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On a slightly tangential note: how do you guys read research papers? Do you go through them word by word or you only skim them to get a general understanding?

On a slightly tangential note: how do you guys read research papers? Do you go through them word by word or you only skim them to get a general understanding? I try to do the former but the work seems so boring that I am hardly motivated to do this more.

MereInterest 8y ago
Most of the time, skimming through, picking out the parts that are different from others in the field. For physics: "Okay, this paper is from so and so, yup, same facility and equipment as the previous one. Theory section, same basic overview, skip to the end for what makes this experiment worthwhile? Anything interesting in their analysis, and how good are their statistics? Did they show the usual set of diagnostics plots for the type of analysis they did, and if not, what are they trying to downplay?"
rflrob 8y ago
For the most part, the way to read papers in biology is to go through the figures. When I was quickly trying to figure out if a project I was about to start up just got scooped (it did, and good for them for saving me the effort), I did it by glancing at figure 1, then reading the title of figure 1, then closely examining figure 1 while cross-referencing with the detailed caption. Then move on to 2, 3, etc. By figure 5, I had a hard time telling what was going on, so I found the part of the text that referenced it, and read it carefully. I've heard arguments that one should leave the abstract until the end, since it sometimes pushes a story harder than the data necessarily warrants, and so if you come to your own conclusion about what's going on in the paper, then check to make sure the authors claim what you feel is supported, you're less likely to be misled. Probably this makes sense for reviewing a paper, but for most things, I'd rather find out quickly if the paper is even relevant to what I'm working on.
- dekhn 8y ago
  I've found looking at figures and captions to be really misleading. I find that I have to read the methods section first to convince myself that the data collection was correct before I can trust any figures. You have to read the abstract. It's the intro and conclusion you can skip.
pmiller2 8y ago
In mathematics: Read the title and abstract. Then read the statements of the main theorems and corollaries (skip the lemmas and interstitial commentary at first). At each step, evaluate whether you want to continue or abandon the paper for whatever reason (not interesting, not relevant, whatever). Finally, if you made it this far, read the whole paper word for word with a pen and paper (or chalk + chalkboard) handy. For longer papers or books/theses (say, 20+ pages), do this whole process on each individual section/part/chapter that you want to consume. It also helps to have a reason to read the paper besides curiosity. I find things that are relevant to current work to be easier to get through than more peripheral sorts of things. Having a colleague to discuss things with also helps.
- sweezyjeezy 8y ago
  FWIW, I don't think this article really applies to areas like maths or computer science, where the main output is theorems or algorithms that can be verified line by line. It's more about empirical science where one is trying to prove/disprove hypotheses through rigorous experimentation.
  - pmiller2 8y ago
    No, I don’t think so, either. In math, there are excellent papers that cover .01% of what needs to be said about the subject, and ordinary or even bad papers that say much more. Provided there are no serious logical errors, the difference is simply how important is the question being answered. Edit: Although it may go without saying, all else being equal, a better paper is easier to read than a lesser one. But, really, content is king.
enriquto 8y ago
> how do you guys read research papers my phd advisor started by looking only at all the displayed formulas. If there was nothing interesting or new, he would not bother reading any sentence of the paper.
PeterisP 8y ago
It's worth to note that "reading papers" consists of two activities - actually reading a paper indenting to understand it, and skimming a large number of papers or abstracts to filter out which papers to actually read in detail - and it's the second part that seems to take the majority of time, at least for me.

MereInterest 8y ago

Most of the time, skimming through, picking out the parts that are different from others in the field. For physics: "Okay, this paper is from so and so, yup, same facility and equipment as the previous one. Theory section, same basic overview, skip to the end for what makes this experiment worthwhile? Anything interesting in their analysis, and how good are their statistics? Did they show the usual set of diagnostics plots for the type of analysis they did, and if not, what are they trying to downplay?"

rflrob 8y ago

For the most part, the way to read papers in biology is to go through the figures. When I was quickly trying to figure out if a project I was about to start up just got scooped (it did, and good for them for saving me the effort), I did it by glancing at figure 1, then reading the title of figure 1, then closely examining figure 1 while cross-referencing with the detailed caption. Then move on to 2, 3, etc. By figure 5, I had a hard time telling what was going on, so I found the part of the text that referenced it, and read it carefully. I've heard arguments that one should leave the abstract until the end, since it sometimes pushes a story harder than the data necessarily warrants, and so if you come to your own conclusion about what's going on in the paper, then check to make sure the authors claim what you feel is supported, you're less likely to be misled. Probably this makes sense for reviewing a paper, but for most things, I'd rather find out quickly if the paper is even relevant to what I'm working on.

dekhn 8y ago
I've found looking at figures and captions to be really misleading. I find that I have to read the methods section first to convince myself that the data collection was correct before I can trust any figures. You have to read the abstract. It's the intro and conclusion you can skip.

pmiller2 8y ago

In mathematics: Read the title and abstract. Then read the statements of the main theorems and corollaries (skip the lemmas and interstitial commentary at first). At each step, evaluate whether you want to continue or abandon the paper for whatever reason (not interesting, not relevant, whatever). Finally, if you made it this far, read the whole paper word for word with a pen and paper (or chalk + chalkboard) handy. For longer papers or books/theses (say, 20+ pages), do this whole process on each individual section/part/chapter that you want to consume. It also helps to have a reason to read the paper besides curiosity. I find things that are relevant to current work to be easier to get through than more peripheral sorts of things. Having a colleague to discuss things with also helps.

sweezyjeezy 8y ago
FWIW, I don't think this article really applies to areas like maths or computer science, where the main output is theorems or algorithms that can be verified line by line. It's more about empirical science where one is trying to prove/disprove hypotheses through rigorous experimentation.
- pmiller2 8y ago
  No, I don’t think so, either. In math, there are excellent papers that cover .01% of what needs to be said about the subject, and ordinary or even bad papers that say much more. Provided there are no serious logical errors, the difference is simply how important is the question being answered. Edit: Although it may go without saying, all else being equal, a better paper is easier to read than a lesser one. But, really, content is king.

enriquto 8y ago

> how do you guys read research papers my phd advisor started by looking only at all the displayed formulas. If there was nothing interesting or new, he would not bother reading any sentence of the paper.

PeterisP 8y ago

It's worth to note that "reading papers" consists of two activities - actually reading a paper indenting to understand it, and skimming a large number of papers or abstracts to filter out which papers to actually read in detail - and it's the second part that seems to take the majority of time, at least for me.