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If scholarly or non-scholarly sources are used in a paper, the sources can greatly affect the quality of the paper. Most of us have heard that scholarly sources should be used in our research papers. But how do we know if a source is scholarly or not? This handout will help us answer that question so we can easily distinguish between scholarly and non-scholarly sources.

Let’s first look at the different kinds of periodicals. Here are the five general types that can help categorize periodicals, ordered from the most scholarly to the least scholarly.

1. Academic Journals
   Ex.: JAMA, Journal of Education, Journal of Business Strategies
2. Trade Publications
   Ex.: Publishers Weekly, Information Today, Advertising Age
3. General Interest Publications
   Ex.: Economist, National Geographic, Scientific American
4. Popular Publications
   Ex.: People, Reader’s Digest, Time
5. Sensational Publications
   Ex.: National Enquirer, Star, Globe
    

Now that we understand the differences between the five types of periodicals, we can now look at the characteristics of scholarly and non-scholarly sources. These characteristics can serve as a general guideline to help us determine if a source is scholarly or not.

• Scholarly sources
• Non-scholarly sources

Next, please see the table that compares the characteristics of scholarly and non-scholarly sources. This table is a very useful tool for determining quickly if a source is scholarly or not.

For additional information about this topic, you might review the VC/UHV library’s webpage “What is a Scholarly Journal?” at the following link: http://vcuhvlibrary.uhv.edu/study/journals.cfm.

Copyright 2006 by the Academic Center, the University of Houston-Victoria, and David Felts.

Created 2006 by David Felts.

Copyright 2006 by the Academic Center and the University of Houston-Victoria

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