When advising students performing research in one's group, what's the best way to make sure that they keep on top of the literature?
- Is it best to forward any article of interest to the student?
- Should we keep a list of journals the student should follow independently of me?
- Are there other practices (reading journal, etc.) to make sure they stay up to date?
- Is this something that can be pursued at a group level instead of on a one-on-one level?
Answer
As a current student, I find that the constant barrage of requests makes it very hard for me to keep up with the literature unless it is very pertinent to my staying afloat. Thus, reading should be tied to my staying afloat.
The most effective way seems to be a journal club with the advisor with the duty of presenting rotating between the advisees. As a side note, a journal club without the advisor falls apart rather quickly. There should be mechanisms to make sure that attendees actually read the papers as well as the presenter doing a good job with reviewing the prior literature. I've personally learned quite a lot in this format.
The other method would be to set up a system to share papers. Using an RSS feed is pretty effective along with using NCBI's email updates. Internally, Mendeley groups or Google+ work well.
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