OBVU100 University Seminar / Bengtson

How to Identify Primary Scientific Articles

Recognizing Scholarly Articles

Scholarly articles in the sciences and social sciences are often written in a way that breaks them down into the following sections.

1.  Long, descriptive article title.

2.  Author or authors often provide their academic credentials.

3.  Articles begin with an ABSTRACT or summary.

4. An INTRODUCTION section places the article in context and states the problem the researchers are attempting to solve.

5. A  METHODS section explains exactly the way the authors conducted their research.  This provides so much detail that others could duplicate their research to see if they get the same results.

6.  RESULTS or Findings section gives the result of the research, often with many charts, graphs and statistics.

7. DISCUSSION section provides some analysis on the research and often explains what the statistics in the previous section mean.

8. CONCLUSION is the final section that discusses if this research was useful and meaningful and suggests ways to improve this research or other related things that need to be researched.

9.  BIBLIOGRAPHY lists the previously published work that the authors used to write their article.

This interactive web site shows how many of the section of a scholarly article are arranged.

Locating Primary Scientific Articles

Yes, you can look in Google or Google Scholar, but as Dr. Dyer mentions in the flying snake video above, many science journals do not make the full-text of the article freely available.  

The BVU Library makes a selection of databases available to you.  Databases are made up of descriptions of journal articles in all subject areas.  Here are a few databases you can use to find primary scientific articles.

Strategies for Reading Scientific Articles

Each of these strategies below has a different approach, so find a method you like and stick with it.  Each strategy has the following similarities:

• Breaks down the article into different sections and asks you to skip to read the article out of order.
• Expects you to ask questions while you read and to take notes.  This requires you to interact with what you are reading.  If you just pass your eyes over the text, you aren't going to get any meaning from it.
• Assumes you will need to read the articles multiple times.  Allow yourself LOTS of time to comprehend what you are reading.  Even experts with years of experience may spend an hour reading one scientific article.

This video asks three faculty members to discuss their strategies for reading journal articles.  Find a strategy that works for you!