Finding Scholarly Information

Interpretations of what constitutes scholarly information vary. Scholarly information is generally defined as information written by academics in a particular field of study for a mostly academic audience and is published/edited by a university or scholarly society.   Some scholarly publications, although not all, are peer-reviewed (refereed) and it is these publications that are held in high esteem in academic circles.
 

Peer-reviewed journals contain articles which have been reviewed, edited and approved by recognised experts.  Since the authors' peers have examined the originality and significance of the articles and advised the editor(s) to publish, peer-reviewed journals are considered to be academically credible and an excellent source of information for your university study.
 

Using appropriate journal databases can increase your access to peer-reviewed resources.  The following are examples of databases which contain some of the scholarly Education literature:

• A+Education
• Proquest
• EricIndex
• Scopus
• Current Abstracts
• Humanities International Complete
• Synergy

While not all journals in these databases will be peer-reviewed, many of the peer-reviewed, highly cited, highly regarded journals in the social sciences are included in these databases

Other databases also contain scholarly, including peer-reviewed Education-related publications.  A list of Education-related databases can be found via the Library's SearchSMART page.
 

There are several ways to check whether a journal is peer-reviewed:

• Print copies of journals will usually state that the journal is refereed/peer-reviewed (e.g. under journal details, or information for contributors)

• The Ulrichsweb database will state if a journal is refereed (Urichsweb uses the term refereed rather than peer-reviewed).  To check if a journal is refereed:
   
  1. Select Ulrichsweb  
  
  2. Perform a 'Title (Exact)' search (entering the exact journal title)
  
  3. Select the relevant journal title on the results page (sometimes there may be more than one journal with the same title).  If the journal is refereed (peer-reviewed), this will be stated in the basic description.
   

• Some databases (e.g. Infotrac) allow you to limit your search to peer-reviewed articles.

• Some of the full-text databases (e.g. Synergy) contain only peer-reviewed publications. In these databases there are usually links to individual journal homepages, where you can examine the information provided to ascertain if the journal is peer-reviewed.

Note: Not all items in a peer-reviewed journal will be peer-reviewed  (e.g. editorial, letters, some reviews, announcements etc).
 

For more information about the reviewing process, see the UMSL Libraries' Peer Review Subject Guide.