Academic Skills Advice
Choosing Journal Articles
This workshop will
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Help you decide which articles to use in your written assignments or research project
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Show you how to read abstracts to assist with your choice
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Introduce two types of journal articles
Teaching Points:
1.
2.
3.
4.
Understanding different types of articles
Searching for articles
Breaking down abstracts
Choosing articles to support your academic work
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Academic Skills Advice
1. Understanding different types of articles
There are broadly two types of articles found in scholarly journals:
A research article is a primary source...that is, it reports the methods and results of an
original study performed by the authors. The kind of study may vary (it could have been an
experiment, survey, interview, etc.), but in all cases, raw data has been collected and analysed by
the authors, and conclusions drawn from the results of that analysis.
A review article is a secondary source...it is written about other articles, and does not
report original research of its own. Review articles are very important, as they draw upon
the articles that they review to suggest new research directions, to strengthen support for existing
theories and/or identify patterns among existing research studies. For student researchers,
review articles provide a great overview of the existing literature on a topic. If you
find a literature review that fits your topic, take a look at its references/works cited list for leads
on other relevant articles and books!
2. Searching for articles
Before we look at a strategy for deciding which articles will be of use to you, we will look briefly at
how to find the texts in the first place. Whilst the Library holds paper copies of many journals for
you to search, it is most likely you will carry out your search on-line either on a specialist database
or via a search engine such as Google Scholar. But what is it you are searching for?
First, you need to identify the key words or phrases in your brief/task/we that relate to the subject
you are being asked to write about. For example:
Discuss whether embedded or bolt-on study skills sessions more effective
for first year undergraduate students.
The key terms are – ‘embedded’; ‘bolt-on’; ‘study skills’; ‘undergraduate’; ‘first year’
Next, you search for articles using these terms alone or in isolation. Don’t forget to also choose
publication date range, language, and any other categories related to your requirements.
You analyse your results using the strategy below (or another you prefer) to decide if the articles
are appropriate for you to use. Using these articles, you identify synonyms for each term, e.g.
‘academic skills’
‘discretionary’
‘fresher’
‘study skills’
‘voluntary’ or ‘extra-curricular’ for ‘bolt-on’
‘first year undergraduate’
…and search again using different combinations of original and new terms.
In this way, you generate a larger number and broader range of articles to choose from.
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Academic Skills Advice
Whatever the article type, you are likely to read academic journals which are read by academics
engaged in theorising and undertaking empirical research relating to any given topic. This means
the intended readers will have considerable knowledge in this area. So, you can expect to find
articles to be difficult to read. One basic strategy to help with this is to read the article more than
once to ensure you get what you need out of the article.
Each subject area has a dedicated Subject Librarian: they can advise you on selecting the right
key terms to use when searching for articles, which specialist databases to use and much more.
You will find out who your Subject Librarian is via their webpages:
www.bradford.ac.uk/library
3. Breaking down abstracts
Whatever your reason for assessing articles, there is such an abundance of work available, both
hard copy and on-line, you may find it difficult to choose the relevant ones.
So how do you do that?
Abstracts provide a summary of a journal article and usually includes:
 The overall aim and specific objectives of the research
 The problem or task being addressed
 Methodology and methods
 Key findings
 Main conclusions and key recommendations (if appropriate)
Adapted from Burns and Sinfield (2012: 287)
The process below will help you to assess how useful an article will be to you and your work.
1. What journal is the article taken from?
Check to ensure the journal is reputable: (trust me on this one)
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Is the journal peer-reviewed?
Is the writer reputable?
Are citations and references correctly used?
Is the information still valid?
Are grammar and punctuation correct?
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Academic Skills Advice
2. Look at the title
This will give you basic but important information about the key issues covered by the article and
the research it discusses. To do this you need to identify and understand key words and phrases.
Look at this research paper title:
‘Gender Roles in Tween Television Programming:
A Content Analysis of Two Genres’
(Tweens are aged 8-12 years old)
What does ‘content analysis’ mean’?
A systematic analysis of the content rather than the structure of a communication, such as a
written work, speech, or film or television programme
Aha! So we can assume that the article will:
a) focus on the content of the television programmes for Tweens
b) ask questions of that content regarding gender roles for two specific genres aimed at Tweens
What do you think the researchers are looking for?
How gender roles are represented in the programmes
3. Read the abstract (the slash marks denote the end of a sentence) and analyse each
sentence.
1This content analysis of gender role portrayals in 49 episodes of 40
distinct United States tween television programs aired in 2011
examined two genres: teen scene (geared towards girls) and actionadventure (geared towards boys)./ 2This programming is of interest
because tweens are a lucrative market, they watch more television
than any other age group, and television programs are created
specifically for them./ 3Furthermore, members of this special group
are in an important developmental stage in which social and
intellectual schema are established and identity and gender are
explored./ 4The analysis focused on the numbers of male and female
characters in both genres, and the gender role portrayals of
characters in terms of appearance, behaviors, and personality
characteristics in the two genres./ 5Results show that females,
compared to the U.S. population, were underrepresented in the
action adventure genre, but that the gender distribution in the teen
scene genre mirrored the male–female distribution in the U.S.
population./ 6Overall, compared to males, females were more
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Academic Skills Advice
attractive, more concerned about their appearance, received
comments about their “looks.” /7Females were presented similarly in
both genres./ 8Overall, males were shown in varying levels of
attractiveness, and were portrayed more stereotypically in the action
adventure genre./ 9Exploring these results through the lenses of
cultivation theory and social cognitive theory shows that tween
viewers could potentially develop narrow conceptions about their
range of possibilities in the world./
What is the first sentence telling us? (We will look at the content of the brackets later)
Explicitly tells the reader the researchers looked at a certain number of episodes from a number of
states and when. Also they took a balanced view gender-wise as they looked at programming for
boys and girls.
(WHAT THE RESEARCHERS WILL DO)
What is the second sentence telling us?
Why the researchers are focusing on programming for tweens – what are the reasons?
1 Tweens is a lucrative market
2 They watch more television than any other age group
3 Television programmes are created specifically for them
(SUMMARISING PREVIOUS LITERATURE/ RESEARCH)
What is the third sentence telling us?
An additional reason for choosing this age group – which is…?
Members of this special group are in an important developmental stage in which social and
intellectual schema are established and identity and gender are explored.
(SUMMARISING PREVIOUS LITERATURE/ RESEARCH)
Let’s look at the remaining sentences together
What is the fourth sentence telling us?
What is the fifth sentence telling us?
What is the sixth sentence telling us?
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Academic Skills Advice
What is the seventh sentence telling us?
What is the eighth sentence telling us?
(What is different about this ‘overall’ to the previous one? Any comments?)
Last sentence is the…………………………..?
What theories have they applied ?
What results have they come to?
Without having to read the whole article, you have learnt a great deal.
You have learnt….
Whether the research was primary or secondary in nature
The focus of the research
Why they have researched this subject
Methodology and method
The results
The theories employed to interpret findings
So, if you were planning to use content analysis, or gender representation in media, or looking at
cultivation or social cognitive theories in your research project, this would be an article you may
want to consider.
Having learnt how to assess an abstract, this can make it easier to choose whole articles for use in
your research.
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Academic Skills Advice
Activity 1: Process to choose journal articles
Working in pairs/small groups, read the following abstract and apply the process above. There
may be sentences that do slightly different jobs to those above, but see if you can work out what
they do.
Distinguishing juvenile homicide from violent juvenile offending.
Juvenile homicide is a social problem that has remained a central
focus within juvenile justice research in recent years. The term
juvenile murderer describes a legal category, but it is purported to
have significant scientific meaning. Research has attempted to
conceptualize adolescent murderers as a clinical category that can be
reliably distinguished from their nonhomicidal counterparts. This
study examined 33 adolescents adjudicated delinquent or awaiting
trial for murder and 38 adolescents who committed violent,
nonhomicidal offenses to determine whether the two groups differed
significantly on family history, early development, delinquency
history, mental health, and weapon possession variables. The
nonhomicide group proved more problematic on many of these
measures. Two key factors did distinguish the homicide group: these
adolescents endorsed the greater availability of guns and substance
abuse at the time of their commitment offenses. The significance of
this finding is discussed, and the implications for risk management
and policy are reviewed.
What is the first sentence telling us?
What is the second sentence telling us?
What is the third sentence telling us?
What is the fourth sentence telling us?
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Academic Skills Advice
What is the fifth sentence telling us?
What is the sixth sentence telling us?
What is the seventh sentence telling us?
3. Choosing articles to support your academic work
This process of breaking down the abstract benefits you in two ways:
 It saves you time – you don’t have to read entire potentially long-winded and useless
articles, just 250 words or so.
 You can focus on finding particular elements of a research project – this maybe the
participant group, the methodology, the research topic, results or anything else you feel
is relevant.
Once you have selected your journal articles, you can look for common aspects between them and
look for particular sections you are particularly interested in, such as the results. In this way, you
build up your literature ‘bank’ for use in any assignment, but particularly for literature reviews.
For further support on critical analysis, we run workshops on What is Critical Analysis?, Critical
Analytic Thinking, Critical Analysis whilst Reading, and Critical Analysis When Writing. We also run
specific workshops on How to Read Journal Articles Critically. Please also refer to the books in the
list below.
References
American Public University System (2014) Q. What's the difference between a research article (or
research study) and a review article? http://apus.libanswers.com/a.php?qid=153014 Accessed
11 February 2014.
Burns, T. and Sinfield, S. (2012) Essential study skills: the complete guide to success at university.
3rd edition. London, Sage Publications Ltd.
Cottrell, S. (2013) The study skills handbook. 4th ed. Basingstoke, Palgrave Macmillan.
DiCataldo, F. and Everett, M. (2008) Distinguishing juvenile homicide from violent juvenile
offending. In Shon, P.C.H. (2012) How to read journal articles in the social sciences. (24-26).
London, Sage Publications Ltd.
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Academic Skills Advice
Gerding, A and Signorielli, N. (2014) Gender roles in tween television programming: a content
analysis of two genres sex roles. Jan 2014. Vol. 70 (1/2) 43.
Farlex Inc (2014) The Free Dictionary. http://www.thefreedictionary.com/content+analysis
Accessed 20 May 2014.
Shon, P.C.H. (2012) How to read journal articles in the social sciences. London, Sage Publications
Ltd.
All visuals are from Clip Art
Answers
Tweens abstract
What is the fourth sentence telling us?
Exactly what is being analysed – which is…?
1 The numbers of male and female characters in both genres
2 The gender role portrayals of characters in terms of appearance, behaviors, and personality
characteristics in the two genres.
(WHAT THE RESEARCHERS WILL DO)
What is the fifth sentence telling us?
There is a change from telling us about reasons and method of research to what?
Results show that females, compared to the U.S. population, were underrepresented in the action
adventure genre, but that the gender distribution in the teen scene genre mirrored the male–
female distribution in the U.S. population.
(RESULTS AND FINDINGS)
What is the sixth sentence telling us?
We are still on results but has switched to an ‘overall’ result.
Overall, compared to males, females were more attractive, more concerned about their
appearance, received comments about their “looks.”
(RESULTS AND FINDINGS)
What is the seventh sentence telling us?
Still on results but that…..
Females were presented similarly in both genres.
(RESULTS AND FINDINGS)
What is eighth sentence telling us?
Overall, males were shown in varying levels of attractiveness, and were portrayed more
stereotypically in the action adventure genre.
(RESULTS AND FINDINGS)
(What is different about this ‘overall’ to the previous one? Any comments?)
More detail re females and looks than male looks, and not detail about what ‘stereotypically’
means re action adventure genre. Suggests an assumption being made on the part of the
researchers about their readers.
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Academic Skills Advice
Last sentence is the conclusion?
What theories have they applied ?
Cultivation theory and social cognitive theory
What results have they come to?
Tween viewers could potentially develop narrow conceptions about their range of possibilities in
the world.
(WHAT THEY CAME UP WITH)
Activity 1: Juvenile homicide
What is the first sentence telling us?
Juvenile homicide is a social problem that has remained a central focus within juvenile justice
research in recent years. Where did they get this info from? Previous research.
What is the second sentence telling us?
The term juvenile murderer describes a legal category, but it is purported to have significant
scientific meaning. Where did they get this info from? Previous research
What is the third sentence telling us?
Research has attempted to conceptualize adolescent murderers as a clinical category that can be
reliably distinguished from their nonhomicidal counterparts. Where did they get this info from?
Previous research
What is the fourth sentence telling us?
This study examined 33 adolescents adjudicated delinquent or awaiting trial for murder and 38
adolescents who committed violent, nonhomicidal offenses to determine whether the two groups
differed significantly on family history, early development, delinquency history, mental health, and
weapon possession variables. What the researchers did
What is the fifth sentence telling us?
The nonhomicide group proved more problematic on many of these measures.
(RESULTS)
What is the sixth sentence telling us?
Two key factors did distinguish the homicide group: these adolescents endorsed the greater
availability of guns and substance abuse at the time of their commitment offenses.
(RESULTS)
What is the seventh sentence telling us?
The significance of this finding is discussed, and the implications for risk management and policy
are reviewed. Implications hinted at but can’t be discussed further due to word count restrictions
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