How to Read an Academic Paper

Since September last year, reading papers has become crucial for my studies. I want to draw new ideas from these papers and resolve some problems by referring to them. However, it often takes me a long time to read a paper line by line. Even after doing so, I sometimes fail to grasp key ideas and important information. This is truly frustrating. To address this, I have summarized a guideline for reading papers, which I hope to follow when conducting literature surveys on specific topics.

I should focus on four key parts: Motivation, Method, Evaluation, and Limitation.

• Motivation: This section usually explains why the authors decided to conduct this research, with a particular focus on the flaws of previous work. Understanding the motivation helps me see the gap in the existing literature that the paper aims to fill.

• Method: This is the core of the article. I need to identify the main idea behind the method, understand the challenges encountered during its implementation, and see how the authors overcame these challenges. I should also consider why the authors chose specific techniques. By doing this, I can better remember and comprehend the paper. If I encounter similar challenges in the future, I will know which skills or techniques might be useful.

• Evaluation: This part is equally important. I should pay attention to how the experiments were designed and which benchmarks were used. The results of the evaluation are also crucial, as they validate the effectiveness of the proposed method.

• Limitation: Sometimes the authors summarize the limitations themselves, but other times I need to identify or summarize them on my own. Recognizing limitations can highlight potential areas for further research.

In addition to these four parts, the order of reading is also important. I should start with the Abstract and Conclusion to get a high-level overview. If the paper seems worthwhile, I will then read the Introduction to understand the context. Next, I will examine the graphs and figures to visualize the key points. Finally, I will read the entire article in detail. In my opinion, the structure of academic papers is similar to Progressive Image Loading, a technique used for online image loading. This method first loads the smallest and vaguest version of an image, gradually increasing the resolution and clarity. Similarly, by following this structured approach, I can progressively build my understanding of the paper. In conclusion, I hope to adhere to these guidelines when reading papers to improve my efficiency and comprehension.