Reporting standards for Systematic Evidence Syntheses
ROSES is a collaborative initiative with the aim of improving the standards of reporting in evidence syntheses. At the core of ROSES is a set of detailed state-of-the art forms for ensuring evidence syntheses report their methods to the highest possible standards.
The ROSES initiative is relevant for anyone conducting or reviewing a systematic review or systematic map. ROSES forms will help review authors to ensure that all relevant methodological information is reported in their review, and will help editors and peer-reviewers to critique the reliability and validity of a review.
ROSES was introduced to the evidence synthesis community by Neal Haddaway, Biljana Macura, Paul Whaley and Andrew Pullin in their article in Environmental Evidence in early 2018 (Haddaway et al. 2018).
CEE now considers it mandatory for all submitting authors of systematic review and map protocols and reports to complete the relevant ROSES checklist as part of their submission to demonstrate that they have included all relevant methodological details in their documents. The ROSES checklist should be uploaded along with the submitted manuscript as a supplementary file. Failure to do so could result in your manuscript being returned before review. Completion of the ROSES forms does not require a considerable time commitment, but if done early, could save considerable resources by avoiding your manuscript being bounced by editorial staff prior to peer-review.
CEE encourages authors to read ROSES checklists for reviews and maps as soon as they begin a new project to facilitate completion of the forms at the submission stage. The information and support in the ROSES forms could also make the job of conducting a review and drafting the protocol and report documents much easier.
Authors are encouraged to check the ROSES website to ensure they are using the most up-to-date version of the ROSES forms.
Below are direct links to information about ROSES and ROSES forms for all CEE review authors.
ROSES for systematic map protocols
ROSES for systematic map reports
ROSES for systematic review protocols
ROSES for systematic review reports
ROSES template for flow diagram of review activities
Haddaway et al. 2018 ROSES RepOrting standards for Systematic Evidence Syntheses: pro forma, flow-diagram and descriptive summary of the plan and conduct of environmental systematic reviews and systematic maps. Environmental Evidence