How to read philosophy papers and articles more efficiently (especially for research purposes)?

Question

Very often philosophy papers/articles/essays by some influential contemporary philosophers do not have an abstract/introduction/synopsis. Some articles, such as a recorded talk given by the author at a seminar, may even start with some rambling. This adds difficulty to research, as it is harder to decide whether the article is relevant to my topic. Besides, I find different authors have different styles, and their lexicon and structure may probably vary. Are there universally helpful ways to read philosophy papers and articles efficiently, especially for the purpose of research?

Answer 1

You can search for keywords.

You can look at a synopsis about the author on their institutions website, or information from databases like Academia.edu, at least of other paper titles (admittedly it's not great).

It's not as easy as in the sciences, & a lot more of the critical work is in books rather than essays or papers. Read like hell is the key, I'd say. Skim through things, go deeper if you detect relevance or good signs.

Try to pre-select with recommendations from the community or other indicators of quality or relevance, like citations.