How to Read Research Papers?

Ask yourself

• What question is being asked in this paper?
  • If the paper is well written, you will be able to find that in the abstract.
  • It's much easier and more engaging to read something if you have an agenda when you read it.
• What did they find?
• What is the interpretation?
  • In other words, why and who should care about this?
• What is the design of this experiment?
  • For this, you might often need to go beyond the abstract.
• What exactly was done?
• How were the data analyzed?