SOC 245: Individual and Society--Hegtvedt--Fall 2023

Peer-reviewed Journal

• Journals that have all their articles carefully and systematcially reviewed by subject experts to insure that only the highest quality research is being published. 
   
• The University of Arizona has a good guide on characteristics that distinguish a scholarly journal from a non-scholarly (or popular) journal.
   
• Synonyms: scholarly journal, refereed journal, academic journal.    

Google Scholar is a search tool from Google, separate from its main search engine, with its own URL (http://scholar.google.com). According to Google, its purpose is “to search specifically for scholarly literature, including peer-reviewed papers, theses, books, preprints, abstracts and technical reports from all broad areas of research.”

Google Scholar is an excellent resource. Its strengths are that it is multidisciplinary, easy to search and provides a quick way to locate articles which cite other articles. For example, you can see where an article has been cited by clicking the "Cited by" link at the bottom of the item entry.  For certain articles, Google Scholar will link to cited articles through Web of Science.   

A word of caution, however: Google Scholar does not always connect to Emory sources. A book or journal article may be in the library even if you cannot access it through Google Scholar links. Never purchase an item without checking the library's resources first. Remember, you can also borrow items from other libraries for free.  You can read more about searching effectively in Google Scholar here.  

Finally, in some cases you might find it useful to follow a particular author whose work is especially relevant to your own. Depending on how you set up your preferences, you'll receive an email alert when the author publishes a new article and/or when someone else cites his or her work.  You can learn more about following a public scholar profile here.