Mistakes to avoid when writing the introduction to your paper

As a journal editor I read a lot of manuscripts. The introduction is often the hardest part of a paper to write, particularly for high impact journals where one must tread a fine line between shameless self-promotion and clearly explaining the importance of one's work in a manner that is appreciated by both specialists and non-specialists. Two mistakes crop up time and again:

Mass citations

"Extremely niche topic x has become a hot topic due to its potential applications [1-26]. Many novel effects have been reported [27-48]. These works have been extended to unprecedented directions [49-68], paving the way to..."

Yes, it is important to acknowledge relevant prior work on your topic. But when you cite papers en masse it gives the impression that you don't understand which papers in your research paper are really important!

 One sentence citations

 "Smith et al. explored applications of extremely niche hot topic x [1]. Brown et al. innovatively demonstrated a novel effect [2]. Newton et al. paved the way to...[3]."

 The opposite extreme of explaining each reference individually (but in a single sentence only, otherwise the introduction will be too long) has the same effect, suggesting you have merely skimmed the works you have cited without really understanding how they fit together and what the bigger picture is.

 

Don't do this! Cite one or two review articles instead, along with the specific works you are building on. Don't make the reader have to do a literature review just to tell whether your paper might be worth reading!