How to Do Research Meta Discussion

These are the notes from a lab meta discussion on doing research, reading papers, and finding ideas. The ideas are presented in no particular order.

Assignment

• Read 3 papers
• take notes about how you read the papers
• one enjoyable paper
• different knowledge levels for each

Questions

• Why are you reading that research paper?
  • open problems
  • related work
  • advisor told me
  • to implement
  • to learn about a field
  • lit search
  • maintaining knowledge
  • trends in a field
  • interest after conference
  • contains answers to homework
  • seminal papers
• How does one pick a paper to read?
  • number citations
  • by reference
  • by google scholar
  • by author
  • by conference
• To what level of detail should I read?
  • 3 passes (from paper)
  • introduction, background, related work useful if unfamiliar
  • levels depending on knowledge of area
  • find “these are our contrabutions” section
• Is this paper worth reading?
  • too many papers to read everything

Approaches

• Write why reading to check if you succeeded in reading for your goal
• Be able to explain paper to someone else
  • loose
  • depending on your goal
• Read blogs, Medium articles for high-level entry points
  • take a class
  • read books
• Surveys more useful when you are familiar with a field (truth in this?)
• Find your comfort level for entry point
• Videos at 1.5 speed
• Don’t spend all time reading papers
  • Recognize when to stop reading a paper
• Don’t always seek to understand every minor detail of a paper
• Recognize what method works for learning a paper or topic
• 4 or 5 hours of deep work per day, use it wisely
• Explore the network of papers
• Read multiple papers at once
  • active compare
• Paired reading
• Have a [good] pen in your hand
• Take breaks
• 3 passes
  1. title, abstract, introduction, and conclusion
  2. key points, figures, references, problem and solution
  3. fine details, implementation; be able to re-create
• Watch the talk of the paper
  • Authors may emphasize certain parts more than others
• Look at the paper’s code
• Build related work before writing your paper
• Use a whiteboard

Tools

• Reference manager (stores pdf)
  • Mendeley
  • Zotero
• Powerpoint
• gnuplot
• matplotlib

Reading Critically and Creatively

• Wear the skepticism hat, read papers thinking What is wrong with this?
• Wear the creativity hat, think How would I improve this work?

How to write notes

• low-level notes; write while reading
• high-level notes; 2 sentence summary afterwards

Finding a Research Problem

How to Write a Review