Scholarly, Academic, Peer Reviewed or
Refereed Journal Articles
Usually about a concept, issue or problem
Not up to date about news, products, etc as trade or
professional publications.
Studies or observations
Sophisticated writing style using jargon related to discipline
Usually written by professors or researchers
Go through a review process of the author(s) peers.
Lengthy (>5 pages-may include charts, graphs, formulas.)
In-text References (Marks, 2004)
Bibliography and summary at end.
Journals (hardcopy) have little or no advertising. Black and
white. May have book reviews or meeting announcements.
Other Attributes of Scholarly Journals
 Usually have titles which include the following words:
 Quarterly, Journal of , Review, Perspectives,
Proceedings of
 Beginning of article usually gives an abstract (brief
summary of 50-150 words), along with keywords.
Keywords may be useful as search terms.
 End of article usually summarizes the study or
findings or conclusions.
Read abstract to determine usefulness.
Note keywords
In-text citations
Reference List -may be used to obtain
additional articles
Trade or Professional Journals
 Usually in color
 Ads for products, reviews, current news.
 Glossy paper
 Articles are usually short in length
 No in-text citations
 No bibliography at end of articles
 Usually come out weekly or monthly
 Staff writers or professionals who are guest
writers as opposed to professors.
Trade Journal Article
Database Searching Tips
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And-combines terms. Less results
Or –synonyms –expands results
Not –to eliminate words
Try using Subject searching if possible rather than keywords.
Search for keywords/subjects in abstract if possible. More
focused!
 Limit to scholarly, peer-reviewed, academic or refereed journals.
Unique to each database.
 Note: Even though the database(s) allow you to set these limits,
what they say is scholarly is not always.
 Look for the attributes mentioned previously to determine if it really
is.
More Tips
 Use synonyms.
 Combine synonyms using OR
 Keep synonyms together using (parentheses) A.K.A. nesting
 (motor vehicle or car)
(managerial or management) and (accounting)
Or
(managerial accounting or management accounting)
Truncation
 Truncation-uses root of word and symbol(s) to
give variant endings - saves you having to come
up with them.
 Database dependent. Use help screens.
 Uses symbols (!, *, ?)
 account! -results in the following:
 account, accounts, accounted, accounting
Article Linker & Find Journals by Title
 Article Linker -looks for articles in other databases.
 Green arrow -click on it to link to another database
 If article or journal not found, you can interlibrary loan.
(library obtains from another library)
 Find Journals by Title:
Tells which databases have journal and the coverage
in years.
Also tells if in print and/or microfilm in the library.