Peer Review is a process that journals use to ensure the articles they publish represent the best scholarship currently available. 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.
Publications that don't use peer review (Time, Cosmo, Salon) just rely on the judgement of the editors whether an article is up to snuff or not. That's why you can't count on them for solid, scientific scholarship. --University of Texas at Austin
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A primary difference between scholarly journals and other types of journals and magazines is that articles in these journals undergo a "peer review" process before they are published. What does this mean?
Peer review is the process by which an author's peers, recognized researchers in the field, read and evaluate a paper (article) submitted for publication and recommend whether the paper should be published, revised, or rejected.
Peer review is a widely accepted indicator of quality scholarship in a discipline or field. Articles accepted for publication through a peer review process meet the discipline's expected standards of expertise.
Peer-reviewed (or refereed) journals are scholarly journals that only publish articles that have passed through this review process. --San Diego State University Library
These databases provide access to peer-reviewed journal articles on Women's Studies. The databases listed in this Research Guide are available only to Truckee Meadows Community College students, faculty and staff. You will need your TMCC credentials (Username and Password) to access them off-campus.
Some sample titles of journals/publications available in the TMCC Library Ebsco Database are:
Frontiers: A Journal of Women's Studies
Gender Issues
Health Care for Women Intl.
Journal of Women and Religion
Lesbian News
Sexuality & Culture
Women and Politics
Women in Business
Women in Prison
Women in the Hispanic World
Women and Environments Intl.
Women of the U.S. Congress
Women who Lead Nations
Women who Reformed Politics
Tips for Reading a Research Article
Read the Abstract. It consists of a brief summary of the research questions and methods. It may also state the findings. Because it is short and often written in dense psychological language, you may need to read it a couple of times. Try to restate the abstract in your own nontechnical language.
Modified from Net Lab
The search term was "women AND violence," limited to full-text and peer-reviewed (scholarly) journals. Over 7,000 articles were retrieved. Here is the one of the retrieved articles titled "A Woman's Place: Reflections on the Origins of Violence."
The database provides an APA-format citation, although the citation should be altered to conform to APA rules (see the page on citing documents in this LibGuide):