These notes are intended to help you develop your approach to the way that you read an academic article for study purposes, ie as part of your studies for your degree. The notes should be used alongside the example article discussed,
Flamholtz, E. (1983) "Accounting, Budgeting and Control Systems in their Organizational Context: Theoretical and Empirical Perspectives", in Accounting, Organizations and Society, vol. 8, no 2/3, pp.153-169.
This is the first article in your module handbook for OE209, Organisations: Control and Resistance.

Many students find difficulty in reading academic articles such as the one by Flamholtz. They tend to complain that:
"it's too difficult"
"I lose track of what the author is saying"
"I get so far (1 or 2 pages) then find I can't make any sense of it"
"I find I have to keep going back over stuff I've just read because I can't see what the author is saying"
"After a couple of pages I lose interest"

One major reason for such problems is that students attempt to read the article in the wrong way. They try to read it as if it were a short story, or novel or newspaper report (eg on a soccer match). That is, they start at the beginning and try to read through to the end. So:

There are lots of printed materials that are not intended to be read through from beginning to end. The telephone directory is a clear example. Another example is a technical manual eg for a computer program or a motor car. Although you might read a newspaper article from start to finish, you probably won't read the newspaper itself in that way: you'll look for items that interest you, probably jumping back and forth between items in the newspaper.

Each of these examples requires you to adopt the appropriate approach to reading, depending on the purpose for which the text was produced and your own interests. As a student, you will probably be reading an academic article to be able to grasp what the author is presenting as their key argument. (Note: an 'argument' in academic terms does not mean a 'quarrel' - it means the presentation by the author of what they claim as valid knowledge, with that claim being supported by logical reasoning based either on theory or on evidence, or on both.) All arguments have a structure, so you need to read in such a way that you can recognise the structure.

'Efficiently' means that you do not waste your valuable time; 'effectively' means that you are successful in understanding what you read.

Top class athletes, sportswomen and sportsmen may have some innate aptitude, but they get to be successful through constant training. The athletes that will compete in the next Olympics are already in training, David Beckham is constantly practising kicking free kicks and penalties, Johnny Wilkinson constantly practises drop kicks and penalty shots, etc. But their coaches and trainers advise them on how they are doing, so that they do not practise 'bad habits'.

So it is with reading academic articles. If you read in an inappropriate manner, you are likely to reinforce 'bad habits' - and because it will be a 'bad experience', you will tend to avoid reading, and so not become better at it.

OK, let's have a go at working through an academic article in an appropriate way. To do this we need to see how the author has structured the article. We shall use the article by Eric Flamholtz that have a copy of in your OE209 Module Booklet. Turn to that now, then click on the link below to go to part 2.