Assessing Research
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Accordingtoyourselfassessment.docxAccording to your self assessment, you should begin with Identifying Scholarly Resources.
IDENTIFYING SCHOLARLY RESOURCES
WHY START HERE? In an academic environment, it is important to select and rely on sources that are credible and authoritative. For master‘s and doctoral degrees in particular, it is important that you are able to identify scholarly, peer-reviewed resources to support your papers and assignments. You may be unsure what "peer-review" means or what constitutes a scholarly source. Start in the "Identifying Scholarly Resources" section and work your way through the four main sections of Library Research Skills: "Identifying Scholarly Resources", "Defining Your Topic", "Searching Effectively", and "Evaluating Source Quality."
Find Scholarly & Peer Reviewed Sources
Featured Resources
FEATURED RESOURCES
What are peer-reviewed articles? Learn more about the peer-review process and how to identify peer-reviewed articles.
Locating scholarly sources Learn more about the world of scholarly information and how it will contribute to your assignments.
Research on the web can be tricky. Only about 8-10% of scholarly journals publish online for free. The Library has millions of scholarly sources. But how do you tell a scholarly source from a non-scholarly source?
Your assignment may require a primary source. It may say secondary sources aren't allowed for academic writing. What does that mean?
The Library has 100,000s of ebooks. But books are secondary sources. How can they be useful for academic writing?
The Scholarly Research Cycle identifies 6 steps to help you progress through the research and writing process.
What is Scholarly?
It's important to know how to differentiate between scholarly and popular sources. While popular sources such as blogs, websites, Twitter, and magazine articles may be credible, they might not have the level of rigor expected by your program. Scholarly journals continue to be the preferred vehicle for research information. Most scholars publish their works as articles in peer-reviewed journals.
What are peer-reviewed articles?
Peer-reviewed articles are considered the gold standard in academic publishing. The phrase "peer-review" has several synonyms you may hear, such as scholarly, refereed, or juried.
What are peer-reviewed articles and how do I find them
WHAT ARE PEER-REVIEWED ARTICLES AND HOW DO I FIND THEM?
Learn more about the peer-review process and how to identify peer-reviewed articles. View media.
Peer-review is a process many academic journals require before publishing an article to ensure they are publishing the best content. Each research article considered for a peer-reviewed journal must go through critical evaluation by subject experts (usually faculty member peers or other researchers in the field). The article is evaluated on its research methodology, literature review, discussion, results, and conclusions before it is published. If an article does not meet the standards of scholarship in the discipline, it will not be published by the journal.
Primary vs. Secondary Resources
When your instructors talk about primary sources, they are probably referring to published original research studies, not historical documents.
Primary sources are often published in peer-reviewed journals and are valuable because they report a research study on a topic that may not have been studied before. Primary resources (original research studies) generally include the following sections:
· A research question
· Brief literature review
· Description of methodology
· Discussion of results
· Conclusions
If an article does not have these sections it may be a secondary or tertiary resource.
The Scholarly Publishing Cycle
THE SCHOLARLY PUBLISHING CYCLE
See how a primary resource is developed from start to finish. View the media.
Secondary sources, on the other hand, tend to report on primary sources. A literature review article is a secondary source because it evaluates several primary sources on a topic. Secondary resources:
· Evaluate either one or perhaps a group of primary resources
· Do not conduct a research study, but instead comment on the studies that others have done
· May be called a synthesis, an analysis, or a literature review of a particular subject
· Are great sources to use for finding primary resources on a subject
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The publisher Credo shows the difference between secondary and primary sources.
Tertiary resources provide context, background, or overview information on a topic. These are resources such as:
· Subject-specific encyclopedias
· Handbooks on a topic
· Dictionaries or other reference books
Tertiary resources can give you a general overview of your topic or give you additional ideas for describing your topic, which may be helpful as you develop your topic focus and research strategy.
What about Books?
The Library has 100,000s of ebooks. Books are generally considered secondary sources. While they are edited, they do not use the rigorous peer-review process that academic journals do.
Books can still be useful in your research even if they aren’t peer-reviewed.
· They can give context to a topic. They can offer a nice gateway to an area.
· They can steer you in the right direction.
· Because they are much bigger resources, books often have broad subject coverage at a more basic level. They can be more readable than journal articles.
· They can offer references to scholarly articles.
· Try using books to find the names of important authors or founding theorists in a subject area, or to find names of theories or branches within a discipline.
How can I find Books?
Option 1:
1. Search Summon on the library home page.
2. Once you get your results, filter by clicking Books in the left hand navigation.
Option 2:
1. Go to the library home page
2. Go to Databases A-Z
3. Find the “All Database Types” button.
4. Click “Books.”
RESOURCES
Evaluating Source Quality
Get the criteria for differentiating between scholarly and popular sources.
