Research Toolkit

Once you read a couple scholarly articles, it will be easy to recognize others in the future. The number one thing you might notice about scholarly articles is that they are hard to read. Why do we want to read something so hard? Well, as you continue on your journey in education, you will learn how to read these dense and complex texts. It will get easier with practice! Reading scholarly articles will grow your critical reading and thinking skills, increase the depth of your knowledge, and as time goes on, it will help you become a better scholar, too.

This page will help break down and understand what is in a scholarly article

Your article might be scholarly if...

• It tells you who the author is, where they work, the degree(s) they have, or other relevant credentials
• It has headings that follow IMRAD or AIMRAD: Abstract, Introduction, Methods/Methodology, Results, and Discussion
• It uses technical terms or jargon that experts in a field might use
• It discusses other research or scholarly sources, and cites them in-text and in a reference list that you can use to verify the information
• It was published in a peer-reviewed journal

Digging Deeper

Various elements of scholarly sources (author, audience, purpose, review, content, and appearance) provide clues to identify them.  Ask yourself the following questions to help in your assessment.

Author: Does the author have an advanced degree or other credentials that would make them an expert on the topic being discussed (scholarly source)? Or is the author anonymous, a journalist, or someone with unknown credentials (popular source)?
Audience: Who was the source written for? Is it for a broad audience (popular source)?  Or was it written for other experts, researchers, or students (scholarly source)?
Purpose: Why was the source written? Is it for entertainment or news related (popular source), or does it report on original research or add to the body of knowledge on a topic (scholarly source)?
Content: Is the source written at a level so the general public could understand the content (popular source)?  Or does it contain more technical language that experts in a field use (scholarly source)?
Appearance: Are there colorful images or art present (popular source)?  Or is it mostly mostly text with charts, tables, and technical images (scholarly source)? Does the source have introduction, methods, results, and discussion sections (scholarly source)?

If you haven't already taken a look at the Research Guide, please start there. The basics of research, using the library Search and Discover! and databases, and instructions on searching the web are all there. This guide is meant to supplement the information found there, and further your understanding of the process.

If you haven't already taken a look at the Research Guide, please start there. The basics of research, using the library Search and Discover! and databases, and instructions on searching the web are all there. This guide is meant to supplement the information found there, and further your understanding of the process.