SWK 106 Child Welfare

Scholarly Journals - Characteristics

• Originality: Communicate and report analysis and interpretation of data and experimental results, new ideas, research, and theories
• Authors: Experts, professionals, and practitioners in the subject area(s)
• Intended Audiences: Professionals, researchers, and educators in the subject area(s)
• Sponsorship: often a professional organization or society in the subject area (s)
• Publication Frequency: usually a regular pattern with assigned volume and issue numbers, although articles may be published online as soon as they successfully complete the review process.
• Editorial and Peer Review: most articles are critically evaluated for scholarship by peers and/or professional editors. Note that NOT all items in a scholarly journal are peer-reviewed: examples -- book reviews, editorials, meeting abstracts

Scholarly Journal Articles - Characteristics

• Illustrations: often fewer than a popular magazine or newspaper. Charts and graphs may be used to summarize results or data.
• Terminology specific to the subject and discipline. May take extra time to read if you are not already familiar wit the subject or discipline.
• Article format:  often contains
  • Abstract: brief description of the article
  • Author affiliations: with a university or college department or a museum, government agency, or health institution related to the subject area of the article
  • Sections such as Introduction, Methodology, Results, Discussion, Conclusions. This varies depending on the on the discipline and the requirements of the specific journal
  • References to works cited (or footnotes or a bibliography)

Peer-Review What is it?

Review process

• Review must be completed before an article is officially accepted and published
• Not all articles are accepted
• Authors cannot pay to guaranteed publication of their article(s)

An example of the process

• Editors send the article to outside reviewers - peers. Peers are specialists or experts in the relevant subject field
• The article may be kept confidential or posted publicly during the review process, depending on the discipline and specific journal policies
• Reviewers may be anonymous or not to the authors of the article, depending on the specific journal's policies
• Reviewers may recommend rejection, publication with corrections and/or follow-up, or acceptance.
• Journal editors must also agree if acceptance is recommended.