WHAT DOES "PEER-REVIEWED" OR "REFEREED" MEAN?
Peer review, also known as refereed, is a process in which experts in related fields of study review and evaluate literature before it is published. It is largely used with research journals to help ensure that published articles represent the best scholarship currently available. When an article is submitted to a peer-reviewed journal, the editors send it 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, Discover, Newsweek, U.S. News) rely on the judgment of the editors whether an article is quality material or not. They are not as reliable because these journals do not rely on solid, scientific scholarship.
Note: This is an entirely different concept from "Review Articles."
HOW DO I KNOW IF A JOURNAL IS PEER-REVIEWED?
Often, you can tell just by looking. A scholarly journal is visibly different from magazines, but occasionally it can be hard to tell. If you want to be certain that a journal is peer-reviewed, limit your searches to Scholarly/Peer-Reviewed results. Search our Journals A - Z. Type the journal's title into the text box and search, and your results will provide a variety of information about the journal, including whether the journal contains articles that are peer reviewed or refereed.
