Research Basics

How do I know if a Book is scholarly?

Scholarly books have:

1. Authors who are experts on the topic

• They often have advanced degrees in the field of the topic.

2. Scholarly publishers

• Often you will find University Press in the name, but not always.
• Other scholarly publishers include Springer, Praeger, Routledge, Polity, and Gale.

3. Citations

• All statistics and previous studies will be cited.
• Citations will be to other scholarly sources.

How do I know if an Article is scholarly/peer reviewed?

To find scholarly/peer reviewed journals, simply use the limiters provided.

Some databases do not include this limiter because ALL of their resources are peer reviewed. 

If you do not see a limiter, use Ulrich's to verify a journal's scholarly/peer reviewed status.

• In Ulrich's, peer reviewed is called Refereed.