Expert: Walter Hintz - 9/27/2005

Question
Hello. I'm an undergraduate senior in biology just starting to do research and am having quite some difficulty reading and understanding primary literature. Do you have any tips on how to learn how to read that stuff well with less time and pain than I might spend if I just keep reading them the way I currently do? Thanks.

Answer
I have been a biologist for a long time now and I know what you mean. You are probably trying to read every word. When you research an article you should be looking for specific points to consider. Many articles contain a lot of information that is not pertinent to what you want to know.  For example if it is a research paper you need to know the problem , hypothesis and conclusions.  You do not need to go over all the methods and materials nor the experimental design.  You do not need to study all the data because the conclusions have been drawn from the data. Be sure the article you have selected applies to your study by going over the abstract carefully. If there are four or five articles on the same study just look at the conclusions.  Why read the same thing.
I always read the abstract before anything else.
 Try to speed read the articles looking for key words.  I hope I have helped you a little bit.