1.

CORE
CORE is a multidisciplinary aggregator of OA research. CORE has the largest
collection of OA articles available. It allows users to search more than 219 million OA
articles. While most of these link to the full-text article on the original publisher's site,
or to a PDF available for download, five million records are hosted directly on CORE.

CORE's mission statement is a simple and straightforward commitment to offering

OA articles to anyone, anywhere in the world. They also host communities that are
available for researchers to join and an ambassador community to enhance their
services globally. In addition to a straightforward keyword search, CORE offers
advanced search options to filter results by publication type, year, language, journal,
repository, and author.

CORE's user interface is easy to use and navigate. Search results can be sorted
based on relevance or recency, and you can search for relevant content directly from
the results screen.

Collection: 219,537,133 OA articles

Other Services: Additional services are available from CORE, with extras that are
geared toward researchers, repositories, and businesses. There are tools for
accessing raw data, including an API that provides direct access to data, datasets
that are available for download, and FastSync for syncing data content from the
CORE database.

CORE has a recommender plug-in that suggests relevant OA content in the

database while conducting a search and a discovery feature that helps you discover
OA versions of paywalled articles. Other features include tools for managing content,
such as a dashboard for managing repository output and the Repository Edition
service to enhance discoverability.

Good Source of Peer-Reviewed Articles: Yes

Advanced Search Options: Language, author, journal, publisher, repository, DOI,

year

2. ScienceOpen
Functioning as a research and publishing network, ScienceOpen offers OA to more
than 74 million articles in all areas of science. Although you do need to register to
view the full text of articles, registration is free. The advanced search function is
highly detailed, allowing you to find exactly the research you're looking for.
The Berlin- and Boston-based company was founded in 2013 to "facilitate open and
public communications between academics and to allow ideas to be judged on their
merit, regardless of where they come from." Search results can be exported for easy
integration with reference management systems.

You can also bookmark articles for later research. There are extensive networking
options, including your Science Open profile, a forum for interacting with other
researchers, the ability to track your usage and citations, and an interactive
bibliography. Users have the ability to review articles and provide their knowledge
and insight within the community.

Collection: 74,560,631

Other Services: None

Good Source of Peer-Reviewed Articles: Yes

Advanced Search Options: Content type, source, author, journal, discipline

3. Directory of Open Access Journals

A multidisciplinary, community-curated directory, the Directory of Open Access
Journals (DOAJ) gives researchers access to high-quality peer-reviewed journals. It
has archived more than two million articles from 17,193 journals, allowing you to
either browse by subject or search by keyword.

The site was launched in 2003 with the aim of increasing the visibility of OA scholarly
journals online. Content on the site covers subjects from science, to law, to fine arts,
and everything in between. DOAJ has a commitment to "increase the visibility,
accessibility, reputation, usage and impact of quality, peer-reviewed, OA scholarly
research journals globally, regardless of discipline, geography or language."

Information about the journal is available with each search result. Abstracts are also
available in a collapsible format directly from the search screen. The scholarly article
website is somewhat simple, but it is easy to navigate. There are 16 principles of
transparency and best practices in scholarly publishing that clearly outline DOAJ
policies and standards.

Collection: 6,817,242

Other Services: None

Good Source of Peer-Reviewed Articles: Yes

Advanced Search Options: Subject, journal, year

4. Education Resources Information Center
The Education Resources Information Center (ERIC) of the Institution of Education
Sciences allows you to search by topic for material related to the field of education.
Links lead to other sites, where you may have to purchase the information, but you
can search for full-text articles only. You can also search only peer-reviewed
sources.

The service primarily indexes journals, gray literature (such as technical reports,
white papers, and government documents), and books. All sources of material on
ERIC go through a formal review process prior to being indexed. ERIC's selection
policy is available as a PDF on their website.

The ERIC website has an extensive FAQ section to address user questions. This
includes categories like general questions, peer review, and ERIC content. There are
also tips for advanced searches, as well as general guidance on the best way to
search the database. ERIC is an excellent database for content specific to
education.

Collection: 1,292,897

Other Services: None

Good Source of Peer-Reviewed Articles: Yes

Advanced Search Options: Boolean

5. arXiv e-Print Archive

The arXiv e-Print Archive is run by Cornell University Library and curated by
volunteer moderators, and it now offers OA to more than one million e-prints.

There are advisory committees for all eight subjects available on the database. With
a stated commitment to an "emphasis on openness, collaboration, and scholarship,"
the arXiv e-Print Archive is an excellent STEM resource.

The interface is not as user-friendly as some of the other databases available, and
the website hosts a blog to provide news and updates, but it is otherwise a
straightforward math and science resource. There are simple and advanced search
options, and, in addition to conducting searches for specific topics and articles, users
can browse content by subject. The arXiv e-Print Archive clearly states that they do
not peer review the e-prints in the database.

Collection: 1,983,891
Other Services: None

Good Source of Peer-Reviewed Articles: No

Advanced Search Options: Subject, date, title, author, abstract, DOI

6. Social Science Research Network

The Social Science Research Network (SSRN) is a collection of papers from the
social sciences community. It is a highly interdisciplinary platform used to search for
scholarly articles related to 67 social science topics. SSRN has a variety of research
networks for the various topics available through the free scholarly database.

The site offers more than 700,000 abstracts and more than 600,000 full-text papers.
There is not yet a specific option to search for only full-text articles, but, because
most of the papers on the site are free access, it's not often that you encounter a
paywall. There is currently no option to search for only peer-reviewed articles.

You must become a member to use the services, but registration is free and enables
you to interact with other scholars around the world. SSRN is "passionately
committed to increasing inclusion, diversity and equity in scholarly research," and
they encourage and discuss the use of inclusive language in scholarship whenever
possible.

Collection: 1,058,739 abstracts; 915,452 articles

Other Services: None

Good Source of Peer-Reviewed Articles: Yes

Advanced Search Options: Term, author, date, network

7. Public Library of Science

Public Library of Science (PLOS) is a big player in the world of OA science.
Publishing 12 OA journals, the nonprofit organization is committed to facilitating
openness in academic research. According to the site, "all PLOS content is at the
highest possible level of OA, meaning that scientific articles are immediately and
freely available to anyone, anywhere."

PLOS outlines four fundamental goals that guide the organization: break boundaries,
empower researchers, redefine quality, and open science. All PLOS journals are
peer-reviewed, and all 12 journals uphold rigorous ethical standards for research,
publication, and scientific reporting.
PLOS does not offer advanced search options. Content is organized by topic into
research communities that users can browse through, in addition to options to
search for both articles and journals. The PLOS website also has resources for peer
reviewers, including guidance on becoming a reviewer and on how to best
participate in the peer review process.

Collection: 12 journals

Other Services: None

Good Source of Peer-Reviewed Articles: Yes

Advanced Search Options: None

8. OpenDOAR
OpenDOAR, or the Directory of Open Access Repositories, is a comprehensive
resource for finding free OA journals and articles. Using Google Custom Search,
OpenDOAR combs through OA repositories around the world and returns relevant
research in all disciplines.

The repositories it searches through are assessed and categorized by OpenDOAR

staff to ensure they meet quality standards. Inclusion criteria for the database include
requirements for OA content, global access, and categorically appropriate content, in
addition to various other quality assurance measures. OpenDOAR has metadata,
data, content, preservation, and submission policies for repositories, in addition to
two OA policy statements regarding minimum and optimum recommendations.

This database allows users to browse and search repositories, which can then be
selected, and articles and data can be accessed from the repository directly. As a
repository database, much of the content on the site is geared toward the support of
repositories and OA standards.

Collection: 5,768 repositories

Other Services: OpenDOAR offers a variety of additional services. Given the nature
of the platform, services are primarily aimed at repositories and institutions, and
there is a marked focus on OA in general. Sherpa services are OA archiving tools for
authors and institutions.

They also offer various resources for OA support and compliance regarding
standards and policies. The publication router matches publications and publishers
with appropriate repositories.
There are also services and resources from JISC for repositories for cost
management, discoverability, research impact, and interoperability, including ORCID
consortium membership information. Additionally, a repository self-assessment tool
is available for members.

Good Source of Peer-Reviewed Articles: No

Advanced Search Options: Name, organization name, repository type, software

name, content type, subject, country, region

9. Bielefeld Academic Search Engine

The Bielefeld Academic Search Engine (BASE) is operated by the Bielefeld
University Library in Germany, and it offers more than 240 million documents from
more than 8,000 sources. Sixty percent of its content is OA, and you can filter your
search accordingly.

BASE has rigorous inclusion requirements for content providers regarding quality
and relevance, and they maintain a list of content providers for the sake of
transparency, which can be easily found on their website. BASE has a fairly elegant
interface. Search results can be organized by author, title, or date.

From the search results, items can be selected and exported, added to favorites,
emailed, and searched in Google Scholar. There are basic and advanced search
features, with the advanced search offering numerous options for refining search
criteria. There is also a feature on the website that saves recent searches without
additional steps from the user.

Collection: 276,019,066 documents; 9,286 content providers

Other Services: None

Good Source of Peer-Reviewed Articles: Yes

Advanced Search Options: Author, subject, year, content provider, language,

document type, access, terms of reuse
10. Digital Library of the Commons Repository
Run by Indiana University, the Digital Library of the Commons (DLC) Repository is a
multidisciplinary journal repository that allows users to access thousands of free and
OA articles from around the world. You can browse by document type, date, author,
title, and more or search for keywords relevant to your topic.

DCL also offers the Comprehensive Bibliography of the Commons, an image

database, and a keyword thesaurus for enhanced search parameters. The repository
includes books, book chapters, conference papers, journal articles, surveys, theses
and dissertations, and working papers. DCL advanced search features drop-down
menus of search types with built-in Boolean search options.

Searches can be sorted by relevance, title, date, or submission date in ascending or

descending order. Abstracts are included in selected search results, with access to
full texts available, and citations can be exported from the same page. Additionally,
the image database search includes tips for better search results.

Collection: 10,784

Other Services: None

Good Source of Peer-Reviewed Articles: No

Advanced Search Options: Author, date, title, subject, sector, region, conference

11. CIA World Factbook

The CIA World Factbook is a little different from the other resources on this list in
that it is not an online journal directory or repository. It is, however, a useful free
online research database for academics in a variety of disciplines.

All the information is free to access, and it provides facts about every country in the
world, which are organized by category and include information about history,
geography, transportation, and much more. The World Factbook can be searched by
country or region, and there is also information about the world's oceans.

This site contains resources related to the CIA as an organization rather than being a
scientific journal database specifically. The site has a user interface that is easy to
navigate. The site also provides a section for updates regarding changes to what
information is available and how it is organized, making it easier to interact with the
information you are searching for.

Collection: 266 countries

Other Services: None

Good Source of Peer-Reviewed Articles: No

Advanced Search Options: None

12. Paperity
Paperity boasts its status as the "first multidisciplinary aggregator of OA journals and
papers." Their focus is on helping you avoid paywalls while connecting you to
authoritative research. In addition to providing readers with easy access to
thousands of journals, Paperity seeks to help authors reach their audiences and help
journals increase their exposure to boost readership.

Paperity has journal articles for every discipline, and the database offers more than a
dozen advanced search options, including the length of the paper and the number of
authors. There is even an option to include, exclude, or exclusively search gray
papers.

Paperity is available for mobile, with both a mobile site and the Paperity Reader, an
app that is available for both Android and Apple users. The database is also
available on social media. You can interact with Paperity via Twitter and Facebook,
and links to their social media are available on their homepage, including their
Twitter feed.

Collection: 8,837,396

Other Services: None

Good Source of Peer-Reviewed Articles: Yes

Advanced Search Options: Title, abstract, journal title, journal ISSN, publisher,
year of publication, number of characters, number of authors, DOI, author, affiliation,
language, country, region, continent, gray papers
13. dblp Computer Science Bibliography
The dblp Computer Science Bibliography is an online index of major computer
science publications. dblp was founded in 1993, though until 2010 it was a
university-specific database at the University of Trier in Germany. It is currently
maintained by the Schloss Dagstuhl – Leibniz Center for Informatics.

Although it provides access to both OA articles and those behind a paywall, you can
limit your search to only OA articles. The site indexes more than three million
publications, making it an invaluable resource in the world of computer science. dblp
entries are color-coded based on the type of item.

dblp has an extensive FAQ section, so questions that might arise about topics like
the database itself, navigating the website, or the data on dblp, in addition to several
other topics, are likely to be answered. The website also hosts a blog and has a
section devoted to website statistics.

Collection: 5,884,702

Other Services: None

Good Source of Peer-Reviewed Articles: Yes

Advanced Search Options: None

14. EconBiz
EconBiz is a great resource for economic and business studies. A service of the
Leibniz Information Centre for Economics, it offers access to full texts online, with the
option of searching for OA material only. Their literature search is performed across
multiple international databases.

EconBiz has an incredibly useful research skills section, with resources such as
Guided Walk, a service to help students and researchers navigate searches,
evaluate sources, and correctly cite references; the Research Guide EconDesk, a
help desk to answer specific questions and provide advice to aid in literature
searches; and the Academic Career Kit for what they refer to as Early Career
Researchers.

Other helpful resources include personal literature lists, a calendar of events for
relevant calls for papers, conferences, and workshops, and an economics
terminology thesaurus to help in finding keywords for searches. To stay up-to-date
with EconBiz, you can sign up for their newsletter.

Collection: 1,075,219
Other Services: None

Good Source of Peer-Reviewed Articles: Yes

Advanced Search Options: Title, subject, author, institution, ISBN/ISSN, journal,

publisher, language, OA only

15. BioMed Central

BioMed Central provides OA research from more than 300 peer-reviewed journals.
While originally focused on resources related to the physical sciences, math, and
engineering, BioMed Central has branched out to include journals that cover a
broader range of disciplines, with the aim of providing a single platform that provides
OA articles for a variety of research needs. You can browse these journals by
subject or title, or you can search all articles for your required keyword.

BioMed Central has a commitment to peer-reviewed sources and to the peer review
process itself, continually seeking to help and improve the peer review process.
They're "committed to maintaining high standards through full and stringent peer
review."

Additionally, the website includes resources to assist and support editors as part of
their commitment to providing high-quality, peer-reviewed OA articles.

Collection: 507,212

Other Services: BMC administers the International Standard Randomised

Controlled Trial Number (ISRCTN) registry. While initially designed for registering
clinical trials, since its creation in 2000, the registry has broadened its scope to
include other health studies as well.

The registry is recognized by the International Committee of Medical Journal Editors,

as well as the World Health Organization (WHO), and it meets the requirements
established by the WHO International Clinical Trials Registry Platform.

The study records included in the registry are all searchable and free to access. The
ISRCTN registry "supports transparency in clinical research, helps reduce selective
reporting of results and ensures an unbiased and complete evidence base."

Good Source of Peer-Reviewed Articles: Yes

Advanced Search Options: Author, title, journal, list

16. JURN
A multidisciplinary search engine, JURN provides links to various scholarly websites,
articles, and journals that are free to access or OA. Covering the fields of the arts,
humanities, business, law, nature, science, and medicine, JURN has indexed almost
5,000 repositories to help you find exactly what you're looking for.

Search features are enhanced by Google, but searches are filtered through their
index of repositories. JURN seeks to reach a wide audience, with their search engine
tailored to researchers from "university lecturers and students seeking a strong
search tool for OA content" and "advanced and ambitious students, age 14-18" to
"amateur historians and biographers" and "unemployed and retired lecturers."

That being said, JURN is very upfront about its limitations. They admit to not being a
good resource for educational studies, social studies, or psychology, and conference
archives are generally not included due to frequently unstable URLs.

Collection: 5,064 indexed journals

Other Services: JURN has a browser add-on called UserScript. This add-on allows
users to integrate the JURN database directly into Google Search. When performing
a search through Google, the add-on creates a link that sends the search directly to
JURN CSE. JURN CSE is a search service that is hosted by Google.

Clicking the link from the Google Search bar will run your search through the JURN
database from the Google homepage. There is also an interface for a DuckDuckGo
search box; while this search engine has an emphasis on user privacy, for smaller
sites that may be indexed by JURN, DuckDuckGo may not provide the same depth
of results.

Good Source of Peer-Reviewed Articles: Yes

Advanced Search Options: Google search modifiers

17. Dryad
Dryad is a digital repository of curated, OA scientific research data. Launched in
2009, it is run by a not-for-profit membership organization, with a community of
institutional and publisher members for whom their services have been designed.
Members include institutions such as Stanford, UCLA, and Yale, as well as
publishers like Oxford University Press and Wiley.

Dryad aims to "promote a world where research data is openly available, integrated
with the scholarly literature, and routinely reused to create knowledge." It is free to
access for the search and discovery of data. Their user experience is geared toward
easy self-depositing, supports Creative Commons licensing, and provides DOIs for
all their content.
Note that there is a publishing charge associated if you wish to publish your data in
Dryad. When searching datasets, they are accompanied by author information and
abstracts for the associated studies, and citation information is provided for easy
attribution.

Collection: 44,458

Other Services: None

Good Source of Peer-Reviewed Articles: No

Advanced Search Options: No

18. EThOS
Run by the British Library, the E-Theses Online Service (EThOS) allows you to
search over 500,000 doctoral theses in a variety of disciplines. All of the doctoral
theses available on EThOS have been awarded by higher education institutions in
the United Kingdom.

Although some full texts are behind paywalls, you can limit your search to items
available for immediate download, either directly through EThOS or through an
institution's website. More than half of the records in the database provide access to
full-text theses.

EThOS notes that they do not hold all records for all institutions, but they strive to
index as many doctoral theses as possible, and the database is constantly
expanding, with approximately 3,000 new records added and 2,000 new full-text
theses available every month. The availability of full-text theses is dependent on
multiple factors, including their availability in the institutional repository and the level
of repository development.

Collection: 500,000+

Other Services: None

Good Source of Peer-Reviewed Articles: No

Advanced Search Options: Abstract, author's first name, author's last name,
awarding body, current institution, EThOS ID, year, language, qualifications,
research supervisor, sponsor/funder, keyword, title

19. PubMed
PubMed is a research platform well-known in the fields of science and medicine. It
was created and developed by the National Center for Biotechnology Information
(NCBI) at the National Library of Medicine (NLM). It has been available since 1996
and offers access to "more than 33 million citations for biomedical literature from
MEDLINE, life science journals, and online books."

While PubMed does not provide full-text articles directly, and many full-text articles
may be behind paywalls or require subscriptions to access them, when articles are
available from free sources, such as through PubMed Central (PMC), those links are
provided with the citations and abstracts that PubMed does provide.

PMC, which was established in 2000 by the NLM, is a free full-text archive that
includes more than 6,000,000 records. PubMed records link directly to
corresponding PMC results. PMC content is provided by publishers and other
content owners, digitization projects, and authors directly.

Collection: 33,000,000+

Other Services: None

Good Source of Peer-Reviewed Articles: No

Advanced Search Options: Author's first name, author's last name, identifier,
corporation, date completed, date created, date entered, date modified, date
published, MeSH, book, conflict of interest statement, EC/RN number, editor, filter,
grant number, page number, pharmacological action, volume, publication type,
publisher, secondary source ID, text, title, abstract, transliterated title

20. Semantic Scholar

A unique and easy-to-use resource, Semantic Scholar defines itself not just as a
research database but also as a "search and discovery tool." Semantic Scholar
harnesses the power of artificial intelligence to efficiently sort through millions of
science-related papers based on your search terms.

Through this singular application of machine learning, Semantic Scholar expands

search results to include topic overviews based on your search terms, with the option
to create an alert for or further explore the topic. It also provides links to related
topics.

In addition, search results produce "TLDR" summaries in order to provide concise

overviews of articles and enhance your research by helping you to navigate quickly
and easily through the available literature to find the most relevant information.
According to the site, although some articles are behind paywalls, "the data [they]
have for those articles is limited," so you can expect to receive mostly full-text
results.
Collection: 203,379,033

Other Services: Semantic Scholar supports multiple popular browsers. Content can
be accessed through both mobile and desktop versions of Firefox, Microsoft Edge,
Google Chrome, Apple Safari, and Opera.

Additionally, Semantic Scholar provides browser extensions for both Chrome and
Firefox, so AI-powered scholarly search results are never more than a click away.
The mobile interface includes an option for Semantic Swipe, a new way of interacting
with your research results.

There are also beta features that can be accessed as part of the Beta Program,
which will provide you with features that are being actively developed and require
user feedback for further improvement.

Good Source of Peer-Reviewed Articles: Yes

Advanced Search Options: Field of study, date range, publication type, author,
journal, conference, PDF

21. Zenodo
Zenodo, powered by the European Organization for Nuclear Research (CERN), was
launched in 2013. Taking its name from Zenodotus, the first librarian of the ancient
library of Alexandria, Zenodo is a tool "built and developed by researchers, to ensure
that everyone can join in open science." Zenodo accepts all research from every
discipline in any file format.

However, Zenodo also curates uploads and promotes peer-reviewed material that is
available through OA. A DOI is assigned to everything that is uploaded to Zenodo,
making research easily findable and citable. You can sort by keyword, title, journal,
and more and download OA documents directly from the site.

While there are closed access and restricted access items in the database, the vast
majority of research is OA material. Search results can be filtered by access type,
making it easy to view the free articles available in the database.

Collection: 2,220,000+

Other Services: None

Good Source of Peer-Reviewed Articles: Yes

Advanced Search Options: Access, file type, keywords

 Check out our roundup of free research
databases as a handy one-page PDF.

How to Find Peer-Reviewed Articles

There are a lot of free scholarly articles available from various sources. The internet
is a big place. So how do you go about finding peer-reviewed articles when
conducting your research? It's important to make sure you are using reputable
sources.

The first source of the article is the person or people who wrote it. Checking out the
author can give you some initial insight into how much you can trust what you’re
reading. Looking into the publication information of your sources can also indicate
whether the article is reliable.

Aspects of the article, such as subject and audience, tone, and format, are other
things you can look at when evaluating whether the article you're using is valid,
reputable, peer-reviewed material. So, let's break that down into various components
so you can assess your research to ensure that you're using quality articles and
conducting solid research.

Check the Author

Peer-reviewed articles are written by experts or scholars with experience in the field
or discipline they're writing about. The research in a peer-reviewed article has to
pass a rigorous evaluation process, so it's a foregone conclusion that the author(s) of
a peer-reviewed article should have experience or training related to that research.

When evaluating an article, take a look at the author's information. What credentials
does the author have to indicate that their research has scholarly weight behind it?
Finding out what type of degree the author has—and what that degree is in—can
provide insight into what kind of authority the author is on the subject.

Something else that might lend credence to the author's scholarly role is their
professional affiliation. A look at what organization or institution they are affiliated
with can tell you a lot about their experience or expertise. Where were they trained,
and who is verifying their research?

Identify Subject and Audience

The ultimate goal of a study is to answer a question. Scholarly articles are also
written for scholarly audiences, especially articles that have gone through the peer
review process. This means that the author is trying to reach experts, researchers,
academics, and students in the field or topic the research is based on.

Think about the question the author is trying to answer by conducting this research,
why, and for whom. What is the subject of the article? What question has it set out to
answer? What is the purpose of finding the information? Is the purpose of the article
of importance to other scholars? Is it original content?

Research should also be approached analytically. Is the methodology sound? Is the

author using an analytical approach to evaluate the data that they have obtained?
Are the conclusions they've reached substantiated by their data and analysis?
Answering these questions can reveal a lot about the article's validity.

Format Matters
Reliable articles from peer-reviewed sources have certain format elements to be
aware of. The first is an abstract. An abstract is a short summary or overview of the
article. Does the article have an abstract? It's unlikely that you're reading a peer-
reviewed article if it doesn't. Peer-reviewed journals will also have a word count
range. If an article seems far too short or incredibly long, that may be reason to
doubt it.

Another feature of reliable articles is the sections the information is divided into.
Peer-reviewed research articles will have clear, concise sections that appropriately
organize the information. This might include a literature review, methodology, results
(in the case of research articles), and a conclusion.

One of the most important sections is the references or bibliography. This is where
the researcher lists all the sources of their information. A peer-reviewed source will
have a comprehensive reference section.

Tone
An article that has been written to reach an academic community will have an
academic tone. The language that is used, and the way this language is used, is
important to consider. If the article is riddled with grammatical errors, confusing
syntax, and casual language, it almost definitely didn't make it through the peer
review process.

Also consider the use of terminology. Every discipline is going to have standard
terminology or jargon that can be used and understood by other academics in the
discipline. The language in a peer-reviewed article is going to reflect that.
If the author is going out of their way to explain simple terms, or terms that are
standard to the field or discipline, it's unlikely that the article has been peer reviewed,
as this is something that the author would be asked to address during the review
process.

Publication
The source of the article will be a very good indicator of the likelihood that it was
peer reviewed. Where was the article published? Was it published alongside other
academic articles in the same discipline? Is it a legitimate and reputable scholarly
publication?

A trade publication or newspaper might be legitimate or reputable, but it is not a

scholarly source, and it will not have been subject to the peer review process.
Scholarly journals are the best resource for peer-reviewed articles, but it's important
to remember that not all scholarly journals are peer reviewed.

It's helpful to look at a scholarly source's website, as peer-reviewed journals will

have a clear indication of the peer review process. University libraries, institutional
repositories, and reliable databases (and now you have a list of legit ones) can also
help provide insight into whether an article comes from a peer-reviewed journal.

Common Research Mistakes to Avoid

Research is a lot of work. Even with high standards and good intentions, it's easy to
make mistakes. Perhaps you searched for access to scientific journals for free and
found the perfect peer-reviewed sources, but you forgot to document everything, and
your references are a mess. Or, you only searched for free online articles and
missed out on a ground-breaking study that was behind a paywall.

Whether your research is for a degree or to get published or to satisfy your own
inquisitive nature, or all of the above, you want all that work to produce quality
results. You want your research to be thorough and accurate.

To have any hope of contributing to the literature on your research topic, your results
need to be high quality. You might not be able to avoid every potential mistake, but
here are some that are both common and easy to avoid.

Sticking to One Source

One of the hallmarks of good research is a healthy reference section. Using a variety
of sources gives you a better answer to your question. Even if all of the literature is in
agreement, looking at various aspects of the topic may provide you with an entirely
different picture than you would have if you looked at your research question from
only one angle.

Not Documenting Every Fact

As you conduct your research, do yourself a favor and write everything down.
Everything you include in your paper or article that you got from another source is
going to need to be added to your references and cited.

It's important, especially if your aim is to conduct ethical, high-quality research, that
all of your research has proper attribution. If you don't document as you go, you
could end up making a lot of work for yourself if the information you don't write down
is something that later, as you write your paper, you really need.

Using Outdated Materials

Academia is an ever-changing landscape. What was true in your academic discipline
or area of research ten years ago may have since been disproven. If fifteen studies
have come out since the article that you're using was published, it's more than a little
likely that you're going to be basing your research on flawed or dated information.

If the information you're basing your research on isn't as up-to-date as possible, your
research won't be of quality or able to stand up to any amount of scrutiny. You don't
want all of your hard work to be for naught.

Relying Solely on Open Access Journals

OA is a great resource for conducting academic research. There are high-quality
journal articles available through OA, and that can be very helpful for your research.
But, just because you have access to free articles, that doesn't mean that there's
nothing to be found behind a paywall.

Just as dismissing high-quality peer-reviewed articles because they are OA would be

limiting, not exploring any paid content at all is equally short-sighted. If you're
seeking to conduct thorough and comprehensive research, exploring all of your
options for quality sources is going to be to your benefit.

Digging Too Deep or Not Deep Enough

Research is an art form, and it involves a delicate balance of information. If you
conduct your research using only broad search terms, you won't be able to answer
your research question well, or you'll find that your research provides information that
is closely related to your topic but, ultimately, your findings are vague and
unsubstantiated.

On the other hand, if you delve deeply into your research topic with specific searches
and turn up too many sources, you might have a lot of information that is adjacent to
your topic but without focus and perhaps not entirely relevant. It's important to
answer your research question concisely but thoroughly.

Different Types of Scholarly Articles

Different types of scholarly articles have different purposes. An original research
article, also called an empirical article, is the product of a study or an experiment.
This type of article seeks to answer a question or fill a gap in the existing literature.

Research articles will have a methodology, results, and a discussion of the findings
of the experiment or research and typically a conclusion.

Review articles overview the current literature and research and provide a summary
of what the existing research indicates or has concluded. This type of study will have
a section for the literature review, as well as a discussion of the findings of that
review. Review articles will have a particularly extensive reference or bibliography
section.

Theoretical articles draw on existing literature to create new theories or conclusions,

or look at current theories from a different perspective, to contribute to the
foundational knowledge of the field of study.