Reviewing an academic PAPER is not like reading a book, report, or newspaper where you can jump around the article and choose where to start and what to actually read.
To review a paper it is best to read the paper sequentially, from start to finish.
Each sentence may present new ideas or information that you need to know and/or verify before you move on to later sections.
Always start with the Abstract, as it should provide the what (the premise), the how (methods used), the results, the conclusion, and why this paper is important and relevant to today's societies.
While some academics like to next read the Results followed by the Conclusion sections before they commence their read through, for the general public it is best to start with the Introduction.
While you are reading a paper, you are to be only concerned with the presented statements, references, and evidence contained within that paper. All this has to make sense in the context of the methodology used and what is being revealed, and be fully addressed in the results and discussion sections.
Your preconceived beliefs (or lack of knowledge regarding the presented topic) may result in you having questions, and is why you need to write things down as you go.
Your primary role is judging the research content (and not the author).
Is the evidence relevant, and does the article convincingly analyse and interpret the evidence?
Are the conclusions consistent with the evidence and arguments presented ? Do they address the main question posed ?
You will be working with a PDF version (best viewed on a computer screen).
Many reviewers read the PDF in one window and have a separate window open containing a word processing file, ready for comments to be typed.
This Time Travel paper is in three parts. You must start with Part One and only look at the next part when you have finished your read and have written down all that you need to comment about (if you are going to contact the publisher and provide feedback).
To review this paper, you only need: an open mind; the knowledge of reading in English; being able to search for and check cited references; and the ability to compare the verified citations to extracted test data.
While you are able to download all three Parts of the Paper to your computer, it is best to only open and read one at a time, in order 1, 2, 3, as each part introduces new concepts that may confuse you if you read them before understanding the earlier findings.
