Journal Article (reading assignment)
Learning Exercise #1
Delving into Journal Articles
Objective: To help students better understand the process of research and research methods
Directions: You will be assigned a scholarly article. After reading the article, you’re requied to answer all the questions below completely.
Based upon your reading of the article, you should address the following questions in a 1 to a 1 and ½ page (max.) typed paper: (please refer to APA Style guidelines)
1. What is the research question?
2. What theory did these authors use?
3. What were the authors’ hypotheses?
4. Was the research deductive or inductive?
5. How were the variables operationalized?
6. What kind of relationship exists between the variables? (correlation, cause and effect, or spurious. Define these definitions using the text and provide examples from your article.)
7. What method did the researchers use? (Survey, field study, experiment, existing sources, or triangulation, or another method? Explain.)
8. Who composed the sample? Was it representative?
Grading criteria: Your ability to communicate your thoughts in writing to include appropriate grammar, punctuation, spelling, syntax, evidence of appropriate editing (10 points), your ability
to critique the article’s research question, methods, and overall argument (15), and your ability to demonstrate correct use and application of the concepts from the text to the research article (15 points).