| Course | BUS 700 Introduction to Business Administration in Doctoral Study (BUS/700) |
|---|---|
| Week | 2 |
| Paper type | Doctoral scholarly reading paper |
| Length | about 1,161 words, 4 double-spaced pages plus title page and references |
| Format | APA 7 student paper |
| School | University of Phoenix |
| Program | DBA |
| Updated | October 2026 |
Free sample paper for BUS 700 Week 2
Reading Like a Scholar: How a Bank Manager Learned to Read, Evaluate and Use Three Research Articles
[Student Name]
University of Phoenix
BUS/700: Introduction to Business Administration in Doctoral Study
Week 2 Assignment
[Instructor Name]
[Date]
The doctoral student and Buckeye Valley Bank are composites written for a model paper.
Marcus Bell, a composite DBA student and director of retail operations at Buckeye Valley Bank in Ohio, identified a practical problem in Week 1: why older small business owners adopt mobile banking slowly, especially after branch closures. His instinct was to search the internet and skim articles. His instructor asked him instead to read three peer-reviewed studies in full and evaluate them. Managers read to find answers quickly; scholars read to understand how an answer was reached and whether it can be trusted. This paper describes how Marcus learned to read like a scholar.
Types of Scholarly Sources
Peer-reviewed empirical articles report original research and have been evaluated by independent experts. Review articles synthesize many studies. Conceptual articles develop theory without new data. Books and dissertations offer depth. Trade publications, consultant reports and websites can provide context but are not scholarly evidence. Doctoral work relies primarily on peer-reviewed sources.
Finding Articles
Marcus searched the university library's business and social science databases using terms such as technology acceptance, mobile banking, small business owners and branch closures, filtering for peer-reviewed articles. He followed citations backward to classic studies and forward, using citation searches, to newer work. He kept a search log of terms and databases so he could repeat or extend the search later, a habit that will matter when he writes a formal literature review.
A Three-Pass Reading Strategy
In the first pass, Marcus read the title, abstract, introduction, headings and conclusion to understand the question and claims. In the second pass, he read the full text, focusing on the argument and evidence. In the third pass, he evaluated the methods, assumptions and limitations and noted questions.
Article One: Perceived Usefulness and Ease of Use
Davis (1989) asked why people accept or reject information technology and proposed two beliefs that drive acceptance: whether a tool will help users do their work and whether it will be easy to use. Using studies of users with workplace software, he developed measurement scales and found that perceived usefulness was more strongly linked to usage than ease of use.
Evaluating Article One
The study is foundational and its measures have been widely used. Its limitations include samples of workplace users in the 1980s using specific software, which may not represent small business owners using mobile banking decades later. For Marcus, the key insight is that older owners may adopt mobile banking if they see it as useful, regardless of age, a challenge to his assumption that age itself is the barrier.
Article Two: A Unified Model
Venkatesh et al. (2003) compared eight models of technology acceptance and proposed a unified theory with four main determinants: performance expectancy, effort expectancy, social influence and facilitating conditions, with age, gender, experience and voluntariness moderating some relationships. Testing the model in organizations, they found it explained more variance in intentions than earlier models.
Evaluating Article Two
The study is broader and includes age as a moderator, directly relevant to Marcus's question. Its data came from employees adopting workplace systems, where use may be required, unlike customers choosing whether to bank on their phones. Marcus notes that facilitating conditions, such as help from branch staff, may matter more for voluntary customer adoption.
Article Three: Branch Closings and Local Lending
Nguyen (2019) studied bank branch closings in the United States and found that closings led to a lasting decline in small business lending in the immediate area, with effects concentrated within a few miles of the closed branch, suggesting that local relationships and information matter in lending.
Evaluating Article Three
The study uses large datasets and a design that compares areas affected by closings due to bank mergers with similar areas, strengthening causal claims. It addresses lending rather than technology adoption, but it shows that branch closings have real consequences for small businesses, raising the stakes of Marcus's problem.
Reading Across Disciplines
The three articles come from information systems and economics, fields with different conventions. Information systems studies often use surveys and statistical models of beliefs and intentions, while economics studies use large administrative datasets and designs that try to isolate causes. Marcus found economics articles harder to read because of their mathematical notation, but learned to focus on the identification strategy, the explanation of why the comparison isolates the effect of interest. Reading across disciplines gives a fuller view of a business problem than any single field.
Judging Credibility
Marcus assessed credibility using several signals: publication in respected peer-reviewed journals, clear descriptions of data and methods, discussion of limitations and how often other researchers have cited and built on the work. He also checked whether later studies challenged the findings. Davis's measures, for example, have been refined but not overturned, while newer work has added factors such as trust and habit.
What the Articles Leave Out
None of the articles studies small business owners as mobile banking users, and none examines whether digital tools can substitute for the relationships lost when branches close. The technology studies focus on employees in workplaces, and the lending study focuses on credit, not on how owners manage day-to-day banking. Identifying these omissions is as important as summarizing what the studies found.
Comparing the Articles
The first two articles explain why people adopt technology; the third shows what is lost when physical branches close. Together they suggest a question: can mobile banking replace the relationships and information branches provided, and what conditions help older business owners adopt it? None of the articles answers this directly, indicating a possible gap.
Reading Time and Habits
Reading the three articles carefully took Marcus about 11 hours, far longer than he expected. The first pass took 20 minutes per article, the second about two hours and the third, with note-taking, up to three hours for the economics study. He now schedules reading in 90-minute blocks early in the morning, when he is least likely to be interrupted, and keeps a running list of terms to look up rather than stopping to search each one.
Recording Notes for Synthesis
Marcus created a reading log with columns for citation, question, theory, method, sample, findings, limitations, relevance and his questions, stored in a reference manager so notes stay linked to each source. Structured notes will make it easier to compare dozens of studies when he writes a literature review.
Lessons About Scholarly Reading
Marcus learned that methods sections reveal what claims can bear, that abstracts often state findings more confidently than the full text, that classic studies need updating for new contexts and that reading across disciplines, information systems and economics, enriches understanding of a business problem.
Conclusion
Scholarly reading requires finding the right sources, reading in passes, evaluating methods and limits and connecting studies. Applying this approach to three articles helped Marcus challenge his assumptions about age and technology, recognize the consequences of branch closures and identify a gap that could shape his doctoral research.
References
Davis, F. D. (1989). Perceived usefulness, perceived ease of use, and user acceptance of information technology. MIS Quarterly, 13(3), 319-340. https://doi.org/10.2307/249008
Nguyen, H.-L. Q. (2019). Are credit markets still local? Evidence from bank branch closings. American Economic Journal: Applied Economics, 11(1), 1-32. https://doi.org/10.1257/app.20170543
Venkatesh, V., Morris, M. G., Davis, G. B., & Davis, F. D. (2003). User acceptance of information technology: Toward a unified view. MIS Quarterly, 27(3), 425-478. https://doi.org/10.2307/30036540
What the BUS 700 Week 2 instructions ask
The second BUS 700 assignment usually asks doctoral students to demonstrate scholarly reading skills. Typical requirements include distinguishing types of sources, locating peer-reviewed articles through library databases, summarizing and evaluating articles' purpose, theory, methods, findings and limitations, comparing articles and explaining how they relate to a topic of professional interest. Some prompts ask for an annotated reading of specific articles. Read original sources rather than summaries, evaluate methods as well as conclusions, connect articles to one another and cite sources in APA format. Explain why each article was chosen and how it relates to the question you care about. Show how notes taken now will support a literature review later.
How this BUS 700 Week 2 example is built
A manager used to executive summaries must learn to read research articles that are long, technical and cautious, and the paper shows how. It distinguishes peer-reviewed empirical studies, reviews and conceptual papers from trade articles. A three-pass method moves from skimming structure to understanding arguments to evaluating methods. The student applies it to two classic studies on why people accept new technology and an economics study showing that bank branch closings reduce local small business lending. For each, he records the question, theory, method, findings and limitations, judges relevance to older business owners and notes connections among the three for future synthesis.
BUS 700 Week 2 grading rubric: where the points go
Strong scholarly reading papers show the student reading actively and critically. Faculty credit accurate summaries of each article's purpose, theory, method, findings and limitations; evaluation of the quality and fit of evidence; recognition of differences between disciplines and designs; and connections across articles that point toward synthesis. Explaining a systematic reading and note-taking strategy shows developing doctoral habits. Clear organization and correct APA citations are expected. Noticing what an article does not show, as well as what it does, demonstrates critical reading. Faculty also value attention to how each study's setting, such as workplace software or merger-driven closings, limits what it can say about another context, and a note-taking system that will support synthesis later.
BUS 700 Week 2 help: mistakes to avoid
Students often summarize abstracts rather than reading full articles. Read the methods and limitations sections. Another frequent gap is accepting conclusions without considering sample, context and design. Ask whether the findings apply to your setting. Students also read articles in isolation; compare them. Avoid relying on secondary summaries or websites. Keep structured notes for each article. Distinguish theory from findings. Finally, record your own questions as you read, since they often become the seeds of a research problem. Note how long each article took to read well; early in a doctoral program, careful reading is slow, and planning for that prevents rushed, shallow notes later. Revisit difficult articles after a week, since understanding often improves on a second reading.
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BUS 700 Week 2 questions, answered
What does BUS 700 Week 2 usually cover?
It usually covers scholarly reading: types of sources, finding peer-reviewed articles, a strategy for reading research, evaluating purpose, theory, methods, findings and limitations and connecting articles to a topic.
Where can I find a free BUS 700 Week 2 sample paper?
A complete scholarly reading paper that analyzes three research articles for a bank manager's topic, with notes, appears on this page. DBA students who send their article list can receive a complimentary draft.
What is a three-pass reading strategy?
An approach in which the reader first skims an article's structure and main claims, then reads for the argument and evidence and finally evaluates methods, assumptions and limitations in detail.
How do you evaluate a research article?
Consider the clarity of its question, the fit of its theory, the quality of its methods and data, whether conclusions follow from evidence, its limitations and its relevance to your context.
What is the difference between a peer-reviewed article and a trade article?
Peer-reviewed articles are evaluated by independent experts before publication and report research methods and evidence, while trade articles share news or opinions without formal review.
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