation
  8. Conference Processes
  9. Details of Reputation Score Update
  10. Peer Review Game
  11. Analysis
  12. Self-incentivization
  13. Inclusivity
  14. Recovery
  15. Fairness
  16. ...and 3 more sections

Key Result

Theorem 1

Let $\alpha<\frac{1}{6}$. The outcome $(H,H)$ is the unique pure Nash equilibrium of the peer review game.

Figures (3)

  • Figure 1: DecentPeeR processes and their division into an off/on-chain as well as venue-specific/cross-venue.
  • Figure 2: Change in the user score over time, considering the different probability of faulty behavior (F.P.). Each line indicates a different fault probability of a user.
  • Figure 3: This figure shows clustering probability for a range of committee sizes. The blue line shows how probability evolves, and the red line is the upper bound of probability.

Theorems & Definitions (13)

  • Definition 1: Unified Author & Unified Reviewer
  • Definition 2: Honest Behavior & Faulty Behavior
  • Definition 3: Nash equilibrium
  • Theorem 1
  • Lemma 1
  • proof
  • proof : Proof of Theorem \ref{['Theorem 1']}
  • Theorem 2
  • proof
  • Lemma 2
  • ...and 3 more