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Computing and Engineering

Scholarly, peer-reviewed OR popular news article

            The Library offers a variety of electronic databases to support research assignments and personal interests.  These databases identify articles in scholarly journals, popular magazines and newspapers (also called "periodicals").  Many of the articles are available full text in the databases. 

These databases are not freely available on the Internet; the Library pays a subscription fee for each database.
  

Note below how to distinguish scholarly from popular or news articles.

Scholarly or peer-reviewed journal articles

  • Primary source of information, original research
  • Firsthand report of research
  • Author(s) conducted the research
  • Bibliography included (use to identify additional articles)
  • Peer review of articles for publication (other scholars in that discipline review the article content)

Examples: Bioscience, Nature, Science

  Popular or news articles

  • Secondary source of information
  • Newspapers, magazines and trade publications fall into this category
  • Secondhand report of research
  • Author(s) did not conduct the research
  • No bibliography
  • No peer review (editor or editorial board but not scholars)

Examples: Discover, Science News, Scientific American

Popular vs. Scholalry Articles

Popular: 1.Written by professional journalists 2.Primary audience is the general public 3.General interest stories & opinion pieces 4.Easily understood language 5.Rarely gives bibliographic citations 6.Covers current events Scholarly: 1.Written by researchers or scholars 2.Primary audience is other scholars 3.Original research & inquiry 4.Scholarly or technical language 5.Includes full citations for sources 6.No current events – peer review process is too long

Primary vs. Secondary

Text describing differences between primary and secondary sources.