peer reviewed articles vs literature review

Kinesiology: Peer Review vs Literature Review

• Peer Review vs Literature Review

What is Peer Review?

Peer Review is a critical part of evaluating information. It is a process that journals use to ensure the articles they publish represent the best scholarship currently available, and articles from peer reviewed journal are often grounded in empirical research. When an article is submitted to a peer reviewed journal, the editors send it out to other scholars in the same field (the author's peers) to get their opinion on the quality of the scholarship, its relevance to the field, its appropriateness for the journal, etc. Sometimes, you'll see this referred to as "refereed." 

Publications that don't use peer review (Time, Cosmo, Salon) rely on an editor to determine the value of an article. Their goal is mainly to educate or entertain the general public, not to support scholarly research.

Some of the library’s databases will allow you to limit your search to scholarly journals. When you enter your search term(s), you can check the  Peer Reviewed  boxes and run your search with confidence that results will be from peer reviewed journals.  The image below is from an EBSCO database, CINAHL. 

KEEP IN MIND THAT PEER REVIEWED JOURNALS ALSO CONTAIN INFORMATION THAT IS NOT PEER REVIEWED  -- book reviews, letters to the editor, short commentary and editorial commentary are not peer reviewed. 

You can access  Ulrich's Web  to see if a particular journal is peer reviewed. (highlighted stars mean that those titles are peer reviewed).

If you are unsure, please reach out to your Librarian and we will assist you. 

Search Tips

Interfaces and search options vary across databases, but best practices for searching are relatively consistent across interfaces. No matter which database you choose, remember these important tips...

1) Don't search wth your topic as a single phrase!  Determine the key concepts of your topic. Then place each concept in its own search bar.  For example...

2) Use ORs  to string together synonyms or related terms for core concepts...

3) Use truncation,  when appropriate. Adding an * to the end of a word will catch all forms of that word. For example,  teach*  will return  teach, teachers, teaching , etc.

4) Look for the "peer reviewed" limit  in each database. You can set this limit on the main search screen (before you search) or narrow your results after you've started your search. Typically, this option is available in the Advanced Search settings.

5) Set Date and Full Text limits  as appropriate for your topic..

APA Resources

Basics of Seventh Edition APA Style Free Tutorial from the American Psychological Association

Purdue OWL APA Formatting and Style

• Student Paper Checklist (Concise Guide Version) Use this checklist while writing your paper to make sure it is consistent with seventh edition APA Style. This checklist corresponds to the writing and formatting guidelines described in full in the Concise Guide to APA Style (7th ed.).

What is a Lit Review?

Think of scholarly papers like a conversation. A paper takes a look at what people are saying on a particular topic and then adds something new to the conversation based on their own research. A literature review is how scholars get caught up on the conversation so they will know what to say or ask next.

A literature review can be just a simple summary of the sources, but it usually has an organizational pattern and combines both summary and synthesis.

A summary is a recap of the important information of the source, but a synthesis is a re-organization, or a reshuffling, of that information. It might give a new interpretation of old material or combine new with old interpretations. Or it might trace the intellectual progression of the field, including major debates.

Literature review

A literature review is a critical summary of what the scientific literature says about your specific topic or question. Often student research in APA fields falls into this category. Your professor might ask you to write this kind of paper to demonstrate your familiarity with work in the field pertinent to the research you hope to conduct. 

While the APA Publication Manual does not require a specific order for a literature review, a good literature review typically contains the following components:

• Introduction
• Thesis statement
• Summary and synthesis of sources
• List of references

Some instructors may also want you to write an abstract for a literature review, so be sure to check with them when given an assignment. Also, the length of a literature review and the required number of sources will vary based on course and instructor preferences.

NOTE:  A literature review and an annotated bibliography are  not  synonymous. While both types of writing involve examining sources, the literature review seeks to synthesize the information and draw connections between sources. If you are asked to write an annotated bibliography, you should consult the  Publication Manual of the American Psychological Association  for the APA Format for Annotated Bibliographies.

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Q. What's the difference between a research article and a review article?

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Answered By: Sarah Naomi Campbell Last Updated: Sep 07, 2018     Views: 218813

Watch this short video to learn about types of scholarly articles, including research articles and literature reviews!

Not in the mood for a video? Read on!

What's the difference between a research article and a review article?

Research articles , sometimes referred to as empirical  or primary sources , report on original research. They will typically include sections such as an introduction, methods, results, and discussion.

Here is a more detailed explanation of research articles .

Review articles , sometimes called literature reviews  or secondary sources , synthesize or analyze research already conducted in primary sources. They generally summarize the current state of research on a given topic.

Here is a more detailed explanation of review articles .

The video above was created by the Virginia Commonwealth University Libraries .

The defintions, and the linked detailed explanations, are paraphrased from the Publication Manual of the American Psychological Association , 6th ed .

The linked explanations are provided by the Mohawk Valley Community College Libraries .

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Q. What's the difference between peer-reviewed literature and material like white papers and policy briefs?

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Answered By: James Adams Last Updated: Mar 14, 2024     Views: 4173

Articles in a peer-reviewed or "refereed" journal are reviewed prior to publication by experts (usually faculty members) with credentials in the article's field of study. Many Harvard article databases allow you to limit your search results to only include peer-reviewed journals.

Other material like white papers and policy briefs that are not peer-reviewed can still be valuable for your research. Relevant preprints that will eventually be peer-reviewed or gray literature unlikely to be published in a journal could be included as long as they pass the C.R.A.A.P. test, evaluating Currency , Relevancy , Authority , Accuracy , and Purpose . 

A good strategy for finding gray literature is to conduct a search in the HKS Library Customized Google Think Tank search , which includes over 700 think tank sites from across the world. If you are uncertain about whether to include grey literature in your research project, check with your class instructor.

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About Systematic Reviews

A Peer Review vs a Systematic Review

Automate every stage of your literature review to produce evidence-based research faster and more accurately.

Learn More In a sea of existing scientific literature, the rate at which new articles and reviews are being published is skyrocketing. So how does one know with all this available literature which studies are credible and relevant? This is where the different review types come into play. Each of the review types addresses scientific questions in its own unique manner. With evidence-based medicine gaining popularity, there is a need to produce high-quality scientific articles to guide clinical practice. This has led to the emergence of evidence synthesis which attempts to identify, collect and analyze results from multiple sources. Evidence synthesis is described as the interpretation of information contained in individual studies within the scope of the research topic. Systematic reviews are the most effective forms used to conduct evidence synthesis since they use rigorous, methodical, and reproducible processes. But there is a difference between evidence synthesis and a systematic review , so be sure you have a clear understanding of them. Evidence synthesis methods also comprise other types of reviews such as scoping reviews, narrative reviews, meta-analyses, and rapid reviews. If you’d like to know more about the differences between a rapid review vs systematic review , you can read on at the link.

In this article, we will look at what a systematic review is , and how it is different from a peer review.

What Is A Systematic Review?

A systematic review uses explicit methods to identify, select, and critically appraise relevant primary research. It attempts to review all the available evidence to answer a clearly formulated research question. Systematic reviews use inclusion or eligibility criteria to filter out studies irrelevant to the search topic. They are hallmarks of the evidence synthesis process in scientific research since they use all eligible existing research on a topic. Unlike research papers like RCTs that report primary data, systematic reviews report on the findings by combing primary information extracted from eligible studies. This makes systematic reviews a secondary report of data. The methodology involved is rigorous, transparent, and reproducible, this makes systematic reviews a high-quality source of information.

The Systematic review methodology involves the following steps.

• Formulating and stating a clear research question to answer (PICO approach)
• Developing a protocol (with strict inclusion and exclusion criteria for the selection of primary studies)
• Performing a detailed and broad literature search
• Critical appraisal of the selected studies
• Data extraction from the primary studies included in the review
• Data synthesis and analysis using qualitative or quantitative methods [1].

Learn More About DistillerSR

(Article continues below)

What Is A Peer Review?

Peer review is a system to assess the quality of a manuscript submitted by the author before it is published. Independent researchers in the same discipline assess the manuscripts for originality, quality, validity, and significance to help editors determine if they can be published in their journal. Based on the quality score awarded by the reviewers, the manuscript may be forwarded to a more fitting journal. For example, high-quality manuscripts are forwarded to high-quality journals, this leads to categories called journal classes. These independent reviewers may or may not have competencies similar to the authors of the manuscript.

How Does A Peer Review Work?

When a manuscript or an article is submitted to a journal, it is assessed by the editor to see if it meets the criteria for submission. Once it is confirmed that it satisfies the criteria, the editorial team then selects potential peer reviewers within the same field to evaluate the manuscript.

Single-blind, double-blind, or open reviewing, are techniques used to assess the originality, quality, validity, and significance of the manuscript. A variation from these standard approaches is the transparent, collaborative, and post-publication peer reviews.

Different journals use any of these methods to evaluate the quality of the content they publish. You can find out which peer-review system is used by a particular journal on their “about” page.

Why Do We Need A Peer Review?

Peer reviews are designed to assess the validity, quality, and originality of scientific articles that are published. This helps in maintaining the integrity of scientific literature by filtering out poor articles. Peer reviewers are experts in a certain field who volunteer their time to help improve the quality of manuscripts that are published. They help point out gaps in articles that may require further explanation and suggest changes to make a paper easier to read, and more useful in the field.

Researchers mustn’t confuse these two types of reviews. A systematic review involves reviewing all the available eligible literature to find credible, and reliable evidence to answer a specific research question. A peer review, on the other hand, is done by other authors in the same discipline and evaluates the quality, validity, and originality of a single article before it is published. The process of peer review establishes confidence in the articles that are published in a journal. Systematic reviews then search for and collect studies that have been peer-reviewed, to synthesize evidence found in them. Systematic reviews, after their completion by the author, are also peer-reviewed before publication.

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Types of scholarly literature

You will encounter many types of articles and it is important to distinguish between these different categories of scholarly literature. Keep in mind the following definitions.

Peer-reviewed (or refereed):  Refers to articles that have undergone a rigorous review process, often including revisions to the original manuscript, by peers in their discipline, before publication in a scholarly journal. This can include empirical studies, review articles, meta-analyses among others.

Empirical study (or primary article): An empirical study is one that aims to gain new knowledge on a topic through direct or indirect observation and research. These include quantitative or qualitative data and analysis. In science, an empirical article will often include the following sections: Introduction, Methods, Results, and Discussion.

Review article:  In the scientific literature, this is a type of article that provides a synthesis of existing research on a particular topic. These are useful when you want to get an idea of a body of research that you are not yet familiar with. It differs from a systematic review in that it does not aim to capture ALL of the research on a particular topic.

Systematic review:  This is a methodical and thorough literature review focused on a particular research question. It's aim is to identify and synthesize all of the scholarly research on a particular topic in an unbiased, reproducible way to provide evidence for practice and policy-making. It may involve a meta-analysis (see below). 

Meta-analysis:  This is a type of research study that combines or contrasts data from different independent studies in a new analysis in order to strengthen the understanding of a particular topic. There are many methods, some complex, applied to performing this type of analysis.

Peer Reviewed Article vs. Review Article

TIP :  Review articles and Peer-reviewed articles are not the same thing!  Review articles synthesize and analyze the results of multiple studies on a topic; peer-reviewed articles are articles of any kind that have been vetted for quality by an expert or number of experts in the field. The bibliographies of review articles can be a great source of original, peer-reviewed empirical articles.

Peer Review in Three Minutes

Watch this 3 minute intro to peer review video by North Carolina State University or read this short introduction by the University of Texas at Austin Library.

Is It Peer-Reviewed & How Can I Tell?

There are a couple of ways you can tell if a journal is peer-reviewed:

• If it's online, go to the journal home page and check under About This Journal. Often the brief description of the journal will note that it is peer-reviewed or refereed or will list the Editors or Editorial Board.
• Go to the database Ulrich's and do a Title Keyword search for the journal. If it is peer-reviewed or refereed, the title will have a little umpire shirt symbol by it.
• BE CAREFUL! A journal can be refereed/peer-reviewed and still have non-peer reviewed articles in it. Generally if the article is an editorial, brief news item or short communication, it's not been through the full peer-review process. Databases like Web of Knowledge will let you restrict your search only to articles (and not editorials, conference proceedings, etc).

Checking Peer Review in Ulrich's

Using Ulrich's Periodicals Directory to Verify Peer Review of Your Journal Title

To use this, click on the Ulrich's link to enter the database (or search for it on the main library website).

Change the Quick Search dropdown menu to Title (Keyword) and type your  full   journal title  (not your article title or keywords) into the Quick Search box, then click Search. 

This will give you a list of journal titles which includes the title you typed in. Check the Legend in the upper right corner to view the Refereed symbol ("refereed" is another term for peer-reviewed.) Then check your journal title to make sure it has the refereed symbol next to it.

NOTE: Though a journal can be peer-reviewed, letters to the editor and news reports in those same scientific journals are not! Make sure your article is a primary research article.

• Ulrich's Periodicals Directory Contains information on currently published as well as discontinued periodicals. Includes magazines, journals, newsletters, newspapers, conference proceedings, and electronic publications, together with search and browse indexes. It also contains complete names and addresses of journal publishers.

Peer reviewed articles

They both come out once every month. They're both in English. Both published in the United States. Both of them are "factual".They both have pictures. They even cover some of the same topics.

The difference is that one--Journal of Geography--is peer-reviewed, whereas  National Geographic  is a popular-press title. 

Peer review  is scientists' and other scholars' best effort to publish accurate information. Each article has been submitted by a researcher, and then  reviewed by other scholars in the same field to ensure that it is sound science.  What they are looking for is that:

• The methodology has been fully described (and the study can thus be replicated by another researcher)
• There are no obvious errors of calculation or statistical analysis
• Crucially: The findings support the conclusions. That is, do the results of the research support what the researcher has said about them? The classic problematic example is a scientist claiming that hair growth causes time to pass: The correlation is clearly not causation.

Things to know about peer review:

• It isn't a perfect system:  Scientists make errors (or commit fraud) as often as any other human being and sometimes bad articles slip through. But in general, peer-review ensures that many trained eyes have seen an article before it appears in print.
• Peer-reviewed journals are generally considered "primary source" material:  When a new scientific discovery is made, a peer-reviewed journal is often--but not always--the first place it appears.
• Popular and trade publications  are not peer-reviewed, they are simply edited. That does not mean they are any less potentially truthful or informative--most popular and trade publications take pride in careful fact-checking.* But when the topic is scientific research, the information is generally  "secondary" : It has already appeared elsewhere (usually in a peer-reviewed journal) and has now been "digested" for a broader audience.
• Peer-reviewed journals will always identify themselves as such. If you want to verify that a journal is peer-reviewed, check Ulrich's Periodical Directory .

Some sources of peer-reviewed articles:

• Cornell University Library homepage In particular, check the Articles & Full-Text search and then choose "Limit to articles from scholarly publications, including peer-review" at the top-left.
• Google Scholar Google Scholar takes Google's PageRank algorithm and runs it on a pre-selected set of tables-of-contents and metadata from a preselected set of scholarly journals and papers. These are largely--though not entirely--peer-reviewed. It is a much better option than a regular Google search for scholarly information.
• Web of Science Choosing "All Databases" allows you to search an index of journal articles, conference proceedings, data sets, and other resources in the sciences, social sciences, arts, and humanities.
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Empirical Articles

Review Articles

What is a Peer Reviewed Article?

Peer review is a process that many, but not all, journals use. Article manuscripts submitted to peer-reviewed journals are not automatically accepted and published.

In peer review, a panel of experts in the given field review the manuscript to determine aspects such as the quality of research, appropriateness for the journal, and relevance to the field. One of three decisions is made: accept, reject, or revise based on commentary from reviewers.

The process of peer review is thought to help ensure that high quality articles appear in journals.

Another term for peer-reviewed is  refereed . Peer-reviewed journals may also be called  scholarly.

Remember that magazines, Internet sources, and books are not the same as peer-reviewed journals.

In psychology, articles that report on original/new research studies may be referred to as primary sources or empirical .

• Common sections in a research/empirical article include introduction, literature review, methods/process, data, results, discussion, conclusion / suggestions for further study, and references.
• If the article is not divided into sections, it does not automatically mean it is not an empirical article.
• You cannot assume that an article is empirical just because it is divided into sections.
• In the methods section [which may be called something similar], or otherwise usually toward the beginning or middle of the article [if it does not have sections]: The authors will describe how they actively conducted new or original research -- such as an experiment or survey. Examples of what would likely be explained: How they identified participants, that they received Institutional Review Board (IRB) approval, control vs. experimental groups, and so forth about their research.

Articles that either interpret or analyze empirical articles are considered  review articles.  Such articles are often referred to as  secondary  sources  or  secondary research.

• An entire article that is purely a literature review [usually a review of select other articles considered to be the best support for a research question/topic]
• Systematic review
• Meta-analysis / meta-analyses
• Meta-synthesis / meta-syntheses
• If an article is a review article, it is likely [but not always] to have the words literature review, systematic review, integrative review, meta-analysis, meta-synthesis, or other mention of review in the title.
• The main indicator of a review article is if authors are just interpreting, analyzing, and/or comparing the results of empirical articles. So, in comparison to an empirical article, the authors of a review article do not describe an experiment or survey they conducted.
• If there is a methods section, it will usually describe how the authors searched for other articles [which databases they searched, what search terms they used] and decided the criteria for articles to include and exclude as part of their review. Again, they will not be describing how they conducted new or original research, such as an experiment or survey.
• In a literature review, for example, the authors' might point out what they believe to be the most pertinent/applicable research articles.
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Clinical Psychology Capstone: Literature Review & Peer Review

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Literature Review

What are the differences between literature reviews?

• Literature Review - A general summary, or overview of the topic that is typically qualitative and subjective
• Systematic Review - A type of literature review that answers a focused clinical question
• Meta-Analysis - A type of systematic review using statistical methods to combine data from systematic reviews

What is the best way to find literature reviews?

• PsycINFO - A psychology database with the capacity to limit by Methodology

How do I know a journal is peer reviewed?

• If searching in a database (eg: Social Work Abstracts,GenderWatch), select Peer Review from the Refine/Limit Results options.
• Check the journal's website:  look for the 'about' or 'about this journal' section.
• Check Ulrich's Periodicals Directory ; Search by journal name and look for the little black referee's jersey icon.
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What does Peer Review mean anyway?

When you submit an article to a journal, someone has to determine if it's worth printing.  Peer review was developed as a way to screen articles and determine the quality of your article. 

At a peer reviewed journal, the editor sends your article out to several reviewers (usually three) who are in the same field, or 'peers'.  Generally, your name will be taken off of the article so personalities don't interfer with the process.  The reviewers read through your article looking to see if:  the topic is unique or novel, if the data or research is sound, and if it's well written.  The reviewers can: reject the article; accept it with revisions; accept it as is.  

Benefits of peer review is that multiple people decide vs just the editor and the review process weeds out poorly written or researched articles.

Drawbacks of peer review is that it's only as good as the reviewers so poorly written or researched articles have gotten published.  Also, peer review was established as a way to check quality not catch fraud.

For more on peer review (I know that someone is interested...), check out Nature Peer Review Debate

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Peer Reviewed Articles: What Are They?

• What is a Scholarly or Peer Reviewed Article?
• How to Tell if a Journal Article is Peer Reviewed
• Review Articles
• Types of Literature Sources, (Grey Literature)
• What are Evidence Based Reviews?

Related Information

• Video: What is Intellectual Dishonesty

If you cannot access the above video, you can watch it here

Characteristics of Scholarly Literature

Look for these:

• Often have a formal appearance with tables, graphs, and diagrams
• Always cite their sources in the form of footnotes or bibliographies
• Usually have an abstract or summary paragraph above the text; may have sections describing methodology
• Articles are written by an authority or expert in the field
• The language includes specialized terms and the jargon of the discipline
• Titles of scholarly journals often contain the word "Journal", "Review", "Bulletin", or "Research"
• Usually have a narrow or specific subject focus
• Contains original research, experimentation, or in-depth studies in the field
• Written for researchers , professors, or students in the field
• Often reviewed by the author's peers before publication (peer-reviewed or refereed)
• Advertising is minimal or none.
• Anatomy of a Scholarly Article Interactive mock-up of a scholarly article explaining the various section. from NCSU Libraries

► Peer-reviewed (or refereed):    Refers to articles that have undergone a rigorous review process, often including revisions to the original manuscript, by peers in their discipline, before publication in a scholarly journal.  This can include empirical studies, review articles, meta-analyses among others.

► Empirical study (or primary article) :    An empirical study is one that aims to gain new knowledge on a topic through direct or indirect observation and research.  These include quantitative or qualitative data and analysis. In science, an empirical article will often include the following sections:  Introduction, Methods, Results, and Discussion.

► Review article:    In the scientific literature, this is a type of article that provides a synthesis of existing research on a particular topic.  These are useful when you want to get an idea of a body of research that you are not yet familiar with.  It differs from a systematic review in that it does not aim to capture ALL of the research on a particular topic.

► Systematic review : This is a methodical and thorough literature review focused on a particular research question.  It's aim is to identify and synthesize all of the scholarly research on a particular topic in an unbiased, reproducible way to provide evidence for practice and policy-making.  It may involve a meta-analysis (see below). 

► Meta-analysis :   This is a type of research study that combines or contrasts data from different independent studies in a new analysis in order to strengthen the understanding of a particular topic.  There are many methods, some complex, applied to performing this type of analysis.

(Adapted from Scholarly Literature Types , Cornell University)

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What Does Peer Review Mean?

Are all research articles the same, are all research articles peer reviewed.

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[Source: Library How-To: Scholarly vs. Popular Articles ]

So, what is "peer review"? This phrase refers to a quality-control process used by many academic journals.  Authors who are doing research submit a paper they have written to a journal. The journal editor then sends the article to the author's peers (researchers and scholars who are in the same discipline) for review. The reviewers determine if the article should be published based on the quality of the research . They evaluate this quality based on a number of factors, including:

• Did the researchers use appropriate methods ?
• Is the research question important?
• Is the data valid?
• Are the authors' conclusions reasonable, based on the data?
• Is the research original - does it add to our knowledge of the topic?

They do not repeat the experiment or study to see if the results were accurate. This process is important because it validates the research and gives it a sort of "seal of approval" from others in the research community.

Watch this video for a more in-depth overview of how peer review works (NCSU) (5:11 min.)

Not all research articles are the same.The following types of articles are usually lumped under the heading "research articles"  but actually vary in significant ways.

• Empirical research articles : Articles that describe the results of empirical research - researched based on experimentation or observation (what most people typically think of when they think of research). These articles usually have a standard "research paper" format: Abstract, Introduction/Literature Review, Methods, Results, Discussion/Conclusion, References.
• Literature review articles : Articles that summarize, evaluate, and interpret an existing group of empirical research articles on a given topic. These articles generally do not have the standard research paper format but are typically organized by the themes present in the body of existing empirical research reviewed.
• Meta-analysis articles: Articles that present the statistical analysis of the combined results of a carefully selected existing group of empirical research articles. These articles usually have a standard "research paper" format (see Empirical research articles above), though they are not empirical research.

Article Examples

• Empirical research article: Effects of a cognitive - behavioral , school - based , group intervention with Mexican American pregnant and parenting adolescents
• Literature review article: Child and adolescent emotion regulation : The role of parental emotion regulation and expression
• Meta-analysis article: Gender differences in emotion expression in children: A meta-analytic review.

Research articles are a type of scholarly source. A scholarly source is one that presents the findings of a study, research or experimentation. Scholarly sources are written by experts in a discipline for other experts in the discipline. Scholarly sources are considered more reliable than most other sources because the results are based on research, not conjecture or opinion.

While journals publish many research based articles (and these articles have gone through peer review), not all research-based articles are published in journals. Research articles also be published by government agencies, by non-governmental organizations, or by non-profit organizations. These research articles do not always go through traditional peer review but may go through a process of internal review before publication.

Examples of Non-Peer Reviewed Research

• The CDC publishes its own research series in MMWR: Health Care, Family, and Community Factors Associated with Mental, Behavioral, and Developmental Disorders in Early Childhood — United States, 2011–2012
• The United Nations (UN) publishes research on a wide range of topics, many of which involve families and children: Trends in Maternal Mortality: 1990 to 2015
• The PEW Research Center publishes research on a wide range of topics: Parenting in America
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• Differences in Research, Review, and Opinion Articles

Scholarly Journals and Popular Magazines: Differences in Research, Review, and Opinion Articles

• Where Do I Start?
• How Do I Find Peer-Reviewed Articles?
• How Do I Compare Periodical Types?
• Where Can I find More Information?

Research Articles, Reviews, and Opinion Pieces

Scholarly or research articles are written for experts in their fields. They are often peer-reviewed or reviewed by other experts in the field prior to publication. They often have terminology or jargon that is field specific. They are generally lengthy articles. Social science and science scholarly articles have similar structures as do arts and humanities scholarly articles. Not all items in a scholarly journal are peer reviewed. For example, an editorial opinion items can be published in a scholarly journal but the article itself is not scholarly. Scholarly journals may include book reviews or other content that have not been peer reviewed.

Empirical Study: (Original or Primary) based on observation, experimentation, or study. Clinical trials, clinical case studies, and most meta-analyses are empirical studies.

Review Article: (Secondary Sources) Article that summarizes the research in a particular subject, area, or topic. They often include a summary, an literature reviews, systematic reviews, and meta-analyses.

Clinical case study (Primary or Original sources): These articles provide real cases from medical or clinical practice. They often include symptoms and diagnosis.

Clinical trials ( Health Research): Th ese articles are often based on large groups of people. They often include methods and control studies. They tend to be lengthy articles.

Opinion Piece:  An opinion piece often includes personal thoughts, beliefs, or feelings or a judgement or conclusion based on facts. The goal may be to persuade or influence the reader that their position on this topic is the best.

Book review: Recent review of books in the field. They may be several pages but tend to be fairly short. 

Social Science and Science Research Articles

The majority of social science and physical science articles include

• Journal Title and Author
• Abstract 
• Introduction with a hypothesis or thesis
• Literature Review
• Methods/Methodology
• Results/Findings

Arts and Humanities Research Articles

In the Arts and Humanities, scholarly articles tend to be less formatted than in the social sciences and sciences. In the humanities, scholars are not conducting the same kinds of research experiments, but they are still using evidence to draw logical conclusions.  Common sections of these articles include:

• an Introduction
• Discussion/Conclusion
• works cited/References/Bibliography

Research versus Review Articles

• 6 Article types that journals publish: A guide for early career researchers
• INFOGRAPHIC: 5 Differences between a research paper and a review paper
• Michigan State University. Empirical vs Review Articles
• UC Merced Library. Empirical & Review Articles
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