scholarly -- each fact or opinion is documented

Scholarly documentation provides the exact source -- including the author and the page number -- for every important bit of outside information. The article should end with a detailed bibliography. Footnotes or endnotes may be present.

• Offering a list of "recommendations for further reading" or a vague collection of "sources" is not enough.
• The article will probably be long, complex, and possibly difficult for a non-expert to understand right away.

peer-reviewed -- selected and approved by a panel of experts

Each academic journal has a peer review board (a panel of experts) that decides which submissions are acceptable for publication. The review board may send a paper back to the author with suggestions for improvement.

The peer review process doesn't simply involve circling spelling mistakes. The review board will investigate and challenge the author's major assumptions and conclusions, and if the board feels the article is worth further consideration, the author will have a chance to respond. If the article does appear in the journal, you can feel confident that people who know a lot more than you do about a particular topic have identified a particular article as a trustworthy source.

If the topic is the subject of a lot of scholarly attention, some other scholar in the field is likely to publish a new article that challenges the mistakes is the kind of work that is carried out by other scholars in the field, who may wish to publish a new article that challenges or corrects certain details in a published article.)

Reality Check: Peer Review Isn't Perfect.

In an earlier edition of this handout, I presented a much more idealistic view of peer review, for the benefit of my undergraduate students who hadn't come across that term before. But some feedback I found online prompted me to go into a little more depth.

See "The Limits of Peer-Review (Sidebar)."

An undergraduate is still better off citing a peer-reviewed article than something posted in "Crazy Joe's Term Paper Archive," but journalists should check out a peer-reviewed source with just as much thoroughness and skepticism as they would check out any other source. The old newswriting saw still applies: "If your mother says she loves you, check it out." (See also: Academic Journals -- Compared to Magazines.)

written by experts -- not by journalists

Academic journals will typically identify their contributors as professors, graduate students, or others with first-hand experience with the subject matter. If the article credits the author as a journalist ("staff writer", "correspondent" or "special" freelance contributor) then you are probably reading a magazine.

• A journalist may very well produce a thoughtful, insightful, and important overview of a current issue in an academic field, but the journalist's job is to summarize and explain what other people do.
• Without those others doing the academic work, an academic reporter would have no story to report. (See also: Academic Journals -- Compared to Magazines.)

Dennis G. Jerz
28 Dec 1999 -- First posted.
10 Dec 2002 -- Minor updates.
22 Jan 2007 -- Toned down a too-idealistic description of peer review.