CLEAR Program

The CLEAR Program at the University of Utah’s College of Engineering prepares engineering undergraduates for success in their careers through improving their oral and written communication, teamwork skills and ethical understanding.

What is a Scholarly Journal?

A scholarly journal contains articles (and sometimes 'open letters') written by scholars to report results of research and other scholarly activities. What sets 'scholarly articles' apart is that they are reviewed by other scholars in the field before publication is approved. Besides following proper style requirements, the scholarly reviewers examine each submitted paper for:

  • Basing their research on the findings of earlier, published, scholarly works

  • Designing the research and analyzing results in a correct or reasonable manner

  • Basing conclusions on the evidence provided by the author's experimental results

  • Exceptions are made for articles that are Exceptional

Researchers can make mistakes designing and conducting research and later during the analysis of results. Scholarly review attempts to keep mistakes out of the scholarly record (the peer-reviewed journals) in order to more quickly advance knowledge. For most academic papers, scholarly articles are excellent resources and the preferred sources for supporting your arguments.

Search Strategies

Boolean Operators are used to connect and define the relationship between your search terms.  When searching electronic databases, you can use Boolean Operators to either broaden or narrow your search results.  The three Boolean Operators are AND, OR and NOT.


Boolean Operators

Boolean operators are simple words (AND, OR and NOT) used as conjunctions to combine or exclude keywords in a search, resulting in more focused search results.

venn diagram with "teenagers" in the left circle, "adolescents" in the right circle, and "OR" in their overlap.  All circles and overlap are colored purple.

OR

  • Broadens or expands your search
  • Is used to retrieve like terms or synonyms
  • Finds all items with either teenager OR adolescent
  • In set theory and math, "union" is inclusive "OR".
    "OR" = teenager U adolescent

Venn diagram with the left circle "diet" overlapping with the right circle "children".  The overlap says "and".  The venn diagram is white except for it's overlap "and" which is purple.

AND

  • Narrows or limits your search
  • Used to retrieve unrelated terms
  • Finds items with both diet and children
  • In set theory and math, "intersection" is "AND".
    "AND" = diet children

Venn diagram with the left circle saying "spider", the right circle saying "monkey", their overlap says "not".  The left circle that says "spider" is purple, but the right circle and overlap are white.

NOT

  • Narrows or limits your search
  • Finds the term "spider" not "monkey"
  • Use the NOT operator with caution
  • May eliminate relevant records

Note:
AND is the default or implied operator in Usearch, Google, Scopus, PubMed, EBSCOhost, and most search interfaces. 
"ecotourism sustainable" is the same as "ecotourism AND sustainable"

In Usearch, EBSCOhost, SCOPUS, and PubMed, Boolean operators (AND, OR, NOT) must be entered in upper case.


Phrase Searching

Phrase searching is using quotations.

For instance:

"international olympic committee"
"Utah tennis"

It finds the exact phrase, and items with words in the order typed.  One exception is Scopus.  Scopus uses curly brackets or braces for {exact phrase} searching.  In Scopus, quotes are used for "loose/approximate phrase" searching.


Truncation Stemming

Truncation or stemming is using an asterisk *.  It is also known as a wildcard.  Truncation is a symbol that retrieves all the suffixes or endings of a word.

For instance:

school*             retrieves school, schools, schooling, schooled, etc.
latin*                 retrieves latina, latino, latinx, latinos, latinas, latin, latinization, etc.

Note:
In the Library of Congress, % (percent sign) is a single character wildcard and ? (question mark) is truncation for multiple characters.


Nesting

Nesting is commonly used when combining more than one Boolean operator (OR, AND).  Most search interfaces search left to right.  Using parentheses in a search changes the order of operation.

For instance:

(moral* OR ethic*) AND (assisted suicide OR euthanasia)
(ski OR skis OR skiing OR snowboard*) AND video*

Proximity or Adjacency Operators

Proximity operators allow you to find one word within a certain distance of another.

With (w), Near (n), Next (n), or Pre (p) are common proximity operators.

Note:
Read the database help to see if proximity operators can be used in your searches.


Thanks to Alfred Mowdood for authoring these instructions.

What are Some Characteristics of a Scholarly Journal?

  • Scholarly journals are usually published or sponsored by a professional society or association.
  • There may be a list of reviewers on the first few pages. This type of journal is known as a "juried", "refereed", or "peer reviewed" journal. In such journals, all articles are reviewed by experts before publication so the journals tend to be considered among the best in their fields.

Some Differences between Scholarly and Popular Publications:

SCHOLARLY JOURNAL

POPULAR MAGAZINE

Audience

Professionals, Professors, Graduate Students

People without a college degree in the subject

Indexing
(Databases)

Indexed in Multidisciplinary and subject-specific indexes like Biological Abstracts, Historical Abstracts, etc. Databases known to primarily, or exclusively, accept only peer-reviewed articles for publication.

Indexed in general-purpose indexes like Readers' Guide or ProQuest/Periodical Abstracts. Databases known to cover the 'Popular Literature' where the author's background or knowledge is unknown.

Language

Field-specific language/jargon, requires reader to be conversant with other research in the field.

Written in everyday language accessible to any generally knowledgeable reader.

Some Differences between the Articles in Scholarly and Popular publications:

SCHOLARLY ARTICLES

POPULAR ARTICLES

Author

Author's credentials in the field are established (e.g., institutional affiliation, maybe degrees, etc.)

Authors may not have special qualifications for writing article; credentials are not given

Bibliography

Yes.

Probably not.

Research

Usually based on original research or new applications based, at least in part, on the original scholarly research of others.

The author may be a reporter; someone who have done "background research", but not "original" research, the actual lab work, math, or theoretical analysis.

Scholarly, Popular, or Trade?

For a side-by-side comparison of scholarly, popular, and trade publications, check out this guide.

Librarian Contact Info

Profile Photo
Alfred Mowdood
he/him/his
Contact:
The University of Utah
J. Willard Marriott Library
Head of Faculty Services,
Representative, Patent and Trademark Resource Center (PTRC), and
Adjunct Assistant Professor in Kinesiology
295 South 1500 East #2110 R
Salt Lake City, UT 84112-0860
alfred.mowdood@utah.edu
(801) 585-7125

Pronouns: he/him/his

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