The school research lead and making the most of abstracts

There are a number of reasons why it is particularly important for both school research champions and evidence-based school leaders to make good use of the abstracts found at the beginning of published papers.  First, the full text of the majority peer-reviewed published papers sit behind pay-walls, which makes it expensive for the evidence-based school leader to access research.  As such abstracts provide a summary of the paper indicating the topics covered, the approach adopted and the main claims made, without the expenses of paying for access to the full-paper.   Second, because so much research is published each and abstracts are very short, often no more than 150-200 words, skilled reading of research abstract makes it much easier to keep up with the latest research in your area of interest.  Finally, and most importantly as (Wallace and Wray, 2016) note the very brevity of abstracts, encourages the development of critical reading.  The relative lack of information in an abstract, will facilitate the development of your skills as a critical reader, by forcing you to ask questions about what additional information is required for you be convinced by the argument underpinning the research.

To help us make the best of research abstracts  (Wallace and Wray, 2016)  have identified  a number of questions that may wish to ask of a research article, which uses statistics.

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