Verify a Finding Before You Cite It

What it is for

A seven-step appraisal between finding a promising result and citing it: open the full text, locate the sentence, read the method, size the effect, check funding, look for a review, and confirm it has not been retracted. Use it for every claim that will appear in something you publish or submit. It prevents citations that do not say what you claim they say.

The skill Copy

A one-line takeaway in a results list is a pointer to a paper, not a finding.
Before it enters your writing, do all of this:

1. Open the paper. Not the card, not the abstract - the paper. These searches
   work mostly from abstracts, and abstracts routinely state a conclusion that
   the results section qualifies.
2. Find the sentence the takeaway came from and read the two paragraphs around
   it. Check whether it describes this study's own result, a previous study it
   is citing, or what the authors hope future work will show.
3. Read the method line: how many participants, over how long, human or
   animal, randomised or observational, compared against what. Twelve people
   for two weeks and four thousand for four years look identical in a results
   list.
4. Check direction and size. "Statistically significant" is not "large enough
   to matter". Write down the actual effect, with its unit, or do not cite it.
5. Check who funded it and what the authors declared. Not to dismiss the
   paper, but so that you are the one who found out.
6. Check whether it stands alone. One paper is an observation. Look for a
   systematic review or meta-analysis on the same question and read what it
   concluded, even when it is duller than your paper.
7. Check it has not been retracted or corrected, and note the year. A 2009
   result in a fast-moving field needs a reason to still be quoted.

Then state the claim at the strength the evidence supports. "One small
randomised trial found X" is honest. "Studies show X" is not.

The failure this prevents: a sentence in your work with a real citation
attached that the cited paper does not support - the error a reviewer finds
in ten seconds and remembers for years.

How to install it Copy

1. Open the tool and start a new conversation, project or template.
2. Paste the text below wherever the tool keeps standing instructions
   — usually called system prompt, instructions, or persona.
3. Save it so it applies to every run rather than a single message.

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Where it came from