Tips to Remember
Check to see if an article has been retracted (withdrawn). Retraction Watch is helping to monitor published scholarly articles on COVID that have been retracted.
- Not everything that is published in a peer-reviewed journal is accurate. Read comments in pre-print servers such as Open Science Foundation Think of a pre-print server as a global peer review, where articles are scrutinized before sending to a formal peer review.
- Read citations that are used in a bibliography. Tracking citations in a peer reviewed article is a good strategy.
Image credit: "Bound Journals" by diylibrarian is licensed under CC BY-NC-SA 2.0
Further Reading
- Critical Appraisal of Clinical ResearchSuccinct article on critical appraisal, published in the Journal of Clinical & Diagnostic Research
- Critical Appraisal of a Journal Article (UCL Great Ormond Street Institute of Child Health Library)Critical appraisal is the process of carefully and systematically assessing the outcome of scientific research (evidence) to judge its trustworthiness. This worksheet introduces this technique to beginners.
- How to (Seriously) Read a Scientific PaperAdvice from researchers on how to read a scientific paper.
- Ten Simple Rules for Reading a Scientific Paper"10 simple rules, relevant to novices and seasoned scientists alike, to teach our strategy for active reading based on our experience as readers and as mentors of undergraduate and graduate researchers, medical students, fellows, and early career faculty. Rules 1–5 are big picture recommendations. Rules 6–8 relate to philosophy of reading. Rules 9–10 guide the “now what?” questions one should ask after reading and how to integrate what was learned into one’s own science."