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Geography Research Guide

Research Databases

 

 

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Recommended Databases

Access LSC-Montgomery Library's research databases to search for articles, ebooks, images and film. Databases are grouped by subject to expedite your research.

What is a scholarly article?

Assignments often require the use of scholarly or peer-reviewed articles. Scholarly resources, such as journal articles, have distinct characteristics when compared to popular resources, such as magazine and newspaper articles. Here is a guide to identifying popular and scholarly resources:

Popular Resources Scholarly Resources
  Purpose Entertain or Inform Present Research
  Format Glossy, colorful pages with lots of advertisements Plain, black-and-white pages with graphs and tables; very few ads
  Language Written in every-day language Formal, field specific
  Audience General Public Professionals in the field, Faculty, and Students
  Citations Full citations generally not included Full citations required
  Examples People Magazine, CNN.com Journal of Psychology, JAMA
 
Peer-reviewed resources have been reviewed by other professionals in the field before being published. Not all scholarly resources are peer-reviewed. Many databases allow users to limit the results to include only peer-reviewed materials. If you are not sure if a source is peer-reviewed, contact a librarian for help.