Re-open review queue default tab

Question

When a question comes up in the re-open queue because it was edited, the default is to show the side-by-side comparison of the pre- and post- edit. There is another 'tab' available that will show the question as it appears after the edit. The view highlighting the changes is fine, and probably what I want to look at first, but there is a key piece of information missing, which is why the question was closed in the first place. This substantially increases the required effort to review the question, since I first need to try to assess why the question is closed by either skimming it or switching tabs to see the close reason and comments, then go on to assess whether the edit makes enough difference to warrant re-opening.

To those who may protest "but you should spend enough time to thoroughly assess the question no matter what", I assure you that I do give each question I review a fair assessment, however some reviews would be much speeded along if I started off knowing why the question was closed in the first place. Particularly for edits that simply add a paragraph to the end of the question (about half the questions I see in re-open, I'd estimate), it's usually straightforward to see whether the new paragraph makes the question more on-topic, or more clear, or narrower, but if I conclude that the edit makes the question clearer then realize the question is a duplicate, it's just frustrating.

So, would it be possible to add the close reason somewhere on the default view of the re-open queue? For instance, there is a banner that says something like "this question was edited after it was closed, should it be re-opened?"; that could read "this question was edited after it was closed for being off-topic (homework/engineering/non-mainstream)/too broad/duplicate/etc."

If this is better suited to mother-meta could migrate it there, but as close-reasons are on a per-site basis, presumably this needs some consideration on a per-site basis as well.

Answer 1

Quite frankly, it shouldn't matter what the close reason was (unless it was closed as a duplicate, in which case that information is visible on the default page). No matter why it was closed, when you review a question for reopen, you should read through the post and assess whether or not you think the question is suitable to be open on our site based on its current state and nothing more. Understandably, it is sometimes necessary to get input from others or to figure out if the new version of the question has addressed the problems that originally had it closed, but checking things like this should be done only after you have assessed it yourself and decided it is a good fit (if you think it should be closed, no point to check why it was closed already).

Displaying the close reason right away can add a bias to a reviewer's decision. We want reviewers to review fairly and objectively. To that end, it makes more sense for the original close reason to not be immediately apparent. You may say that you aren't influenced by how others voted or by the original reason for closure, and perhaps that's true; however, some reviewers are and by hiding the close reason, we allow those reviewers to pass judgement without that being a possible source of bias. If you want, you can click a button and check for yourself. This gives everyone the option to go without knowing.

I'm not ashamed to admit that while I usually address each reopen vote fairly, there have been a few times where I realized I was letting the close reason affect my judgement and was being unfairly harsh or lenient because of it. Because that's always a possibility, I now always make sure to judge a question's content before looking at the close reason, just to ensure that cannot ever be a source of bias in my decision.

The point is (with the exception of duplicates, which usually shouldn't be changed significantly enough to warrant reopening), the close reason should be hidden to allow reviewers to choose whether or not they want to know it before deciding if a question should be closed or not. Putting the close reason in the top banner effectively removes the option of not seeing it.