Lecture

How to Read a Research Article in Social Sciences

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HUM-446: Governing global migration I

This course examines key areas of contemporary migration politics in a historical perspective, such as refugee protection, border security, and regional integration. It also trains students in methods of documentary research. ...

Description

This lecture focuses on teaching students how to read research articles actively and efficiently in the social sciences. It emphasizes the importance of engaging with the argument and evidence, identifying the main argument, positions, and evidence used in the article. The instructor provides guidelines on reading the abstract, introduction, and conclusion, skimming the article, and making determinations about its relevance. The lecture also covers the requirements for the final assignment, which includes analyzing how authors construct arguments and connecting article content to course material. Students are encouraged to develop analytical skills and apply lecture content and debates to new issues.

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Related concepts (15)

Reading comprehension

Reading comprehension is the ability to process written text, understand its meaning, and to integrate with what the reader already knows. Reading comprehension relies on two abilities that are connected to each other: word reading and language comprehension. Comprehension specifically is a "creative, multifaceted process" dependent upon four language skills: phonology, syntax, semantics, and pragmatics.

Evidence-based practice

Evidence-based practice (EBP) is the idea that occupational practices ought to be based on scientific evidence. While seemingly obviously desirable, the proposal has been controversial, with some arguing that results may not specialize to individuals as well as traditional practices. Evidence-based practices have been gaining ground since the formal introduction of evidence-based medicine in 1992 and have spread to the allied health professions, education, management, law, public policy, architecture, and other fields.

Reading

Reading is the process of taking in the sense or meaning of letters, symbols, etc., especially by sight or touch. For educators and researchers, reading is a multifaceted process involving such areas as word recognition, orthography (spelling), alphabetics, phonics, phonemic awareness, vocabulary, comprehension, fluency, and motivation. Other types of reading and writing, such as pictograms (e.g., a hazard symbol and an emoji), are not based on speech-based writing systems.

Evidence-based policy

Evidence-based policy is a concept in public policy that advocates for policy decisions to be grounded on, or influenced by, rigorously established objective evidence. This concept presents a stark contrast to policymaking predicated on ideology, 'common sense,' anecdotes, or personal intuitions. The approach mirrors the effective altruism movement's philosophy within governmental circles. The methodology employed in evidence-based policy often includes comprehensive research methods such as randomized controlled trials (RCT).

Hierarchy of evidence

A hierarchy of evidence, comprising levels of evidence (LOEs), that is, evidence levels (ELs), is a heuristic used to rank the relative strength of results obtained from experimental research, especially medical research. There is broad agreement on the relative strength of large-scale, epidemiological studies. More than 80 different hierarchies have been proposed for assessing medical evidence. The design of the study (such as a case report for an individual patient or a blinded randomized controlled trial) and the endpoints measured (such as survival or quality of life) affect the strength of the evidence.

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