InfoGuides: Communication Disorders 6315: Research in Communication Disorders: Is It Scholarly?

Scholarly Articles

You should only use scholarly articles for this research assignment.

Scholarly articles are found in journals, not magazines. They are written by experts for experts

But not everything in a journal is scholarly, such as:

letters to the editor
editorials
book reviews

See more information about recognizing scholarly articles in Types of Periodicals.

Databases - Scholarly Articles Only

Some databases only contain (or index) journal articles. Therefore, you will not have to verify that articles are scholarly in those databases. Examples include:

Sage Journals Online This link opens in a new window
Full-text from 860+ scholarly journals, with excellent coverage for criminology, psychology, sociology, health sciences and the humanities. Numerous journals also cover education, general and international business, and management.
Format: Full-text, Coverage: 1999-present, Truncation and Wildcard: * and *, Search Tips: Search results may include material earlier than our subscription. DO NOT pay for articles: use our Interlibrary Loan
ScienceDirect This link opens in a new window
Broad science coverage, emphasizing life sciences, health sciences, engineering, earth sciences, agriculture, and pharmacology. Full text from over 3800 journals and chapters from over 5300 books. Also includes business, management and accounting; economics, econometrics and finance, and social science.
Format: Full-text, Coverage: Varies by title, most 1990-present, Truncation and Wildcard: ! and *, Search Tips: Default search assumes entered term is a phrase. Can search for terms in abstract/title/keywords, full-text , author, journal title, etc. Use singular for terms that form regular plurals. For irregular plurals, combine both terms with OR. Greek letters are spelled out in English. Super and subscripts appear inline. Browsable help lists. Journal list.
Web of Science This link opens in a new window
Simultaneously search the most important journals in the social sciences, physical sciences, mathematics, the humanities, and visual and performing arts. Includes 'high impact' scholarly sources. Search by author, topic, affiliation, etc., or follow links to cited sources. Create an individualized sign-in to save results, set up search alerts, and gain access to citation management with the My EndNote Web service. Includes Arts & Humanities Citation Index (AHCI), Social Sciences Citation Index (SSCI), Science Citation Index (SCI).
Format: Citations; some full-text via link resolver, Coverage: 1970-present, Truncation and Wildcard: * and * for (any), ? for (1), $ for (0 or 1), Search Tips: Default search is for terms in the order they are entered, use quotation marks for a phrase. Search options include author, title, keyword, and subject. Author first name is initials only. Supports logical connectors AND, OR, NOT, and SAME. Can limit to one or two of the included indexes.

Scholarly Articles: Using Results List - Discover

If you search for articles using Discover, check the box for Scholarly Articles. It will automatically search for scholarly, peer-reviewed journals.

The search results will show the facet Peer-reviewed Journals is being used to filter the search results.

Using Ulrich's - Search the Database Yourself

The Ulrichsweb Global Serials Directory is a comprehensive international list of online and print journals, magazines, newspapers.

You may directly search the title of a "serial" publication in Ulrichsweb to be 100% certain that it is a scholarly journal.

Read the Basic Description for information on Serial Type/Content Type. It is a scholarly journal if it states:

Serial type: Journal
Content type: Academic Scholarly

Peer-reviewed journals are considered the most authoritative of scholarly journals. The articles are reviewed by experts who specialize in the same scholarly area as the author. A publication is "peer reviewed" if it states:

Refereed: Yes

A trade journal may be reputable, but it is NOT a scholarly journal. Even if the word "journal" is in the name of a publication, it is NOT necessarily a scholarly journal.

A trade newspaper may be reputable, but it is not a scholarly journal.