I prefer Reading a paper

Dear Sina ..

I prefer reading papers when I want to write an article , but I am reading books when I prepare a lecture.

Best regards.

Reading paper

I can depend on both of them. Reading a paper to have a general idea and reading a book to depend as a source.

Reading a book in my field of study is more useful for gaining basic knowledge.

But for advancement in any scientific orientation And gaining expertise And updating information, Definitely reading the paper is more useful.

And in general, for me reading a paper is a priority.

Paper is a good choose for specific research and details of results and discussion, but book can be useful for principles and theoretical aspects.

Hello,

My dear colleagues,

Thank you very much all of you for the your valuable answers and comments. Actually, all of your ideas are so significant and helpful for me.

Thanks a lot,

Hi Dr Sina,

Both, but that is depending on my problem what I looking for, if it requires wide area of details and explanation

It depends on the situation. Books provide opinions, hypotheses, or arts, but papers test these opinions, and discuss them.

I prefer reading a paper

reading paper is more fluent.

Both are important.

There is no difference between the book and the paper if it contains the information you are looking for, but if you work on a paper and search for sources and recent information, researchs will be the right place to search.

There are some amazing papers and some really terrible books. The opposite is also true. It really depends on the topic and choices available.

Both are significant in academics. For fundamental understanding I prefer books while for technical and specialized knowledge papers are ideal.

All the best.

both are important

Both

For the clarity in basic concepts one must read a good book and for learning about the current research one must read a research paper.

In my area of research- ETHNO PHARMACOLOGY, reading of books (even very old books) and research/ review articles (papers) both are very important.

I read both of them.

Both plus reading E-books.

Dear Sina Mahdavi ,

It depends on the work. Sometimes I use books, sometimes articles. I like reading books, because there the details are written.

Regards, Shafagat

Reading a book on a particular topic provide content upto the year of its publication.

It provides information from basic concepts to some advance level.

To understand a new topic, book is a good source.

Reading Journal and conference papers provide latest developments in a particular field which is of great value for a researcher.

I always go for the two:

-Book for background and raw information

-Paper for new innovation and diversity .

As a young researcher I had read books but last dekades I only read papers.

I love to read everything -books, magazines, research papers, opinnionaire articles etc. However, the activity I am to undertake determines my choice. As such I agree with Prof. Yehya A. Salih

I like to read review paper on particular topic, it gives me full package on desire topic, then I used to read books much more reliable and enthusiastic than ordinary publications.

I believe a good book can be life long companion. As for example

'The Prophet' by Khalil Gibran I used to read this book for my soul since 10 years, every months, every day.

Hi, Sina.

My professional interests are books, so I like to use books. But when I write articles about books, then I use papers.

Regards, Seherzada

Papers and books are very useful in my field. Though, I read more of research papers especially engineering articles because they are useful in terms of knowledge expansion and building up articles. However, In preparing lecture note for my students, I read more of books.

A book includes the consensus of research articles on a particular topic & avoid the controversies , which is of great benefit to undergraduates & postgraduates . The new edition of books updates the recent advances every two years . Recent update books fill the gap between editions . Students should read recent edition textbooks to understand the topics , while faculty should update recent advances in papers published in journals . Systematic reviews & meta analysis provide adequate data to analyze the various published articles on a selected topic .

Both books and research papers/articles are very important in-order to get knowledge.

In-order to get the fundamental knowledge and get a vast knowledge in a particular area books play a huge role.

Reading books gives you the fundamental knowledge and papers gives you the latest trends and what the current world expected. Some concepts in the papers we cant understand. So we have refer the book. My point of view Books are heart and Papers are brain.

Hello,

My Dear colleagues,

Thanks again all of you for the your instructive, valuable and helpful answers.

I read all of your answers, carefully, they are very nice and useful for me , really.

Have a nice time and good luck.

Many thanks,

Sina

PAPER

I appreciate all researchers views. For me, i recommend it depends on the situation. If you are doing research empirically then you would definitely read research papers to formulate your idea then for theoretical foundation i recommend you to read books.

Thanks

How can we prefer paper or book? I think both of them are important. We need to get acquanted with all kinds of research such as a paper or book.

They are both beneficial depending on what scholarly course I'm chatting; for empirical or fundamental principles.

I personally prefer to read a publication than a book because a publication addresses issues of methodology and presents the results and interpretation of the results

Just want to note that my opinion is very subjective and does not share the opinion of most researchers.

As for the paper:

The famous physicist and Nobel Prize winner in physics in 1962, Academician Lev Landau, said: "Looking through a scientific article, I usually read only the description of the problem and the results obtained by the author. How I need to solve this problem I know better than he". In my field of interest in Combinatorial Optimization, I agree with the opinion of Academician Landau and use the same method. Why? Because all articles are usually detached from the practice and pursue only one goal - to be published.  Therefore, knowing about the problem description and the results of the author of the article, of course, if this problem is interesting to me, I try to find my own solution. Only in this way I may understand the problem very well and in no other way. Detailed reading of other people's articles in my field of interests gives me nothing but knowledge about the problem statement and for me this is the most important thing. I want to emphasize one thing: An overwhelming number of articles publish results not because they are important to science, but because they are needed to obtain a position and raise the salary. That is, if only the description of the problem to other scientists were known, I am sure that we would get results no worse, and we can be many times better than the already published result.

As for the book:

Of course it depends on the book. However, in my area the vast majority of books are outdated and lost relevance, as new technologies have emerged that require new theories. For example, in my understanding, the Complexity Theory of Algorithms is outdated and requires new approaches to solutions. Therefore, it is not surprising that the Complexity Theory of Algorithms has not been developing for a long time already in the recent decades.

My suggestion is the following: If someone thinks that he has come up with a good method of solution, the best outcome would be to develop as a product for practical use by users. Currently we live in an age of intensive Internet technologies and therefore we need to transform scientific articles like text documents .pdf to the Online Tools on the Internet for open access to a multi-million audience.

I prefer read both a book and paper.

kind regards

For my discipline both are important; both could be foundational and theoretical but papers are reputed for the currency of the knowledge they share.

It depends on the terminology or the topic or the concepts we are searching for.

If we are searching basic concepts and if we are beginners then book is the best option but if we want to know the use, research aspects and experiments of the concepts then its better to prefer research papers.

Best books are the better option to gain the basic concepts and for the wider horizon of the topics but for the research aspects research papers are essential.

I prefer read paper for research.

Both are important... but books is more important when researcher require basic knowledge of research methodology, fundamental of research or history of research topic. Research paper is more important when researcher doing research on going research project for scientific knowledge, and review of related research etc.

Papers briefly explain ideas and achievements, while books provide them in detail (generalities, achievements, current works, future projects). So both are important.

Dear Dr. Sina Mahdavi , it is an interesting question. I often read both books and papers depending on the situation. My preference to go for which one will be governed by the area of my study. But, now a days, I am more focusing to IT based information sources due to several reasons.

Hello,

My Dear colleagues,

For all of the your nice answers...

Both. I read newspaper everyday and journals and books for my research work as when required but no time to read story books.

Both, depending on the need

To develop and teach graduate and authoring courses Read the latest books in the field of specialization, while to publish research rely on a daily follow up reading the latest scientific papers

Reading Book

Interesting question ... in general I like to read more articles than books when I am planning an investigation, to prepare a class or if I want to know more about how to investigate some topic of interest ...

Although, I'm usually reading some book of stories, novels or interesting miscellaneous topics ...

Regards!

I read more of papers especially for the purpose of publications to know the current trends in my discipline and books most times for the purpose of lectures

Each one has a special purpose, and both are important.

I prefer reading review articles. Here you can get old and beautiful idea as well as current knowledge or updates of your research areas.

In my own opinion, it depends on the work to do. I consult books (e-book inclusive) for in depth knowledge about a particular concept but i read articles/papers most of the time for scientific publication purposes, becoming current and for updates in research/academic space.

From the little research I conducted among university students, I noticed that most students prefer reading books for examination. They download and read more of articles when preparing for project write-up.

The recent developments are mostly included in papers and are rarely included in the available books. In my view, it is better to gain in-depth knowledge from the books and be acquainted with the recent developments from papers.

Dear Dr. Sina Mahdavi

I like to read both, it depends on what you are aiming or looking for

regards

I use both journals and books. I also read news papers...

I read articles and books (more of engineering books), I also read newspapers.

Great contribution!

Papers and book both

Articles and books