Peer-Review and Primary Research

Finding Peer Reviewed Journals

• Use a discipline-specific database (Education Full Text, Applied Science and Technology, APA PsycInfo, etc.). While this strategy will help you find peer-reviewed journal articles, you should be aware that not all citations in such indexes are from peer-reviewed journals. 
• Use special features of online databases. Many allow you to limit your search results to peer-reviewed journals.
• Check the Cabell's Directory, available from the Databases A-Z List, to see if it characterizes the journal in question as “peer-reviewed.”
• Check the “Instructions to Authors” section in the journal, where the editor explains the process used to decide whether an article is appropriate for a particular journal.
• If you are in doubt, consult with a librarian or your professor.

Follow some examples below on how to find peer-reviewed journal articles in PRIMO, Databases and Google Scholar.

PRIMO Search on the library homepage:

Enter a search on your research topic in the search anything box.

After you have searched and gotten results use the filters on the left-hand side to limit your search to peer-reviewed journals.

From the library homepage select Browse Databases. Choose a subject specific or a multidisciplinary database that relates to your research topic. If you are accessing the database remotely you will be prompted to login with your 700 # and password. 

The example below is for ProQuest databases, in this examples it is ProQuest Central:

Databases will often have an option to limit your results to peer-reviewed articles before you do your search. 

Once you complete a search and go to the results page, you can filter to peer-reviewed material by selecting the "Scholarly Journals" box on the left-hand side.