How to be a medical researcher?

How do I know if a journal article is written by the researcher?

• This question is relevant to journal articles that are written about and during a study. They contain an abstract (introduction, methods, results, question, etc.) I'm working with primary articles only. I need to know for sure that the journal article is written by the researcher. How can I prove this by looking at the article? Are primary journal articles always written by the researcher?

• Answer:

  The first author is main contributor and will have written all, or the main body of the article. Corrections and changes are often suggested to the 1st author by the other authors. When you say 'researcher', they will be the main researcher, but often people work in research teams, with technicians, so they will have all been involved in the research somehow. ALL authors are obliged to have read and to understand the article (and they should have all made a significant contribution to the research article, though in practise the last author is often the supervisor and has no clue what has happened in the research and just get their name on the paper because of their elevated position).