3: Reading and Citing Scientific Papers
- Page ID
- 138279
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\(\newcommand{\avec}{\mathbf a}\) \(\newcommand{\bvec}{\mathbf b}\) \(\newcommand{\cvec}{\mathbf c}\) \(\newcommand{\dvec}{\mathbf d}\) \(\newcommand{\dtil}{\widetilde{\mathbf d}}\) \(\newcommand{\evec}{\mathbf e}\) \(\newcommand{\fvec}{\mathbf f}\) \(\newcommand{\nvec}{\mathbf n}\) \(\newcommand{\pvec}{\mathbf p}\) \(\newcommand{\qvec}{\mathbf q}\) \(\newcommand{\svec}{\mathbf s}\) \(\newcommand{\tvec}{\mathbf t}\) \(\newcommand{\uvec}{\mathbf u}\) \(\newcommand{\vvec}{\mathbf v}\) \(\newcommand{\wvec}{\mathbf w}\) \(\newcommand{\xvec}{\mathbf x}\) \(\newcommand{\yvec}{\mathbf y}\) \(\newcommand{\zvec}{\mathbf z}\) \(\newcommand{\rvec}{\mathbf r}\) \(\newcommand{\mvec}{\mathbf m}\) \(\newcommand{\zerovec}{\mathbf 0}\) \(\newcommand{\onevec}{\mathbf 1}\) \(\newcommand{\real}{\mathbb R}\) \(\newcommand{\twovec}[2]{\left[\begin{array}{r}#1 \\ #2 \end{array}\right]}\) \(\newcommand{\ctwovec}[2]{\left[\begin{array}{c}#1 \\ #2 \end{array}\right]}\) \(\newcommand{\threevec}[3]{\left[\begin{array}{r}#1 \\ #2 \\ #3 \end{array}\right]}\) \(\newcommand{\cthreevec}[3]{\left[\begin{array}{c}#1 \\ #2 \\ #3 \end{array}\right]}\) \(\newcommand{\fourvec}[4]{\left[\begin{array}{r}#1 \\ #2 \\ #3 \\ #4 \end{array}\right]}\) \(\newcommand{\cfourvec}[4]{\left[\begin{array}{c}#1 \\ #2 \\ #3 \\ #4 \end{array}\right]}\) \(\newcommand{\fivevec}[5]{\left[\begin{array}{r}#1 \\ #2 \\ #3 \\ #4 \\ #5 \\ \end{array}\right]}\) \(\newcommand{\cfivevec}[5]{\left[\begin{array}{c}#1 \\ #2 \\ #3 \\ #4 \\ #5 \\ \end{array}\right]}\) \(\newcommand{\mattwo}[4]{\left[\begin{array}{rr}#1 \amp #2 \\ #3 \amp #4 \\ \end{array}\right]}\) \(\newcommand{\laspan}[1]{\text{Span}\{#1\}}\) \(\newcommand{\bcal}{\cal B}\) \(\newcommand{\ccal}{\cal C}\) \(\newcommand{\scal}{\cal S}\) \(\newcommand{\wcal}{\cal W}\) \(\newcommand{\ecal}{\cal E}\) \(\newcommand{\coords}[2]{\left\{#1\right\}_{#2}}\) \(\newcommand{\gray}[1]{\color{gray}{#1}}\) \(\newcommand{\lgray}[1]{\color{lightgray}{#1}}\) \(\newcommand{\rank}{\operatorname{rank}}\) \(\newcommand{\row}{\text{Row}}\) \(\newcommand{\col}{\text{Col}}\) \(\renewcommand{\row}{\text{Row}}\) \(\newcommand{\nul}{\text{Nul}}\) \(\newcommand{\var}{\text{Var}}\) \(\newcommand{\corr}{\text{corr}}\) \(\newcommand{\len}[1]{\left|#1\right|}\) \(\newcommand{\bbar}{\overline{\bvec}}\) \(\newcommand{\bhat}{\widehat{\bvec}}\) \(\newcommand{\bperp}{\bvec^\perp}\) \(\newcommand{\xhat}{\widehat{\xvec}}\) \(\newcommand{\vhat}{\widehat{\vvec}}\) \(\newcommand{\uhat}{\widehat{\uvec}}\) \(\newcommand{\what}{\widehat{\wvec}}\) \(\newcommand{\Sighat}{\widehat{\Sigma}}\) \(\newcommand{\lt}{<}\) \(\newcommand{\gt}{>}\) \(\newcommand{\amp}{&}\) \(\definecolor{fillinmathshade}{gray}{0.9}\)Scientific research papers are the major way that scientists communicate information about their recent discoveries. As textbooks are very general and contain only a broad overview of a topic, scientists, students, and researchers regularly need to read more focused scientific papers to learn the most recent information about a topic. Through this course, we will be reading scientific papers which focus on topics that we are investigating in class.
At the completion of this lab, students will be able to:
Content:
- Know where to access library databases and how to perform a search for desired content.
- Understand what information can be found in sections of a typical research article in order to read and understand more efficiently.
Physical Skills:
- Cite material from a variety of sources
Scientific Communication Skills:
- Recognize the difference between research (primary), review (secondary) and textbook or encyclopedias (tertiary) sources and select appropriately for the purpose.
Types of Articles
Reading scientific papers and gathering information from them is a challenging skill which we'll practice regularly in class. There are three main types of scientific sources. Primary and secondary sources are peer reviewed, which means that other scientists have checked the work and support that the experiments and analysis were done well and that the work is reliable. The sources that you cite in this course should primarily be primary and secondary articles. Tertiary sources more general and are great places to start for some basic background.
• A primary research article is written by the scientists who do the experiments and these articles contain data from the experiments that they complete. One way that you can tell that a paper is a primary article is that it contains a methods section describing how they did each of the experiments. Here is a link to a primary article that you can read. Gagneux_et_al.Science.pdf
• A secondary (review) article is written by scientists who have read MANY primary articles and combine all of that knowledge into a bigger picture discussion of the field. These articles don't have their own experiments, but discuss the experiments of others. Some ways to tell that a paper is a secondary article is that it uses the word "review" or contains only figures that are models rather than original experiments. These articles also have very long lists of references. Here is a link to a secondary article that you can read.
• A tertiary (third level) source could be a textbook or encyclopedia entry. These are great ways to get some basic background and find other resources, but are not good sources to cite in your research as you should always give credit to the authors who did the work themselves. Here is a link to a tertiary article related to the two above.
• Finally, popular press articles often bring in scientific research and write about experiments that scientists have preformed. However, these are written for the general population and are therefore much easier to read. They often lack the experimental details, but help provide context for the research.
Finding Sources Using the Databases:
Here are the three databases that I recommend for finding primary and secondary sources related to Biology.
- PubMed Central(opens in new window) - this is a government sponsored website that hosts full-text archive of literature from biomedical and life sciences journals. This database has easy ways to filter based on date, free open access, review articles, etc
- Google Scholar(opens in new window) - a version of Google that specifically only searches for scholarly articles. These aren't always peer reviewed (therefore not always primary and secondary articles) and can sometimes include Masters and PhD thesis instead. GoogleScholar does have good ways of filtering the searches based on date and review articles etc.
- EBSCO Host(opens in new window) - This is our libraries (Hayden Memorial Library) search database. You can select many different types of databases and filter based on publication date, type of article, journal, etc. The big benefit of this database is that it can directly provide you with access to articles through our library and if our library doesn't have it, you can complete an interlibrary load request to get the document by e-mail in a few days.
Citing Sources Correctly:
It is critical to cite your sources correctly to give you credit to the scientists who completed the work that you are discussing. Unlike English or even History courses, citations in the sciences are not quotes!! Instead, we cite the scientists ideas and work in our own words. Therefore, we paraphrase the papers that we read. Because the ideas that we write about are NOT our own, we still cite that work. There are two types of citations and your document should always include BOTH.
- In-text Citation - This is in the paragraph where you are talking about the article you read. After paraphrasing the ideas you'll give credit to the authors. There are two formats. If you don't name the authors in the sentence you'd write (Authors last name, Year), but if you list the author in the sentence, then you'd just include (Year). The last few minutes of the second video below will guide you through this process better in particular what to do with multiple authors etc.
- Bibliography/Works Cited Citation - This is the part that goes at the end of your paper where you include all of the information about the article that you are citing. This format is much longer and includes all the info including Author Names, Year, Title, Journal, Volume, Issue, Page, Digital Object Identifier ... See the second video listed below for a step-by-step guide. Also, this APA 7th edition guide is a good sample for citation style. (opens in new window)
Example Citation for a Primary or Secondary Source:
In-text/Parenthetical
When I've found information that you want to include in your paper, I'll write that information in my own words and then give the authors credit. Note that I did not quote, I wrote out the information in my own words, but gave the scientists credit for their discovery. For example:
The structure of deoxyribonucleic acid can be modeled as a double helix where the phosphate and sugar backbone are on the outside and the base-pairs hydrogen bond in the middle, like rungs of a ladder (Watson and Crick, 1953).
Works Cited/Bibliography
Now, at the end of my assignment, I need to include the full bibliography for this work that I've cited above. I do this for all of the resources that I have used on the assignment.
Watson, J.D. & Crick, F.H.C., (1953). Molecular Structure of Nucleic Acids: A Structure for Deoxyribose Nucleic Acid. Nature 171, 737–738. https://doi.org/10.1038/171737a0
General Citation Formatting Guidelines:
In-text/Parenthetical
- Summary sentence in your own words
- Do Not Quote
- General format for one author (AuthorLastName, year)
- General format for two authors (Author1LastName & Author1LastName, Year)
- General format for one author (AuthorLastName et. al., year) "et al.," means "and others" in Latin
Works Cited/Bibliography
- Write it yourself, or carefully check the work done by the "cite this" link and/or EasyBib. They regularly get it in the wrong formatting.
- For Journal Articles, the information is in the order: Author, (year) Article Title. Journal Title. Volume (issue), page#. DOI
- For books, websites, etc, refer to the citation handout from class.