Working with the Literature

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Working with the Literature
Seminar for 4th Year Projects students 5 October
2004, 1400, LT-222 Andrew Long, Paul
Soler University of Glasgow
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References (1)

• Why are references included in an article?
• Development of science is an evolutionary
  process
• Investigations always build on previous work
• References show the related research which has
  been carried out before, on which the current
  work builds
• References help in proper scrutiny of work by the
  scientific community - peer review of articles
• References acknowledge authorship of previous
  work (and hence help to avoid plagiarism!)
• Criteria for including a reference in an article.
• Previous related work (by same or other authors)
• Reliance on prior methods or developments
  thereof
• Result already known - confirmed or extended in
  current work
• Landmark papers - important previous work which
  has started the research field.

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Example of a Paper and references

• Notes
• J.A.P. uses a version of Vancouver system
• Paper numbers-
• 1,2 Related techniques
• 3-5 First observation of effect in 1D
• 6-8 General theory
• 9,10 Closely related measurements
• 11 Important influence on measurements
• 12 Simulation programme
• 13 Assumption in simulation
• 14 Results by different technique on similar
  samples
• 15 Theory directly relevant to experiment

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References (2)
Putting references into an article Need to be
punctilious. Get all the details correct and
check them! Format of references (1) Harvard
style most common in humanities and some
scientific journals (Author, date) in text. In
alphabetical order at the end (add lower case
letter to date if there is more than one
reference from author in that year). Example Ac
cording to recent studies (Soler, 2003), the
Harvard method of referencing (Long, 2003a) is
one of the most popular in the humanities.
. Bibliography Long, A.R. et al. (2003a),
The Harvard method of citation, Journal of
Applied Bibliography 35, 1-10. Soler, P. (2003),
Comparison of referencing styles in the
humanities and sciences, Journal of Citation
Styles 7, 161-173. Note et al.et alii (and
others). Generally used if more than 6 authors.
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References (3)
Format of references (2) Vancouver style most
common in science and medicine Number
numbered consecutively in the order in which the
reference appears in text. Sometimes in the text
as square brackets 1, brackets (1) or
superindices 1. Example Most physics and
science journals adopt the Vancouver style of
citing references 1, as opposed to the Harvard
one 2. . References 1 Soler P., Long
A.R. and Ferrier R.P, Advantages of using the
Vancouver referencing system, Journal of
Scientific Bibliography 7 (2003), 15-23. 2
Long A.R., Harvard method of citation. In Long
A.R. and Soler P. (eds.) Methods of Citation,
Glasgow University Press, Glasgow, (2003), p.
12-22. Links to monographs on citation
styles http//www.lib.gla.ac.uk/researchskills/c
itationstyle.shtml
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Forms of publication (1)

• Journals (1)
• Peer-reviewed by referees who accept or reject
  the articles submitted according to editorial
  policy
• Letters - short articles with ground-breaking
  results, normally fast publication time (1-2
  months)
• Long articles - more details for closer scrutiny
  and slower to publish (3-6 months)
• Journals are either very general (e.g. Nature,
  Science, Physical Review Letters) or much more
  specialised (e.g. Magnetic Resonance Imaging)
• Refereeing of papers is the main guarantee of
  quality of a journal.

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Forms of publication (2)

• Journals (2)
• Paper journals - accessible from Library
• Electronic journals - most paper journals are
  also available electronically through library
  web-page - http//www.lib.gla.ac.uk/ejournals/ind
  ex.shtml
• For example - Physical Review Letters
  http//prl.aps.org/
• Search Physical Review articles using
  http//prola.aps.org/search
• Elsevier journals through Science Direct
  http//www.sciencedirect.com/
• IoP journals through http//www.iop.org/EJ/
• Some journals are only published electronically
• Articles from e-journals are normally available
  in PDF format
• Journal pecking order
• Impact Factor IF (number of current year
  citations) / (number of papers published in
  previous two years).
• IF has built-in bias associated with discipline.
  For example life sciences have much higher IFs
  than physics.
• eg IF 2002 Nature IF 30.432 Science
  IF26.682 Reviews Modern Physics IF23.672
  Physics Reports12.645 Physical Review Letters
  IF7.323 Physics Letters B IF4.298
• Citations of a paper - reference of another
  paper which includes first paper in ref. list

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Forms of publication (3)

• Books
• Mainly monographic topics or text books
• Editorial control guarantees quality of book, but
  main responsibility of content is placed on
  author.
• Conference Proceedings
• Written version of presentations at scientific
  conferences
• Normally quite short with restricted content but
  contain most up-to-date (at time of conference!)
  information
• Refereeing of conference proceedings is not very
  strict so the quality is variable.
• Other outputs
• Web pages - no guarantee of quality (beware!) but
  there is generally some useful information to be
  found in Web searches
• Pre-prints - fastest publication time, accessible
  through respected data-bases, but no refereeing,
  so no guarantee of quality.

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Databases (1)

• Databases
• Allow quick search for publications on specified
  topics, by specified authors, in specified
  journals etc.
• Glasgow University Library has list of important
  databases -
• http//www.lib.gla.ac.uk/Resources/Databases/inde
  x.shtml
• Databases can also be used to search for
  citations which is useful
• To access databases through library it is
  necessary to register first.
• Discipline specific databases
• General science database - Web of Knowledge.
  Access through GU library (to prove
  electronically that subscriptions have been
  paid)
• http//wok.mimas.ac.uk/
• High Energy Physics Database is called SPIRES
  (originally at Stanford but there is a UK mirror
  site at Durham)
• http//www-spires.dur.ac.uk/
• Preprints can also be accessed through
  appropriate databases (which are generally run as
  a service and do not have subscriptions).

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Databases (2)

• Some tips for making Literature Surveys
• Start with a relevant paper or papers if
  possible
• Look at papers referenced in these and continue
  this process
• Make a search for more recent papers by authors
  involved in field
• Search for citations of key papers (useful in
  finding more recent
• work by independent authors)
• Make a search by keywords or phrases (in the
  way one does on
• Internet with a search engine). This is rarely
  an efficient way of
• finding relevant literature
• For background information, consider using the
  Internet, but treat
• any outputs uncovered with caution.