Analyzing academic (scientific) papers

Standard structure What is the state of the field, the problem that needs investigation? This is usually covered in the Introduction or Literature Review; don't attribute findings here to the paper's authors What is the specific next step this research is taking? This is usually stated as a Research Question (RQ), or Hypothesis (Hi) or series of those; what's the difference between an RQ and an H? How is this next step carried out? This is the Methods or Methodology section What evidence was found? This is the Results, often referring back to the RQs or Hi What can be concluded from this research, and how do we move forward? This is usually the Discussion, sometimes the Conclusion. Note that it almost always includes suggestions for further research.

Research papers as discourse There is a discourse community that has shared knowledge and understanding not usually known by the general public. Research proceeds incrementally, with each study building on work that came before. They are generally not carried out in isolation. As a discourse community, researchers in each field share a language, tone and rhetorical style.