Keep in mind your own research question as you begin to read the article. Don’t read it like you would a book, line by line, and page by page.
Read the abstract first to see if you should even bother reading the whole article. The abstract will often tell you why the authors did the study, how they did it, what they found and what it means. Can you find what the stated purpose of the article is and does it relate to your research question? If yes, then read on.
Then, skim the structure of the article. Scholarly articles will typically have an Introduction, Literature Review, Methods, Results, Discussion and Conclusion sections.
Next, jump ahead in the article to the Discussion and Conclusion sections of the paper. Sometimes there may also be a paragraph on directions for future research. In the Discussion section, the author(s) will typically try to describe how the results support the conclusion. Are the findings unique or persuasive? Do you agree or disagree with the claims? Ask yourself again if the paper meets your research needs. If it does not, set it aside. If it does, take good notes and keep going.
Now skip back to the Introduction and see if you can identify the author’s hypothesis or intent. The introduction may contain a summary of previous related research or there may be a separate section called Literature Review. Try to understand how this paper relates to others in the field. You may want to note important works cited here so you can look at those papers as well.
By now, you may have gotten what you need from the article. However, you can read on in the Methods section to learn more about how the study was conducted. The Results section will often contain data, statistics, graphs which you may skim thru in order to flesh out your understanding of the Discussion section. You probably do not need to fully immerse yourself though unless you are well-acquainted with statistics and want to replicate the study yourself.
Finally, go back and closely read a second time any section(s) that offered particularly useful material when you read it the first time. Make sure you are satisfied with your notes.
A brief word on statistics
Take notice any time the words “significant” or “non-significant” are used. These have important statistical meanings. Read more about this.
You’ll often see significance expressed in terms of p-values. Researchers determine p-values by a formula that shows the probability of whether the results they measured were simply due to chance. The smaller the p-value the more statistically significant are the results.
Sample size
Has the study been conducted on 10 or 10,000 people? For some qualitative research purposes, a sample size of 10 might be okay, but otherwise larger is better. More on p-values and sample sizes.
Recording quotes
While you’re reading the article take time to carefully record some useful quotes. Don’t fall into the habit of jotting down or typing out quotes without taking care to note where exactly you read them. This can lead to charges of plagiarism later. The time you put into capturing good citations will save you a lot more time down the road when preparing your own Literature Review section and your Reference List.
Quotes can take two forms, either paraphrasing or direct quotation. Paraphrasing by restating an author’s idea using your own words is preferred but you can quote directly from time to time if necessary. For more information on paraphrasing see Citing sources ethically.
Don’t read scholarly articles passively. Read them critically by asking yourself as you go along what the main purpose, points and conclusions are. A best practice is to type or write down notes as you read.
Sources
Purugganan, M., & Hewitt, J. (2004). How to Read a Scientific Article. In Cain Project for Engineering and Professional Communication. Rice University. https://www.owlnet.rice.edu/~cainproj/courses/HowToReadSciArticle.pdf
Subramanyam, R. (2013). Art of reading a journal article: Methodically and effectively. Journal of Oral and Maxillofacial Pathology, 17(1), 65. https://doi.org/10.4103/0973-029x.110733