What is the difference between an article, a journal and a database?
Answer
An article is a piece of writing published in a journal, newspaper, magazine or other publication. They include both physical and digital writing.
An academic or scholarly article is published in an academic or scholarly journal. These articles are written for a professional audience, like faculty, researchers, and scholars, and often use technical language. They include citations, have information about the authors, and are often (but not always) peer reviewed.
A peer reviewed article is one step up from a scholarly article. It is still published by experts in the field, and has also been reviewed by a panel of 'peers' who are also experts in the subject of the article. All peer reviewed articles are scholarly, but not all scholarly articles are peer reviewed. They are also sometimes called refereed articles. Most of our databases have filters where you can limit your search results to academic or peer reviewed articles.
A scholarly or academic journal is like a magazine or newspaper for academic research (scholarly) articles.
Popular magazines and articles are published for a general audience. Things like Time, Vogue, BusinessWeek, and US News are all popular magazines. The periodicals in the database Flipster are popular magazines.
A database is a directory or collection of resources or content like articles, images, videos, and reports. The library has subscribed to over 100 databases on a wide range of subjects so you have access to trustworthy sources for your assignments or personal research.