Applying critical thinking to reading papers

Always write alongside your reading. This ensures your work is as accurate as possible and will save you time in the long-term.
Note down the relevance of the paper to your work, how it enhances professional or academic knowledge and practice, the rigour of the approach used, any problems with the approach or findings, and what questions the paper raises.
Think critically about the work and raise aspects the authors haven’t where you can.
Check your understanding of key concepts and specialist terms is accurate as you go along.
Note whether the work is still current or has been superseded by other ideas, check for any conflict of interests the authors may have, the funding source and whether the work was peer reviewed.
Search for other works criticising or supporting the work.
Many people make quick annotations on the paper itself for speed.
You can annotate digital copies that are stored in a reference manager (such as Mendeley). Depending on the reference manager you use, you may be able to make notes on the paper, highlight sections of interest, set up notebooks and add digital post it notes to papers.

Researchers in early years and other related fields, such as psychology, sociology, economics, neuroscience and education study people in a range of ways. An increasing number of researchers are interested in the impact of participant selection on the beliefs we hold about people, and to what extent they reflect different populations.

In this context, WEIRD is an acronym standing for Western, Educated, Industrialised, Religious, Democratic. Most participants are from WEIRD populations despite the fact that most people are from non-WEIRD populations. Research outcomes suggest that there are differences between the two populations, for instance in visual perception, decision making, emotional responses and reasoning. It is important to view research outcomes in light of the differences.

When creating search terms to find papers, reading papers, or writing your own work it can be helpful to consider to what extent your work is based on WEIRD participants and assumptions.

It would be helpful for you to read an overview of the relevance and impact of WEIRD cultures on dominant research narratives in more detail in this paper: The Weirdest People in the World?