Tag Archives: connotations

Materials and Methods

Usually “materials and methods” section is in the second paragraph; some journals put it also at the end of a paper. As a reviewer I have always insisted that this heading should be extended to “Patients, materials and methods” while in epidemiology we frequently use the term subjects (BTW epidemiologists have a rather militaristic vocabulary: recruited, cohorts :-) ). The anonymous reviewer of a previous paper now pointed out: Use the phrase “participant” throughout and not “subjects” which has reductionist connotations. I promise to use “participants” from now on, yea, yea.