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David Sharp

Publications and source records attributed to David Sharp.

27 records · Page 2Linked to original sources
PubMed2002

Kipling's guide to writing a scientific paper.

The generally accepted structure of a scientific paper is four sections, an introduction, a methods section, the results, and a discussion. This so-called IMRaD format is, with a few small variations, found in most research articles in biomedical journals. However, as a guide for someone writing up research data for the first time, it is far from complete for example, there is no T for title or even S for summary. Nor does IMRaD explain what belongs in which section and how much should be included in or excluded from any section. As a supplement to, but not a replacement for, IMRaD research-workers could bear in mind the six honest serving-men of the poet Rudyard Kipling. These writer's servants are called What, Why, When, How, Where, and Who, and they can be applied to all parts of the paper from its title down to the tables.

Guidelines as Topic↗
PubMed2002

Peer review in a small and a big medical journal: case study of the Croatian Medical Journal and the Lancet.

AIM: To compare reviewers recommendations and editorial decisions in The Lancet, a high-impact journal, and Croatian Medical Journal (CMJ), a small general medical journal. METHOD: Case study of research manuscripts submitted to the CMJ (n=140 manuscripts; 308 review forms) and a sample of similar manuscripts submitted to The Lancet (n=141; 348 review forms) in 1999 and the first half of 2000. Reviewers recommendations and their influence on editorial decisions on manuscripts were analyzed by logistic regression. Agreement between reviewers was assessed by the kappa statistic. RESULTS: Although reviewers scores were identical in the two journals (median=3 for both journals, range 0 to 5), Lancet reviewers more often recommended rejection than CMJ reviewers (44% vs 17%; chi-square=52.1, p=0.029), and agreed best on rejection (kappa=0.29 [95% CI=0.04 to 0.53] vs kappa=-0.04 [-0.45 to 0.36] for CMJ). Lancet editors were even stricter than their reviewers and accepted for publication only 53% [95% CI=37 to 68] of manuscripts graded acceptable by the reviewers, compared with 85% [73 to 91] for CMJ editors (chi-square=10.0, p=0.001). For nine questions about manuscript quality in the review form, multiple regression analysis showed significant association between editorial decision and reviewers scores for the suitability of research design (B=0.70, OR=2.01, 95% CI=1.40 to 2.89, p<0.001) and discussion of systematic/random error (B=0.32, OR=1.38 [1.03 to 1.85], p=0.031) for The Lancet, and scores for novelty of information (B=0.56, OR=1.75 [1.35 to 2.27], p<0.001) for the CMJ. CONCLUSION: Reviewers of big journals, such as The Lancet, are stricter in their recommendations reviewers of a smaller journal, such as the CMJ. The Lancet editors rely on reviewers to identify methodologically superior studies, whereas CMJ editors look for the novelty of information in a manuscript.

Croatia↗
PubMedDate not supplied

Two Ps better than one?

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Periodicals as Topic↗