Ivy Tech Libraries: ENGL 111-Columbus: Comparing Scholarly & Magazine Articles

The Differences

Comparing Scholarly Journals with Magazines was produced by Diane Duesterhoeft at St. Mary's University.

Articles from scholarly journals, also called peer-reviewed, academic, refereed, or professional journals, are often required or strongly recommended by faculty at the university level for use in writing research papers and projects. This criteria is especially true for upper division courses and is essential in quality graduate work. These are some characteristics that distinguish scholarly journals from other periodicals:

	News, Opinion, or Popular	Trade	Scholarly
Author	Journalist, freelance writer, editorial staff; might not be named	Staff writers, freelance authors	Researcher or scholar in the field; credentials listed
Audience	General public	Specific industry, trade, organization, or profession; jargon often used	Other scholars, professionals, or students familiar with the field
What is the purpose of the publication?	To inform or entertain	To describe issues, problems, or trends in the field	To report original research, experiments, or theories
Are sources cited?	Sources may be cited or identified, but usually not	Sometimes, usually not	Always have footnotes or bibliography
Who publishes it?	Commercial enterprise or an interest organization	Commercial enterprise, trade association	Professional association or commercial enterprise
Appearance in print?	May have glossy pages may have colorful photos and images lots of advertising	Cover depicts industrial setting glossy paper pictures and illustrations in color advertising related to the field each issue starts with page 1	Somber, serious may have charts, graphs, equations limited advertising little or no color
Examples	Popular: Hispanic, Jet, People; News or general interest: Nation, Newsweek, Time	Advertising Age, Progressive Grocer	Harvard Educational Review, Journal of Marriage and Family, Social Science Quarterly, Theological Studies

Research articles written for scholarly journals are heavily reviewed and revised before being accepted for publication. Guidelines for contributors are usually listed somewhere in the publication. Articles are often anonymously reviewed by several other subject experts; this process is called "peer review" and such a periodical is considered a "refereed journal.