what is a critical review of a journal article? a critical review of a journal article evaluates the strengths and weaknesses of an article's ideas and content. It provides description, analysis and interpretation that allow readers to assess the article's value. before you read the article what does the title lead you to expect about the article? study any sub headings to understand how the author organized the content. Study the list of references to determine what research contributed to the author's arguments. Are the references recent? do they represent important work in the field? if possible, read about the author to learn what authority he or she has to write about the subject.

Has the author made an important contribution to the field of study? reading the article: points to consider read the article carefully. Who is the intended audience? what is the author's purpose? to survey and summarize research on a topic? to present an argument that builds on past research? to refute another writer's argument? does the author define important terms? is the information in the article fact or opinion? facts can be verified, while opinions arise from interpretations of facts. When thinking of a thesis, consider the author's intentions and whether or not you think those intentions were successfully realized. Organize your remaining points into separate groups such as points about structure, style, or argument.

write the first draft the review should begin with a complete citation of the article. Note: use the same bibliographic citation format as you would for any bibliography, works cited or reference list. be sure to ask your instructor which citation style to use. for frequently used style guides consult queen's library's citation and style guides. Check for the following when revising: grammar and punctuation errors organization, logical development and solid support of your thesis errors in quotations or in references you may make major revisions in the organization or content of your review during the revision process. note: prepared by university of toronto mississauga library, hazel mccallion academic learning centre last updated: 03 november 2009 source normalized impact per paper snip: 3.234 ℹ source normalized impact per paper snip: 2014: 3.234 snip measures contextual citation impact by weighting citations based on the total number of citations in a subject field. Scimago journal rank sjr: 2.069 ℹ scimago journal rank sjr: 2014: 2.069 sjr is a prestige metric based on the idea that not all citations are the same. Sjr uses a similar algorithm as the google page rank it provides a quantitative and a qualitative measure of the journal’s impact.

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Impact factor: 2.452 ℹ impact factor: 2014: 2.452 the impact factor measures the average number of citations received in a particular year by papers published in the journal during the two preceding years. © thomson reuters journal citation reports 2015 5 year impact factor: 3.730 ℹ five year impact factor: 2014: 3.730 to calculate the five year impact factor, citations are counted in 2014 to the previous five years and divided by the source items published in the previous five years. © journal citation reports 2015, published by thomson reuters you may be asked to write a journal article review. Although this may be an unfamiliar exercise, it is not as complex a task as writing an essay requiring a lot of library research, and not the same as a review in the canberra times which is written for the general reader. Your journal article review is written for a reader eg, your supervisor, lecturer, tutor or fellow student who is knowledgeable in the discipline and is interested not just in the coverage and content of the article being reviewed, but also in your critical assessment of the ideas and argument that are being presented by the author. Use the following questions to engage with the journal article and help you form your critical analysis: objectives.

Is there an explicit theoretical framework? if not, are there important theoretical assumptions? concepts. What are the central concepts? are they clearly defined? argument. What is the central argument? are there specific hypotheses? method. How well does the work advance our knowledge of the subject? style. How clear is the author's language/style/expression? conclusion. These should give you some idea of the central focus and the coverage of the article and the author's reasons for writing the article.

Skim quickly through the whole article, running your eye over opening sentences of paragraphs and glancing at any tables, illustrations or other graphic materials. Read more closely the first section, which should tell you the main issues to be discussed and indicate the theoretical or conceptual framework within which the author proposes to work. Read closely the final section, which should cover the author's conclusions and summarise the main reasons why these conclusions have been reached. Now that you are familiar with the text, read the whole text thoroughly to develop a basis on which to critically review it.

decide which aspects of the article you wish to discuss in detail in your review: the theoretical approach? the content or case studies? the selection and interpretation of evidence? the range of coverage? the style of presentation? usually you will discuss the main issues which the author has specifically examined. Sometimes you may choose a particular issue because it has importance for you and the course you are studying, even if it is not the main issue for the author.

if necessary, read other articles or books which are relevant to your topic, possibly to provide supporting evidence or alternative theoretical models or interpretations of data. You may also want to glance at other reviews of the article in recent academic journals in order to get a feel for the way the article has been received within the discipline. However only use these reviews to support your own evaluation don't merely copy or imitate them. This guide is intended for advanced high school students and college undergraduates who are interested in working on independent research projects. At minimum, it is recommended that the students have completed two years of high school science courses, although enrollment in advanced high school science classes like ap biology, ap chemistry, or ap physics , or the equivalent college level courses, is preferable. Original research can be very rewarding and even fun, but it also takes a huge commitment of time and energy. Having a mentor to help evaluate ideas and provide background information is extremely useful.

As you embark on your own original research project, you'll find it necessary to read in depth scientific literature in your chosen research field. However, this may be the first time you've tried reading a scientific paper and you may find yourself confused about how to proceed. This guide, which is broken into four sections, is intended to help you get started: why bother reading scientific papers? this section explains what you gain by reading the original scientific literature. Two types of research papers containing two types of information here, you will learn what differentiates a review article from a primary research article, and the specific uses for each.

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The parts and uses of primary research articles this section breaks the scientific paper down into its six component parts and explains what kind of information can be found in each part. How to proceed when reading a scientific paper learn tips about what you should be doing, physically, as you read the scientific paper to maximize your understanding and get the most out of your time and effort. Scientific papers are the heart of the science community they're one of the major ways scientists communicate their results and ideas to one another.

If you're considering doing original scientific research, reading the scientific literature is a must! read the roundtable discussion about finding an idea for an advanced science fair project by students who successfully competed at the top level science competitions, and you'll quickly see that scientific papers were vital to those students when it came to both choosing their topics and carrying out their experiments. So if you have a topic you're interested in studying, reading the scientific literature in that field will help you understand what has already been discovered and what questions remain unanswered. The great thing about science is that every time one question is answered, the answer unlocks twice as many new questions. This means that once you've read the literature and know what people have already discovered, you'll probably be able to see what still needs to be done in the field and use that to design your own relevant research project. Scientific papers also contain information about how experiments were conducted, including how long they took, the equipment and materials necessary, and details about how to physically perform the experiments. This kind of information is critical for figuring out how to do your own experiments, and even whether the project will be physically possible given your equipment constraints. There are two types of scientific papers: review articles and primary research articles.