Writing critiques of research articles

A critique consists of both a summary and a critique/evaluation of the article.

• The summary should be a clear concise description of the most important aspects of the article.
  • We expect a research article to have certain sections, whether labeled or not: Introduction, Methods, Results, Discussion, Literature Cited; in your summary, you should address each section, except Lit Cited, although the emphasis will be on the Methods and Results.
  • You must use your own words! Don’t string together sentences or whole phrase from the article. That’s plagiarism.
  • Include a sentence or two addressing the rationale and background information in the authors’ Introduction. Include their hypothesis or objectives.
  • Refer to the other handout about summarizing the Methods/Experimental Design.
  • When summarizing the Results, say what their key results were, making it clear how the experimental treatments compare. Watch out for vague statements that don’t  really say which treatment had which specific effect. Refer to the figures only by putting (Fig. X) at the end of the sentence that describes the result.
  • Include important issues or questions that the authors raised in their Discussion.

• The critique is your evaluation of the article and the research itself.
  • Evaluating the research experiments is more important than evaluating the finer points of the article as it’s written, although both are included to varying degrees. Be sure you look for substantial things to say about the research itself.
  • Some things to include, as appropriate: positive comments, things that aren’t clear to you, aspects of the experimental design that could be done differently or that were well-done, whether  the authors’ interpretation of the data seems reasonable to you.
  • Be realistic about what could and should be accomplished in one set of experiments.
    • Remember that carefully controlled experiments are necessary to get clear answers to specific questions. The more realistic the conditions under which the experiment is performed, the greater the chance for multiple uncontrolled variables to mess up the experiment and produce unclear results.
    • Remember that scientists need to publish results regularly – when they complete a good set of experiments that sufficiently answers one hypothesis. Each article may test  one hypothesis. Don’t expect broader articles – those would be review articles.
  • You may mention aspects of the writing or presentation of data that work or don’t work. Focus on substantial comments about things that helped or hindered your understanding, but remember that the articles are written with other researchers in the same field in mind. They won’t and shouldn’t explain everything. We all expect to look up terms and methods when reading articles in other fields.
  • Phrase your comments respectfully, assuming that they made careful choices for certain reasons. Useful phrases include “The evidence might have been stronger if they had. . .” or “It’s not clear why they . . ..”  or “I disagree with their interpretation . . ..”