Class 13: How to Read and Present a Scientific Paper

There are no slides for this class. This is a practical sessions during which you will work work on your group presentations.

Group presentations

The rules

  • You have 5 minutes per group.
  • Followed by 10 mins plenary discussion.
  • Each group member presents (~1min per member).

Strategy

5mins is short. It requires making a selection of what to tell, and that is difficult. The main goal is to:

  • gather interest among your audience
  • sketch out the main idea

Everything else will be raised in the discussion. You can prepare some back up slides if you anticipate certain questions or plan raising certain discussion points.

A (possible) outline

  1. Why should you care? (~1min)
  • State the research question, make it relatable to the audience, potentially add some context to raise a broader puzzle that is interesting to someone who is not an expert
  1. What did they do? (~2mins)
  • Describe the experimental design and process
  • A good technique is to take the perspective of a participant (i.e. describe what they saw, exactly)
  1. What do they find? (~1min)
  • Focus on the one main result & authors’ conclusions from it
  1. What’s your take on that? (~1min)
  • You can make the link to the initial puzzle or highlight what they did well / what you found not convincing

Readings

For your presentations, you have been randomly assigned to read one of 5 papers (see below). You can find PDFs for all papers on Moodle.

Code 
names <- c(
  "Jiwoo", "Arthur", "Justin", "Tom", "Alice C.", "Agathe", "Lisa", "Jeanne",
  "Valentine", "Micaela", "Assya", "Cyriac", "Alice G.", "Thelma", "Titouan",
  "Maho", "Selma", "Lucas", "Olga", "Eloïse", "Josephine", "Rivka", "Damian",
  "Candice", "Marie", "Mael", "Ariane", "Camille", "Etienne", "Anitha"
)

# define groups
texts <- tribble(~group, ~text,
                  1, "Simonsohn, U., Simmons, J., & Nelson, L. D. (2022). \n Above averaging in literature reviews. \n + [105] Meaningless Means #1: The Average Effect of Nudging Is d = .43. 
", 
                  2, "Mertens, S., Herberz, M., Hahnel, U. J. J., & Brosch, T. (2022). \n The effectiveness of nudging.
", 
                  3, "dos Santos, Q., Perez-Cueto, F. J. A., Rodrigues, V. M., Appleton, K., \n Giboreau, A., Saulais, L., Monteleone, E., Dinnella, C., Brugarolas, M., & Hartwell, H. (2020). \n Impact of a nudging intervention and factors associated with vegetable dish choice.
", 
                  4, "Bacon, L., & Krpan, D. (2018). \n (Not) Eating for the environment. 
", 
                  5, "Tavernier, R., & Adam, E. K. (2017). \n Text message intervention improves objective sleep hours among adolescents.
", 
                  6, "Diliberti, N., Bordi, P. L., Conklin, M. T., Roe, L. S., & Rolls, B. J. (2004). \n Increased Portion Size Leads to Increased Energy Intake in a Restaurant Meal. 
")


# build data frame to which names can be assigned
groups_empty <- crossing(texts, spot_by_group = 1:5) %>% 
  mutate(row_number = 1:nrow(.))

# random group allocation

## make reproducible
set.seed(2025)

# randomly shuffle order of names 
names_random_order <- tibble(name = sample(names, length(names))) %>% 
  mutate(row_number = 1:nrow(.))

# pair with groups
random_groups <- right_join(groups_empty, names_random_order, by = "row_number") %>% 
  select(group, name, text, -c(spot_by_group, row_number))

random_groups %>%
  kable(escape = FALSE, col.names = c("Group", "Name", "Text")) %>%
  kable_styling(full_width = FALSE, position = "left", font_size = 11)
Group Name Text
1 Alice G. Simonsohn, U., Simmons, J., & Nelson, L. D. (2022). Above averaging in literature reviews. + [105] Meaningless Means #1: The Average Effect of Nudging Is d = .43.
1 Cyriac Simonsohn, U., Simmons, J., & Nelson, L. D. (2022). Above averaging in literature reviews. + [105] Meaningless Means #1: The Average Effect of Nudging Is d = .43.
1 Tom Simonsohn, U., Simmons, J., & Nelson, L. D. (2022). Above averaging in literature reviews. + [105] Meaningless Means #1: The Average Effect of Nudging Is d = .43.
1 Mael Simonsohn, U., Simmons, J., & Nelson, L. D. (2022). Above averaging in literature reviews. + [105] Meaningless Means #1: The Average Effect of Nudging Is d = .43.
1 Jiwoo Simonsohn, U., Simmons, J., & Nelson, L. D. (2022). Above averaging in literature reviews. + [105] Meaningless Means #1: The Average Effect of Nudging Is d = .43.
2 Damian Mertens, S., Herberz, M., Hahnel, U. J. J., & Brosch, T. (2022). The effectiveness of nudging.
2 Micaela Mertens, S., Herberz, M., Hahnel, U. J. J., & Brosch, T. (2022). The effectiveness of nudging.
2 Anitha Mertens, S., Herberz, M., Hahnel, U. J. J., & Brosch, T. (2022). The effectiveness of nudging.
2 Selma Mertens, S., Herberz, M., Hahnel, U. J. J., & Brosch, T. (2022). The effectiveness of nudging.
2 Etienne Mertens, S., Herberz, M., Hahnel, U. J. J., & Brosch, T. (2022). The effectiveness of nudging.
3 Camille dos Santos, Q., Perez-Cueto, F. J. A., Rodrigues, V. M., Appleton, K., Giboreau, A., Saulais, L., Monteleone, E., Dinnella, C., Brugarolas, M., & Hartwell, H. (2020). Impact of a nudging intervention and factors associated with vegetable dish choice
3 Assya dos Santos, Q., Perez-Cueto, F. J. A., Rodrigues, V. M., Appleton, K., Giboreau, A., Saulais, L., Monteleone, E., Dinnella, C., Brugarolas, M., & Hartwell, H. (2020). Impact of a nudging intervention and factors associated with vegetable dish choice
3 Thelma dos Santos, Q., Perez-Cueto, F. J. A., Rodrigues, V. M., Appleton, K., Giboreau, A., Saulais, L., Monteleone, E., Dinnella, C., Brugarolas, M., & Hartwell, H. (2020). Impact of a nudging intervention and factors associated with vegetable dish choice
3 Alice C. dos Santos, Q., Perez-Cueto, F. J. A., Rodrigues, V. M., Appleton, K., Giboreau, A., Saulais, L., Monteleone, E., Dinnella, C., Brugarolas, M., & Hartwell, H. (2020). Impact of a nudging intervention and factors associated with vegetable dish choice
3 Maho dos Santos, Q., Perez-Cueto, F. J. A., Rodrigues, V. M., Appleton, K., Giboreau, A., Saulais, L., Monteleone, E., Dinnella, C., Brugarolas, M., & Hartwell, H. (2020). Impact of a nudging intervention and factors associated with vegetable dish choice
4 Titouan Bacon, L., & Krpan, D. (2018). (Not) Eating for the environment.
4 Marie Bacon, L., & Krpan, D. (2018). (Not) Eating for the environment.
4 Ariane Bacon, L., & Krpan, D. (2018). (Not) Eating for the environment.
4 Josephine Bacon, L., & Krpan, D. (2018). (Not) Eating for the environment.
4 Valentine Bacon, L., & Krpan, D. (2018). (Not) Eating for the environment.
5 Agathe Tavernier, R., & Adam, E. K. (2017). Text message intervention improves objective sleep hours among adolescents.
5 Jeanne Tavernier, R., & Adam, E. K. (2017). Text message intervention improves objective sleep hours among adolescents.
5 Justin Tavernier, R., & Adam, E. K. (2017). Text message intervention improves objective sleep hours among adolescents.
5 Candice Tavernier, R., & Adam, E. K. (2017). Text message intervention improves objective sleep hours among adolescents.
5 Eloïse Tavernier, R., & Adam, E. K. (2017). Text message intervention improves objective sleep hours among adolescents.
6 Olga Diliberti, N., Bordi, P. L., Conklin, M. T., Roe, L. S., & Rolls, B. J. (2004). Increased Portion Size Leads to Increased Energy Intake in a Restaurant Meal.
6 Arthur Diliberti, N., Bordi, P. L., Conklin, M. T., Roe, L. S., & Rolls, B. J. (2004). Increased Portion Size Leads to Increased Energy Intake in a Restaurant Meal.
6 Rivka Diliberti, N., Bordi, P. L., Conklin, M. T., Roe, L. S., & Rolls, B. J. (2004). Increased Portion Size Leads to Increased Energy Intake in a Restaurant Meal.
6 Lucas Diliberti, N., Bordi, P. L., Conklin, M. T., Roe, L. S., & Rolls, B. J. (2004). Increased Portion Size Leads to Increased Energy Intake in a Restaurant Meal.
6 Lisa Diliberti, N., Bordi, P. L., Conklin, M. T., Roe, L. S., & Rolls, B. J. (2004). Increased Portion Size Leads to Increased Energy Intake in a Restaurant Meal.

Assignment

If you do not manage to finish your presentations in class, you will need to finish them at home before next session.