Please see the Library's Scholarly vs. Peer Reviewed Journals quick tutorial video for brief instructions on scholarly vs. peer-reviewed journals.
A scholarly publication is regarded as scholarly if it is authored by experts for experts. The publication is academic in focus as it reports original research (experimentation), research methodology, or theory. Generally, scholarly journals target professional or academic researchers and provide detailed analyses concentrating on a single discipline or academic field. The publisher is typically a professional association or an academic press. Not all scholarly journals use a peer-review process.
Peer-Review Process
Before publication, articles are submitted and undergo a rigorous assessment that involves review and approval by the author’s peers (experts in the same subject area). The evaluations are similar to editing notes, where the author receives detailed and constructive feedback from the peer experts. However, these reviews are not made available publicly. For an example, peer review of a fictitious article, click here. Peer-reviewed journals publish articles only if they have passed through the official editorial process. The peer review and evaluation system safeguards, maintains, and improves the quality of scholarly materials published in serials.
Again, it is important to remember that not all scholarly journals go through the peer review process. Also, different databases provide different search limiters. For example:
- Checking the Scholarly/Peer Reviewed limiter in the Library's NavigatorSearch or EBSCOhost Databases will result in only journals that are intended for an academic audience and are peer-reviewed. For more information on how EBSCO defines peer-reviewed articles, click here.
- ProQuest has separate limiters for scholarly and peer-reviewed content.
- Other databases (such as SpringerLink, Taylor & Francis, Wiley Online, etc.) include only peer-reviewed journals and, therefore, do not have checkboxes to limit this type of content.
It is also important to remember that just because a journal is peer-reviewed does not guarantee that all articles are included in the peer-review process. Some articles in a peer-reviewed journal, such as news items, editorials, and reviews, will not be peer-reviewed.
Faculty and students will need to determine whether they are reading a book review, editorial, introduction, etc., coming from a peer-reviewed journal versus an actual research study, for example. The databases will typically not make this distinction for you. For further characteristics of primary/scholarly studies, please see the Library's Academic and Popular Resources page.
Check for Peer-Review Verification
To alleviate any confusion, the Library recommends using the Ulrichsweb database to determine whether or not a particular journal is peer-reviewed/refereed. To access Ulrichsweb, go to the Library’s home page and click A-Z Databases. In the example below, we can determine that Democracy & Education is not peer-reviewed by checking the publication title in Ulrichsweb, as shown below. The black and white striped referee shirt icon indicates that it is peer-reviewed.
For further information about how to use Ulrichsweb (including instructional screenshots), please see the Library's FAQ here.
