Finding Journal Articles
A journal is "a periodical, especially one containing scholarly articles and/or disseminating current information on research and development in a particular subject field" (Young, 1983, p. 125).
To recognize a journal, look for:
- A plain cover
- Mostly text
- Articles with descriptive, "scholarly"-sounding titles
- Authors with university affiliations or professional titles
- An abstract at the beginning of each article
- Scholarly references, including a bibliography or list of references
- Very little or no advertising
- Longer articles (compared to a magazine)
- Tables and graphs rather than photographs
Many students are unfamiliar with journals before college. To help you recognize journal articles, here are some examples. Look for the characteristics listed above.
Example #1: Marianne DeKoven, "Conrad's 'Unrest'," Journal of Modern Literature, XXI, 2 (Winter 1997-1998), pp. 241-249.
Example #2: Bellamy, A. & Hanewicz, C. (2001). An exploratory analysis of the social nature of internet addiction. Electronic Journal of Sociology, 1.5.3.2. [http://www.sociology.org/content/vol005.003/ia.html]
Example #3: Andreas Kranz, Andrea Kinner, and Ralf Kölling. A Family of Small Coiled-Coilforming Proteins Functioning at the Late Endosome in Yeast. Molecular Biology of the Cell Vol. 12, 711-723, March 2001
Journals usually include these kinds of articles, etc.:
- Research reports
- Reviews of the literature on a particular question
- Theoretical discussions
- Book reviews
- Interviews
Where can I find journal articles?
Most HCCS library locations have a few journals on hand.
You can find articles from many more journals in the HCCS subscription databases. The "Journal" databases are usually a good place to start searching. Some of the databases include journals published as early as 1980, and they usually continue through the latest issue. One database, JSTOR, includes some journals as far back as the 1660s!
The contents of a very small number of journals are available on the Internet.
