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Reading Research Articles
ADVICE FOR READING JOURNAL ARTICLES
A. Don't be intimidated
Don't let the length of the journal article intimidate you, nor should you be intimidated by the loquaciousness of the author's writing. Academic professors often use fancy jargon (like loquaciousness). It makes the reading longer and sometimes confusing, but you can still understand what the researcher is getting at. Especially if you understand the structure that I explain below. Here is a funny example of how writing gets more complicated even though it says the same idea:
Simply put - read through the jargon and decipher what you can. If necessary, look up the words you need to know to understand the main point, but don't be intimidated by the length or the wording of the article.
B. Don't feel pressured to sit down and read the entire article from beginning to end. Very few readers do this. Instead, researchers bounce around the article to find what they are looking for.
For more on how to read journal articles see this post.
Now, try to label each section (if they are not labeled already). Understanding this structure should help you understand the research efficiently.
C. Understand the structure
Most of the research articles have a similar structure. Once you understand the structure, it is easier to find what you need and make sense of the article. Sometimes these sections will even be labeled for you.
Most research articles have a format that looks like this: (sometimes a couple of these sections are combined)
**Abstract (Most useful section - read first) - A summary before the actual article, usually in italics or set off from the actual article. Not all articles have this, but most do.
Introduction - The beginning of the research explaining what the author set out to study and why it is important.
Literature Review - This is often confused by students for being the actual research, but it is just a review of previous research that has been done. This section might point out previous research that informs the author's research or shortcomings of the previous research that the author hopes to address. Karen Sternheimer explains the literature review here on the Everyday Sociology blog.
Methods - This explains how the author gathered data. It might include multiple methods such as surveys, ethnography, existing data, etc...
Data/Stats - The author will make sense of the data that they gathered. For quantitative data, the analysis might be complex such as regression analysis, or a discussion of p-value. Don't let the complicated discussion of the statistics intimidate you. You can make sense of the data without understanding all of the statistical jargon.
**Conclusion (Second most useful - read second!) - After the explanation of the methods and data, the author will summarize the data and make sense of it. Finding this section will help you understand what the most important parts of the research was.
Discussion/moving forward - This section is sometimes at the end of the article suggesting either future research or policy implications or the limitations of the research. Authors might critique their own research here.
Choose ONE of the JOURNAL articles you found. Then, answer the following:
1. Please cite your research. (author, title of article, title of journal, date). (If you use JSTOR, it will generate a citation for you.)
2. Where did you find your research article - did you use JSTOR? A journal page? One of the research institutions I mentioned? Or someplace else?
3. Did your article have all 7 sections that I explained above? Were you able to find them?
3b. Using the structure above, try to give a quick summary of the research. You can jump around to the sections that are relevant to quickly discern what the research is about. I recommend reading the abstract first (if there is one), and next the conclusion.
For more advice on reading journal articles, see Karen Sternheimer's post on Everyday Sociology Blog.
