Part II. Characteristics of Technical Literature

Next time you travel to the library go to the periodicals section. Of course, depending on the library the number of periodicals being received will vary, but survey the major journals in your field. Here, you will get some idea of the writing standards of your field and profession. In comparing the range of practices of journals published in the natural sciences, social sciences and humanities you will encounter the following rough trends:

Articles in the natural science disciplines (physics, chemistry and biology) are more likely to have multiple authors than articles in the social sciences and the humanities;

Articles in the natural sciences are more likely to be significantly shorter in length than articles in the social sciences and the humanities;

Articles in the natural and social sciences are more likely to follow the same format (note the use of subheadings) than articles in the humanities;

Articles in the humanities are more likely to have larger bibliographies, more footnotes and refer to a greater number of different scholars, than articles in the natural and social sciences;

Articles in the natural and social sciences are more likely to rely on visual aids than articles in the humanities;

Articles for each discipline have a good deal of jargon and specialist language, the audience for professional journals is usually small, similarly educated specialists and professionals.

Scanning the Literature

As a potential practitioner, you will need to determine which sources of information best suit your needs. These needs will be quite different from your needs as a lay reader. As a lay reader, you may, for example, find secondary sources more helpful in acquainting you with the current debates in a particular field. Here are some factors practitioners and laypersons can consider in choosing primary and secondary sources. Keep in mind that these factors should be considered together as a guideline, not as the sole basis for your choices. As you become familiar with the literature in a particular field, you will be able to more readily define the scope of your reading.

The press and/or journal: Within specific disciplines, commercial and university presses, which publish books and journals, and journals, which publish articles, garner reputations based on who sits on the editorial board, commercial success, circulation and the percentage of manuscripts they accept and reject. With notable exceptions, high prestige journals in a field have higher rejection and circulation rates than lesser known journals. Most journals and presses adhere to blind review system in which a manuscript, with the author's name removed, is sent to a number of referees (usually between 3 and 5). Each referee writes a report calling for the papers' acceptance, rejection or conditional acceptance depending on the author's willingness to revise the paper.

The well-regarded journal Science rejects about 80 percent of the manuscripts submitted; the New England Journal of Medicine has a rejection rate of about 85 percent. In many cases, the author will resubmit a rejected manuscript to another journal. Given the proliferation of journals, tenacious authors can eventually find a home for their work. To determine how a paper has been received, examine the time lag between the original presentation of the manuscript and the actual date of publication. You can determine this by looking to see when the paper was first presented at a conference (usually indicated in an acknowledgments footnote), or the dates of the original experiment. Knowing the specialties and rejection rates of journals and presses are a first step in the evaluation of information sources.

The Title: The title of a source will have key words that will allow you to determine its relevance to your needs.

The Author(s): Practitioners recognizing an author's name can select a source based on his/her reputation. The layperson unfamiliar with the author's reputation can consult citation indices to a degree, help establish the regard the work has in the field, or related fields.

Affiliation of the authors: Just as the reputations of researchers can help you decide what sources to read, so can the reputation of the institution with which the researchers are affiliated. Usually researchers are affiliated with either a university, a private laboratory, a national laboratory, or a think tank. Knowing the reputation or political leaning of a particular institution (especially in the case of think tanks) will enable you locate the strengths and potential biases of the research.

Support: The National Science Foundation (NSF) is the dominant source of funds for scientific and technological research and development. In 1987, according to one estimate, the NSF funded slightly less than half of the research projects in physics; the major source for the other half of physics funding came from the Department of Energy. Over 80 percent of funding for research in civil engineering and anthropology came from NSF. The extent of federal funding in certain research areas has triggered debate over how research priorities are set, and how "politicized" the content of science has become. Still there are other source of funding for research such as private donors, pharmaceutical companies and private foundations (e.g., The Heritage Foundation). Many of these contributors to research and development express clear interests and political agendas. As with knowledge of the affiliation of the authors, knowledge about the source of funds can give lay readers and practitioners a sense of the purpose, importance and direction of the research.