The email arrives. Major revisions. Your heart sinks, and then you feel slightly better because you haven’t been rejected. The editor thinks there’s a paper in there. And the reviewers have taken the time to say what they think you need to do to get the paper to publishable. That’s win – you get to have another go.

So what do you do? Well, there’s temptation – and some very poor advice out there – to just tinker. Do as little as possible. Make some surface changes and then send it back. So you add a sentence to the methods section about how participants were recruited. You pop a few more citations into the literatures. You put a couple of extra quotations into the results. Then you write a response letter that says “we have added”. Then you press submit and wait.

And quite often the paper comes back again. Major revisions, round two. Or worse still, it’s a reject. Why does this happen? Well it’s because the reviewers asked for something bigger than you gave them. Tinkering around the edges of the existing paper left the problems the reviewers identified pretty much where they were.

Major revisions are usually about the basic health of the paper, the things a reader needs to be able to trust before they’ll go along with what you say. The problem generally sits in one or more of five places – the methods, the literatures, the theory, the evidence for the argument, or the way the argument is staged. A reviewer who asks for major revisions in any, some or all of these areas is telling you that something big needs attention. They want you to take their suggestions seriously and rethink. And that might well mean reimagining what the paper is and how it goes.

Let’s take each of these five in turn.

First, literatures. A reviewer says you’ve missed some important work, or that the literature section is a list of who said what, or that the paper doesn’t speak to the debates in this journal. The tinkering response is to drop the references the reviewers suggested into a sentence somewhere and move on. But reviewers who point to literatures are usually worried about your contribution. They can’t see what your paper adds to what’s already known, because the literature section hasn’t been used to set that up. So the major revisions rethink starts with reading the texts that they suggest. You may find these change your argument. Or they might put your paper into a different conversation from the one you thought you were in. This means that you can then rework the literature section so that it builds the problem your paper addresses and makes a space for what you have to say. That may mean cutting a lot of what’s there now. And yes, sometimes the reviewer is suggesting their own work. That’s not automatically bad. Check the recommendations out. They may well be useful.

Next, methods. A reviewer says the methods section is inadequate. They want to know more about how participants were chosen, how data were generated and how the analysis was done. The tinkering response is to add a paragraph of procedural detail. But a reviewer who asks about methods is usually asking a bigger question. Can I trust these results? Do the methods support the claims? So the rethink starts by reading the paper from the reviewer’s point of view. Take each claim in the results and ask what in the writing about the research design lets you make it. You might find the methods account is fine but the claims have got ahead of it. You might find you did something analytically that never made it onto the page and now needs a proper explanation. Or you might realise the paper implies a level of claim that the design doesn’t allow. Or you just need to add more information. Once you’ve seen the issue, your revision may well include what you write about your claims as well as the methods section.

Then theory. A common reviewer comment is that the theory is decorative, or bolted on. You’ve set out a framework in the early pages and then it disappears. The results are reported without reference to the theory, and it pops up again right at the very end in a paragraph saying the results confirm what so and so said. The tinkering response is to add more so and so to the theory section, or a few more mentions of so and so’s theory in the discussion. That won’t fix it. Theory has to do some work in the analysis. So the major revisions rethinking response means asking what the theory lets you see in your data that you couldn’t see without it. If the honest answer is not much, you might need a different theory. Or you might need fewer concepts, used more carefully. Sometimes it means going back and re-analysing your data with the theory in hand. Of course, that’s a lot of work. It is also the work the reviewer asked for.

Then evidence. Reviewers often say the argument isn’t sufficiently supported, that the claims outrun the evidence. The tinkering response is to add more quotations. But more data doesn’t help if the data aren’t doing the job they have to. The major revisions rethink means looking hard at the relationship between each claim and the evidence offered for it. Does the quotation actually show what you say it shows? Have you explained how you read it? Are you relying on one striking participant to carry a claim about everyone? You may need more evidence. Or you may need less data, but stuff that is better chosen and better explained. And you may need to make smaller claims, ones that you can actually back up.

And staging. This is probably the hardest thing to see in your own work. A reviewer says the argument is unclear, or only emerges in the discussion, or that the paper reads like a project report. What they’re often saying is that the stuff you’re talking about is in the wrong order. Or the interesting point is buried on page eighteen. The introduction promises one paper and you’ve delivered another. The tinkering response is to add a sentence to the introduction announcing the argument. The major revisions rethink is to work out what the argument actually is now, after the reviews, and then restage the paper around it. That might mean a new introduction, a differently framed literature section, results reordered so they build logically on one another, and a discussion that does much more than repeat the results. And yes. This can feel like writing a new paper. Sometimes that’s what’s required

So how do you go about all of this?

Most people find it’s a good idea to read the reviews and then put them away for a few days. Theat’s because the first reading is always the defensive one. After a bit of time, you can read the reviews again and try to work out what the reviewers are actually worried about . What sits behind their specific comment?. Two reviewers asking for quite different things can be pointing at the same problem.

Then, before you touch the paper, write a revision plan. Lots of people make a table with each comment and a planned response. That’s very useful for the response letter later. But a table can push you towards answering comments one at a time, and that’s exactly how tinkering happens. So I’d start with a short paragraph, written just for yourself and any co-authors, that says what the revised paper is going to argue and how it will get there. This is the reimagined paper. This is not tinkering. One you have that reimagined paragraph you can check each planned change against it.

If you’re writing with others, talk together before anyone starts editing. A rethink needs agreement about direction. Otherwise everyone tinkers with their own bit and the paper ends up in much the same place.

And don’t expect major revisions to necessarily be quick. Editors usually allow a few months for major revisions for a reason. If you need longer, ask. Most editors would rather have a thoroughly revised paper a bit late than a superficially tinkered with one, on time.

Then write the response letter. It helps to start with a short overview that says what you understood the main concerns to be and how you’ve rethought the paper in response. Then go comment by comment. That way reviewers can see you’ve engaged with the substance of what they said. If you disagree with a suggestion, say so and explain why. A considered disagreement is fine. Reviewers and Editors are mostly reasonable people, and they can be persuaded.

One last thing. Sometimes the rethink tells you the reviewers want a paper you don’t want to write, or that the paper really belongs in a different journal. So you decide not to do the major revision. You decide to withdraw the paper and put it elsewhere. That’s a legitimate decision. It’s a better decision when you’ve done the rethinking first.

So when that major revisions email arrives, take the moment to enjoy not being rejected. Then resist the urge to tinker. The reviewers have given you a chance to make the paper better than the one you sent in. Take it.

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