Scholarly peer review (also known as refereeing) is the process where an author's scholarly work, research, or ideas is subjected to the scrutiny of others who are experts in the same field before a paper describing this work is published in a journal or as a book.
In academic publishing, the goal of peer review is to assess the quality of articles submitted for publication in a scholarly journal. Before an article is deemed appropriate to be published in a peer-reviewed journal, it must first be submitted it to the journal editor who forwards the article to experts in the field. Because the reviewers specialize in the same scholarly area as the author, they are considered the author’s peers (hence “peer review”). Next, these reviewers carefully evaluate the quality of the submitted article, including checking it for accuracy and assessing its validity. Finally, if needed, these reviewers suggest revisions. If the submitted article lacks in scholarly validity, they will reject it. Because a peer reviewed journal will not publish articles that fail to meet the standards established in a given discipline, those that are accepted exemplify some of the best research in a particular field.
When you are determining whether or not the article you found is a peer-reviewed article, you should consider the following questions:
Is the journal in which you found the article published or sponsored by a professional scholarly society, professional association, or university academic department? Does it describe itself as a peer-reviewed publication? (To know that, check the journal's website).
Did you find a citation for it in one of the databases that includes scholarly publications? (Criminal Justice Abstracts, EBSCOhost Academic Search Complete, PsycINFO, etc.)? Read the database description to see if it includes scholarly publications.
Did you limit your search to scholarly or peer-reviewed publications?
Is there an abstract (summary) at the beginning of the article?
Is the tone of the article thoughtful, restrained and serious?
Does the article have footnotes or citations of other sources?
Does the article have a bibliography or list of references at the end?
Are the author's credentials listed?
Is the topic of the article narrowly focused and explored in depth?
Is the article based on either original research or authorities in the field (as opposed to personal opinion)?
Is the article written for readers with some prior knowledge of the subject?
Articles in Veterinary Science can be divided into sections with headings such as these:
-Introduction
-Theory or Backgroun
-Methods
-Discussion
-Literature review
-Subjects
-Results
-Conclusion
In the Veterinary Science discipline, the Resnick Library provides access to the following databases that reference or contain Peer Reviewed articles:
-Science Direct - Probably the most useful database in library to find scholarly peer reviewed articles. All articles referenced in this database can be classified as "Peer Reviewed," and 95% of the article references contain the full text of the article.
-AGRICOLA - Produced by the National Agricultural Library, this database is the most complete of all the Veterinary Databases. However, the references do not contain the full text of articles unless they are available through another database the library subscribes to. Most of the journals/periodicals referenced in the database can be classified as "Peer Reviewed."
-Academic Search Complete - In order to get peer reviewed articles, you must check the "Peer Reviewed" box on the introductory search screen of this database. A small number of veterinary-related articles can be found in this database.
Additionally, the following links may be useful:
Watch for these features when determining if an article has empirical research. They may appear in the abstract, or you may need to skim the text of the article to find them.
Remember, qualitative research can be empirical, too. The easiest way to tell if you're looking at quantitative research is to look at the results. If they are in numeric form, with tables or graphs, it's most likely quantitative. Keep in mind that some studies use more than one type of method, and may include both quantitative and qualitative components.
Examples of quantitative studies:
Qualitative research studies factors that cannot be easily quantified. Qualitative research is common in the social sciences.
A classic form of qualitative research is the focus group, often used for market research. In a focus group, a few people are interviewed in depth about particular products or services. Because the sample group is so small, their opinions cannot be effectively analyzed using statistics, but their impressions can offer valuable insights into the ways that consumers think.
Another example is the case study, common in psychology and medicine. In a case study, a doctor or counselor documents in detail one patient’s experience of a disease or disorder. Case studies are particularly useful when the disorder is rare and thus cannot be studied in large populations.
Example of focus group research:
Example of a case study:
A meta-analysis takes the results of several existing quantitative studies and analyzes them in a new way. Meta analysis looks for previously unnoticed patterns or trends among existing study results, or seeks to pull out new data from them. Meta analysis is usually considered another form of quantitative research.
Example of a meta-analysis:
A literature review is an article whose sole purpose is to provide an overview of previous important research on a particular topic. Although valuable to researchers, literature reviews are not considered primary research. However, they can help you identify research trends and major articles published on a topic.
Almost every research article begins with one or two paragraphs looking at prior research on the same subject, in order to place the new study into context. However, in a pure literature review, no new study is conducted.
Example of a literature review:
QUANTITATIVE
Quantitative research looks at factors that can actually be measured in some way, in other words, quantified. It produces numerical results that can be analyzed statistically.
Quantitative research commonly involves experimentation, surveys, or questionnaires.
EMPIRICAL
The term empirical research is often used as a synonym for quantitative research, but strictly speaking, empirical research is simply any form of research based upon direct observation. It might also be quantitative, but it might not.
