I got the editior's report on my research paper that I sent to an academic journal earlier. The editor said that while the reviewers found positives in the paper, it is not ready for publication in this present form. And the editor said me to revise and resubmit it. Do you think that the paper will be published after my resubmission?

I also would like to seek your advice. One reviewer asked me to add an statistical analysis to the paper. But I dont think it is necessary. If I refuse to do so, will the reviewer say anything negative about my paper?

thx for your help!!!

Not necessarilly and probably yes.

if you can do the statistical analysis why not doing it? in your place i would try to address most of the reviewers comments in the best way possible as then your chances of having the paper published in the specific journal increase. another thing i would do is discuss my ideas on the comments with my supervisor. knowing your work he can give you better advice on how to go with addressing specific comments.

Generally you have to respond positively to all of the reviewers comments - sometimes they want a change that totally alters the thrust of your article. Then it depends on the editor.
Plenty of articles don't even get to the revise and resubmit threshold, so you should persevere.

When you undertake revisions, you'll need to prepare a second document that provides an outline of what revisions you've included, and what revisions you've decided not to include, or have included as a secondary footnote/endnote.

Respond positively to the comments and try to incorporate around 80% of the reviewers' feedback. You might feel that a statistical analysis is not relevant, but it might actually strengthen your argument. The point of reviewers are to help you see areas that can be strengthened for a solid piece of work.

There is never a guarantee that your paper will be published after a revise and resubmit. Even papers that might be accepted pending revision can later be rejected should those revision not provide an adequate piece of work.

thanks very much for your replies. for the statistical analysis, should I discuss it with the journal editor? coz I know the editor is an expert in my field and I found that some papers that adopted the same methodology as mine in my paper do not include statistical analyses, which is why I think the statistical analysis is not necessay in my paper.

hi dotdottung
yes I think it won't hurt discussing it with the editor. I'm thinking what are Editors for and what do they do exactly?

but I guess it would be a good idea to also find someone else (other than the Editor) to discuss the statistical analysis?

love satchi