On an average how many research papers per week/month you read

[kerprof]

On an average, how many research papers per week/month you read?

For example, these research papers could be the ones that came to you to journal/conference proceeding peer review or the ones that your students submitted for your review comments/edits  or that the research papers that you simply read for the research or for teaching purposes .

[Parasaurolophus]

It's hard to say, because I stopped keeping track years ago.

When I teach a new class, it's usually at least two a week. For new units in regular classes, or new readings in regular classes, maybe one or two a month.

If I'm working on a new research project, a handful or three a month, at least. For my current book, probably 20-30 a month.

I suppose it also depends on how much I'm refereeing in a given month.

Ordinarily, this book aside, I used to read no more than about 40 a year. Usually much less than that.

[Kate]

I think this is very field specific.
I look through about 40 papers (not actually reading) and then read some pages out of 10. And then actually read with a pencil 1 or 2 at most.

In my field reading papers is hard. You cannot just open and read it. Decoding takes a lot of time.

[Puget]

I'm confused by your question because to me the examples you list are completely different activities, only one of which I'd describe as  "reading".

ones that your students submitted for your review comments/edits

This is writing, not reading. I'm the senior author on all my student's papers, so multiple rounds of commenting and editing is par for the course. I'm generally doing this with student papers in various stages several times a week (if the students are being productive!).   I suppose if these are not papers you are an author on that might be different.

journal/conference proceeding peer review

Again, I wouldn't describe this as "reading articles"-- it is peer review, which is service to the field. I generally do 1-2 per month. I try to do at least as many as my lab's submitted papers require reviewers (2-3 per paper) because that only seems fair.

research papers that you simply read for the research or for teaching purposes .

This is the only one I'd describe as falling under your thread title. The answer really depends on what you mean by reading--
For keeping up with new developments in my area, I read very, very few papers from start to finish. Generally I don't need to read much of the intro for papers in my subfield because I already know the literature. So I generally skip right to the a quick skim of the methods and then on to the results. I may or may not read part or all of the discussion. I don't know how many papers I skim like this per week-- I just have google scholar alerts set up on certain topics, plus papers that cite my papers, and ToC alerts for relevant journals, and will check out any relevant looking papers from those.

If I'm writing something, I will do targeted searches, but again would be mostly reading selectively for information rather than reading the whole paper start to finish. The only time I carefully read a whole paper is when selecting papers for teaching, where I want to make sure they are really good and reasonably easy to follow for the students.

[Kate]

My numbers are for research only. For teaching in my field we don't need to read papers.

[rota1234]

Right now I have a reading list of 20 sources (mostly books) to be completed within two weeks (not every page will be read).
I also have a list of 15 articles to read for revisions on another project.
And I have a few book chapters to slowly read for a third project, which will shift into reading a lot of articles.

If I'm very productive all of this could be completed in two weeks.
If I have a solid draft of something I may do a deep dive to find more resources/citations. This could take me through 50 or more articles in a short time period.

[jerseyjay]

This is field specific, so I will note that I am a historian.

I assume when you refer to students' papers, you mean graduate students who are working under you. I don't have any graduate students because I am not at a research university. I do have undergraduate papers to read, but I do not consider that research so much as part of teaching.

In terms of reading for prep and teaching, it really depends on the class. Have I taught it before? If so, I might read one or two articles per year I teach the course, if there is new research that relates to the course. If I am developing a new course, I will probably read several more articles.

Peer review is a different type of reading. If we define peer review broadly (i.e., including reviewing for a journal as well as reviewing for a collection I am editing), I would say maybe between six and a dozen per year.

For my own writing, I will read more. I read one article this morning for my current research, and one earlier in the week. When I really get into the research, I might read several a day.

For "keeping up with the field," I might read read an article or two per month, based when I see the latest issue of a journal I follow or  see something posted on twitter.

For fun, I might read one or two random articles per month that often have nothing to do with my own research. For example, while I was waiting at the dentist's office recently, I read two articles in medical journals on my phone about the limitations of peer review. The last time I was at the doctor's office, I read an article in the New England Journal of Medicine that was sitting there about public health and Covid. But sometimes I go several months at a time without feeling the desire to read research articles. 

Two caveats. First "read" does not necessarily mean the whole thing through; it depends on what I am trying to get out of the article. Second, history is a book field, and for most of the categories above, I read more books than articles.

I have no idea if this helps you at all.

[mleok]

I have no idea if this helps you at all.

I can't imagine how such a broadly phrased question could yield responses that would be of use to anyone, given how field specific the responses would be.

[Kate]

I have no idea if this helps you at all.

I can't imagine how such a broadly phrased question could yield responses that would be of use to anyone, given how field specific the responses would be.

Yes, I agree.

[Cheerful]

As many as I must and as few as possible.

[downer]

Define "read."

I did a peer review today but it was of a 3 page paper. I read it carefully.

I read a lot of abstracts. Sometimes I read the Introduction or Conclusion.

It's not unusual for me to browse through an entry of the Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy.

It is unusual for me to read a paper carefully from start to finish. In order to understand a paper well, I probably need to read it at least twice. That hardly ever happens.

[jerseyjay]

I have no idea if this helps you at all.

I can't imagine how such a broadly phrased question could yield responses that would be of use to anyone, given how field specific the responses would be.

I think it depends on how you define "be of use".

I am not sure what the OP was trying to find out: if he is reading too many papers? Too few? There isn't really an answer, except the algebraic response provided by cheerful. The answer depends on one's field, one's institution, one's rank, and one's purpose. A grad student in physics at Harvard is going to read a different amount than a full professor at Harvard, much less a historian at a community college or a sociologist at a SLAC. So in that sense, it was kind of a pointless question, and refining it more might not really yield more useful results.

That said, I think that one of the values of the fora is that it provides insight on how people in different corners of academia function.  This may or may not be valuable in the immediate sense, but it is interesting.

[mamselle]

Maybe the question-behind-the-question is the issue.

Did someone suggest, either in reviewing a paper or discussing a presentation, that you seemed unfamiliar with the literature?

And if, as I've surmised previously, English is not your first language, it may seem daunting to think about having to read more than you already are, just to keep up.

Or did you overhear a bunch of 'young goats' tilting at each other, using their reading rates as metaphors for penile length?

Don't let them get to you, their paper stacks are all the same height.

If you're assigning lots of papers to students, or journal club members, who complain, "It's too muuuuch," that's harder, and depend on the school-type-size-category-discipline levels described above.

So, in the senses I've defined above, why do you ask? (Meant seriously, not snark).

M.

[kerprof]

Maybe the question-behind-the-question is the issue.

Did someone suggest, either in reviewing a paper or discussing a presentation, that you seemed unfamiliar with the literature?

And if, as I've surmised previously, English is not your first language, it may seem daunting to think about having to read more than you already are, just to keep up.

Or did you overhear a bunch of 'young goats' tilting at each other, using their reading rates as metaphors for penile length?

Don't let them get to you, their paper stacks are all the same height.

If you're assigning lots of papers to students, or journal club members, who complain, "It's too muuuuch," that's harder, and depend on the school-type-size-category-discipline levels described above.

So, in the senses I've defined above, why do you ask? (Meant seriously, not snark).

M.

I am asking this for planning purposes - for example... how much hours per week one should spend time reading research papers...

[kerprof]

I have no idea if this helps you at all.

I can't imagine how such a broadly phrased question could yield responses that would be of use to anyone, given how field specific the responses would be.

Sorry for asking a broadly phased question... I am particularly interested in applied science (Computer Science/ Engineering / Data Science etc.) fields...