A peer reviewed or peer refereed journal or article is one in which a group of widely acknowledged experts in a field reviews the content for scholarly soundness and academic value.
You can limit your search results to peer reviewed materials in many library databases:
The table below shows which characteristics are more commonly associated with scholarly or popular sources. Both scholarly and popular sources can be appropriate for your research purposes, depending on your research question, but research assignments will often require you to consult primarily with scholarly materials.
Attribution: This chart was created by the UC Berkeley Library and published under a Creative Commons license.
Need more? Watch this short video from Vanderbilt University.
Colgate University Libraries | 13 Oak Drive, Hamilton, NY 13346 | 315-228-7300