Articles - Popular or Scholarly?

Here is a quick checklist of criteria to help you determine if a resource is scholarly:

• Always list authors and author's affiliations.
• Technical, specialized vocabulary.
• Reports on experiments, studies or literature reviews.
• Graphs, tables, data.
• Always includes footnotes or citations.

• print version fairly plain
• typically published no more than 4 times a year
• may contain a few ads related to academia
• articles are typically lengthy (15-20 pages)
• an abstract (summary of the article) usually precedes the article
• reports of original research (typically includes a literature review, presentation of the methods, and a discussion of the findings), in-depth analysis of issues in the discipline, or in-depth book reviews
• typically peer-reviewed (examined and approved by other experts in the field)
• articles written by experts (typically, professors or researchers)
• author's credentials (degree, title, affiliation) and contact information are typically provided
• assumes reader's familiarity with the subject matter and knowledge of specific vocabulary
• often includes tables, graphs and/or formulas
• always includes footnotes/endnotes and a bibliography/references
• in an online database you may see this icon:

This video, from Cornell University, highlights what to look for in a scholarly journal article. Contact the LCCC Library staff for more help.