Advanced Higher Geography

This week you'll have a look at your first journal article. If you're planning to head to university, journal articles are one of the main ways you'll learn and keep up to date with developments in what you're studying.

The climate impact of COVID-19 induced contrail changes

Journal articles are written by subject specialists (usually academics) and are peer-reviewed. This means that they are checked, in detail, by other experts in the subject before they are published. This gives them an extra level of reliability.

They are also all required to accurately reference any information they state. They do this with in-text references like:

"In CESM, aviation aerosols, especially SO4, tend to mix downward to affect liquid clouds below (Gettelman and Chen, 2013)."

These in-text references can then be matched to the reference list, which gives more information about where to find the source of the information.

Journal articles can use technical language and a structure that makes it hard for non-subject specialists to access. You'll need to read it slowly, checking your understanding regularly as you go.