SOME TIPS ON HOW TO SUMMARIZE A RESEARCH JOURNAL ARTICLE
Lenny Shedletsky
First
, I suggest that you approach any research journal article by first
asking: WHAT IS THE QUESTION (PROBLEM) IT IS TRYING TO ANSWER?
Sometimes the researcher will tell what the question is and sometimes they will not state
it exactly. In either event, if you ask WHAT IS THE QUESTION THEY ARE TRYING
TO ANSWER, you look for it and state it for your reader (and for your self). All else
follows from the questions.
Second
, how did they go about answering the question? That is,
what was their method and procedures? Did they use subjects? How did they select
them? How did they distribute them? What did they ask their subjects to do or what did
they observe about their subjects? In short, the Procedure section of the article goes
here—of course, summarized.
Third
, what did they find? In short, this is the Results section
summarized. I know that this section confuses lots of students, because it is often filled
with technical terms from statistics, tests and notations, etc. Yet, in this course we are
saying very little about statistics. What I am asking of you is that you do your best to
make sense out of the results. You do not need to talk about technical terms that you
really don’t understand. Instead, try to get out of the article the essence of what was
found. You may need to look at the abstract to see the bottom line results, or the
conclusions or the results section. Students with no statistical background can do it.
Fourth
, how did they explain their findings? Typically, the
researcher will sum up their research by going back to their question (number one above)
and addressing it—answering it the best they can with what they found. They will try to
make sense out of what they found. Perhaps it fits with a theory or hypothesis they
started with. Perhaps it does not fit, it counters the theory or the hypothesis. Whether or
not they call for more research should not be taken overly seriously at this point. There is
usually reason to research further. Did they point out any flaws in their own study? The
flaw is still a flaw, but we can point out the flaw and make it clear they saw it.
Fifth
, using concepts from this course (or research methods generally),
critique the study. What are its strengths and weaknesses? When you do this you are
using the principles of research that you are reading about in this course, you are acting
as a critical thinker, and you are contributing to the research process. It is not rude. It is
our responsibility as critical readers. Hopefully, by critiquing it will lead to better
research and help to translate what is here for others to understand. Some day it ought to
lead to improving any research you might do.