How to Write an Article Review?

The article review is the most important stage of writing a scientific article. It consists of a critical review of the article and summarizes the major findings of the article to communicate to the readers of a scientific journal. The article reviewer has to be an expert in the field of the article being reviewed and has to have good writing skills to perform a critical review. And this is where https://essayswritings.net/ comes to the rescue.

Article reviews require an excellent understanding of the article being reviewed and knowledge of the scientific literature in the field. Some reviewers can take several months or even longer do an article review, so it is always important to submit the article reviews earlier so that the article reviewer can catch mistakes early and before publication. The following article gives tips on how to perform an article review successfully.

What Is an Article Review?

Article reviews serve as an important source of quality control in scientific journals, which also have a profound influence on the number of citations and acceptance of the journal article. The main goal of an article review is to determine whether a publication is likely to be published or not. Before you begin writing your article review, you have to get to know the article being reviewed. Ask yourself some questions such as:

• What does the article title mean?
• What is the abstract of the article?
• What is the main focus of the article?
• What are the major findings of the article?
• What makes the article different from other articles in the same or similar area of science?
• What are the shortcomings of the article?
• What is the significance of the article in the present literature?

You should look up the article being reviewed online for these things. The review may appear only a few months or several years old; if so, make sure that the subject of the article is still of current interest.

How to Write a Critical Review?

Critical review writing is the process of reviewing an article to determine whether it is soundly written and the ideas put forth in it are logical and reasonable. The main goal of a critical review is to ascertain whether the article being reviewed is logical, credible, well-written, and supported by good scientific evidence. And if not, why it may not be so.

The reviewer has to evaluate the article not only in terms of the logic and credibility but also in terms of the quality of the writing. In short, a critical review is a process of evaluating the quality of the article being reviewed. It can be considered as an attempt to summarize the key findings of the article for the purpose of communicating them to the readers of the journal article.

Reviewers have to go through the article to see whether it is logical and scientifically sound. For example, some of the common errors that a reviewer may come across include:

• Misusing statistics (e.g., using incorrect statistical tests);
• Making irrelevant suggestions and conjectures in the article;
• Claiming that the authors have published results that are beyond the knowledge of the reviewer;
• Inconsistent style of writing (e.g., mixing up the use of “there” and “their”);
• Lacking of logic in the writing (e.g., assuming that the conclusion does not fit the findings).

Some reviewers use their personal experience and knowledge to assess the article being reviewed. Others focus on the use of scientific evidence to determine whether the paper is scientific or not. The critical review is usually the longest stage of the process of writing an article review.

How to Write an Article Review?

Here are some of the steps to take in order to deliver an all-covering article review.

Step 1

Review an article carefully to determine whether it is a fit for the journal and what it has to offer. The reviewer has to decide whether the article is suitable for the journal and whether it is an appropriate and informative contribution. For this purpose, the reviewer can first read an abstract of an article to see whether the research questions and findings are relevant to the journal. 

The article is also checked for logical consistency to see whether there are any issues such as lack of clarity or style of writing. The reviewer should always focus on the quality of writing rather than the number of words in the article. The reviewer has to identify the mistakes in the publication.

Step 2

The reviewer has to state the reasons why the article is not soundly written (if it is the case, of course). On the other case, if the publication is well done, it is the right time to highlight all the strong points of it – be it the contents, research, writing style, or anything else.

Step 3

The purpose of the article review is to communicate its major findings to the readers. There are two common ways to write an article review. The first method is to do the article review as a separate section of the article. The reviewer has to clearly state the points that are critical and negative in the article.

The first sentence of the article review should briefly state what the article review is about and what the paper adds to the present knowledge of the scientific community. The second sentence has to be an evaluation of the overall quality of the article. The third sentence has to be a concise summary of the major findings. 

A brief description of the method and technique used to research the article should be given in the fourth sentence. Apart from that, it is also important to know the citation of the article being reviewed. When writing the review, a reviewer has to consider what the article is about. For example, if it is a case report, it is necessary to describe the patient’s symptoms in detail. 

The second method of writing the article review is to take the article review as a separate section of the article. The reviewer has to clearly state the points that are critical and negative in the publication. The first sentence of the article review should briefly state what the article review is about and what the paper adds to the present knowledge of the scientific community.

The second sentence has to be an evaluation of the overall quality of the article. The third sentence has to be a concise summary of the major findings. A brief description of the method and technique used to research the article should be given in the fourth sentence. 

Final Say

No matter what article review format you select, it is important that you take your time to do topic research and publication analysis. Thus, you can be sure to do a meaningful and strong review.