Know the difference between empirical and review articles.
Empirical article
An empirical (research) article reports methods and findings of an original research study conducted by the authors of the article.
Literature Review article
A review article or "literature review" discusses past research studies on a given topic.
Indexes journals, books, book chapters, book reviews, dissertations and conference papers in sociology and related disciplines.
The following databases cover disciplines outside of social psychology but which may be related to your topic. Include the term "psychology" as one of your search terms.
Access business and management journals and trade magazines from U.S. and international sources. Includes full text journals, dissertations, working papers, and popular business and economics periodicals.
Know the difference between scholarly and non-scholarly articles.
"Scholarly" journal = "Peer-Reviewed" journal = "Refereed" journal
When researching your topic, you may come across many different types of sources and articles. When evaluating these sources, it is important to think about:
Scholarly | Popular |
Written by experts, like academics, scientists, scholars, etc. | Written by generalists, such as journalists, bloggers, etc. |
Written for specialists or students in the field. |
Written for the general population. |
Written with scholarly or technical language. | Easy to read, or will define any specialized terms. |
Will include a full bibliography of the sources that are cited. | No formal citations, or may not have any citations. |
Published in an academic journal. | Published in a newspaper, magazine, or blog. |
Are often peer-reviewed. | Are edited in-house or self-edited. |
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Here are helpful links and guides to check out for more information on scholarly sources:
Google Scholar searches specifically for scholarly literature, including peer-reviewed papers, theses, books, preprints, abstracts and technical reports from all broad areas of research.