Skip to Main Content

English 110

Research guide for English 106, 110, & 210.

How To Research

How to Find, Read, and Organize Papers

Gosztyla, M. (2022). How to find, read and organize papers. Nature(20220707). https://doi.org/10.1038/d41586-022-01878-7

Taking Notes on Published Research

How to Read Academic Articles (includes video)

Reading scholarly articles is challenging.  Follow these tips as you peruse your articles.

Start by examining the structure and format of the article. Most scholarly, peer-reviewed articles have the same or similar structure. Many contain data and findings.

  • Abstract (summary of the whole article
  • Introduction (why they did the research)
  • Methodology (how they did the research)
  • Results (what happened; identify the findings)
  • Discussion (what the results mean)
  • Conclusion (what they learned)
  • References (whose research they read)
  1. Read the abstract and conclusion first, as these have the main points.
  2. Read the discussion next. This will give you a longer report on the findings and their implications.
  3. At this point, if you're sure the article has what you need, start at the beginning and read the whole thing through, taking notes as you go.