Eli5: With all of the research coming out every day, how do people stay up to date?
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Well, nobody really tries to stay updated on ALL the research. People specialize into different areas. To stay updated on the research in their area, there’s a lot of tools. Web alerts based on keyword searches. Conferences and word of mouth. For any given scholarly topic, someone writes a review article every ten years or so, which is a summary of the current state of affairs.
For people who need to know a little bit of everything, like science journalists or government policy makers, they basically rely on other people to inform them when needed. They will ask those specialized experts to give them a summary or prepare a recommendation for them.
ELI5: experts specialize in knowing a lot about a little, and then summarize for everyone else.
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