“Reading research papers is something most PhD students learn via osmosis”. This article will summarise an approach by Prof. Andrew Ng on reading academic literature.
Consider a project-based scenario where in order to accomplish a goal, there needs to be some research performed on a subject before a possible solution is designed. The objective is to gain insight on past proposals, latest developments and existing challenges in the subject.
Perform the following steps:
Read around the list. The progress of the articles often looks like this:
The following can be used as general guidelines to the extent of research and what it would imply
A single paper is read in multiple passes, this is done as all papers are split into sections which could be useful for understanding the objective and results of the research.
A bad way to read a paper is to start from the first word and end at the last. - Andrew Ng
First Pass: Title, Abstract, Figures
This is enough to get a good sense of the problem statement and a general overview of what the paper is about with minimal reading.
Second Pass: Introduction, Conclusion, Figures, Skim the rest
Usually the abstract, introduction and conclusion gives a very clear summary of the purpose of the paper. After this, skim the rest of the paper. Generally the related work section is difficult to understand and usually filled with a lot of different work that may not entirely be relevant.
Third Pass: Read everything but skip the math
It’s easier to gain a theoretical understanding before deep diving into the math that makes it work (think Feynman technique). Go for the efficient high information content first and hard material later.
Fourth Pass: Read everything but skip parts that don’t make sense
Sometimes scholarly articles are published at the boundaries of our knowledge and bleeding-edge research at the time might be irrelevant in the current day. These parts can be skimmed or more time could be spent if mastering/deep researching is the goal.