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This guide is designed from postgraduate level students working on primary research projects or dissertations.

Peer-Reviewed (Refereed) Journals

Evidential literature is:
  • found in commercial databases,
  • can be categorized as primary, secondary, or tertiary,
  • and is almost always peer-reviewed.

Peer Review is a specialized EDITORIAL process that takes place in scholarly publishing. Journal editors check for incorrect grammar, for punctuation, for spelling, and they check for plagiarism. Peer review is in addition to these traditional editorial functions.

Peer-Reviewed articles are articles that have been evaluated by people outside of the journal and outside the publishing industry who have specialized or expert knowledge in the topic of the article.

The Peer-Review Process:
 
  • The journal editor corrects the manuscript for mechanical mistakes such as misspellings and punctuation errors.
     
  • The editor then forwards the article to a known expert (peer reviewer) in the subject area of the research study who then agrees to assess the article for the value of the research to the discipline (the profession, the community, the general public, etc.), agrees to assess its validity, and agrees to assess its reliability.
     
  • The journal editor relies on the opinion & recommendation of a  peer-reviewer to help them decide whether an article is worthy of publication because journal editors will not be subject specialists in areas such as HIV prevention or opioid addiction. Editors are trained in English... not medical issues.

Journals that use the peer-review process are labeled peer-reviewed (or refereed) journals.

University students are encouraged to use articles from peer-reviewed journals in research assignments.

ACTIVITY:     

To identify whether a journal is peer-reviewed (refereed), go to the TWU Library database called Ulrich’s Periodicals Directory here: 
 

Ulrich's Periodicals Directory logo

Type in the following journal title:  "Health Promotion Practice"

See the database information on this journal below:

Ulrich's database journal record showing peer reviewed label

The Health Promotion Practice journal is peer-reviewed / refereed.

When analyzing an experimental research article, take the safe road and go with peer-reviewed articles.