Searching the scientific literature

PSYC 11: Laboratory in Psychological Science

Jeremy R. Manning
Dartmouth College
Spring 2026

Why search the literature?

  • You don't want to re-invent the wheel
  • Contextualizing your work makes it more impactful
  • Writing a good Discussion section requires knowing what others have found

How to find relevant papers

  • Google Scholar: broad, includes citations and "cited by" links
  • Semantic Scholar: AI-powered recommendations, related papers
  • Reference chaining: find one good paper, then follow its references (and who cited it)

Evaluating what you find

  • Recency: Is this finding current, or has it been superseded?
  • Source: Peer-reviewed journal? Preprint? Blog post?
  • Sample size and methods: Does the study actually support its claims?
  • Citations: How has the field responded to this work?

How deeply should you read?

  • Quick skim (30 sec -- 2 min): title + abstract + key terms (10--50 papers)
  • Quick read (5 min): abstract + figures + captions + discussion (5--10 papers)
  • Deep read (hours): multiple passes, method-by-method, figure-by-figure (1--3 papers)

Discussion: Finding the right papers

  • Pick a research question your group is interested in
  • Each person: spend 3 minutes searching Google Scholar
  • Compare what you found: did you use the same search terms? Find the same papers?
  • Which paper looks most relevant, and why?

The Discussion section

  • Summarize what you did and what you found
  • Describe how your work fits in with the broader literature
  • Describe what you think the next steps are
  • Be honest about limitations

This week's lab: literature review

  • Find a "template" paper and several related papers
  • Re-factor the template's Discussion section, taking the other papers into account
  • Goal: practice synthesizing findings across multiple sources