InfoSkills voor Bestuurskunde

Article types published by scholarly journals

• Theoretical articles articles explore ideas and concepts, often proposing new theories, challenging existing ones, or building on current knowledge to offer fresh perspectives.
• Research articles – also known as original articles – present the findings of new research. They are highly valued in fields like the sciences, economics, and social sciences. These articles usually provide a detailed account of the research methods used and explain the significance of the results.
• Review articles, often called "reviews," provide a summary of the current knowledge on a particular research topic. They are especially useful for gaining a quick and comprehensive understanding of a subject, particularly when recent.
• Case studies are detailed, in-depth analyses of a single subject – such as a person, group, event, or situation – used to explore specific issues within a real-life context. They are commonly used in disciplines like medicine, psychology, business, law, and education to gain insights into complex phenomena. Rather than aiming for broad generalizations, case studies help illustrate how and why something happens in a particular instance.
• Book reviews are concise articles offering insight and opinion on recently published scholarly books (monographs). Although written by scholars, these reviews are not considered scholarly sources themselves, but they can help identify books that are.

Structure of scholarly articles

Scholarly articles typically include the following components:

• Article title
• Abstract (a brief summary highlighting the main points discussed in the article) 
• Introduction or literature review
• Article text/body
  • In research articles, the article body usually includes two sections: Methods and Results.
• Discussion (section where the authors interpret and analyze their findings)
• Conclusion (may be part of the Discussion)
• References (a list of all the sources the authors have cited throughout the article)

Volumes & Issues ǀ Publishing frequency ǀ Pagination

Most scholarly journals are published quarterly and typically have continuous pagination, meaning the page numbers do not restart with each new issue. Instead, they continue sequentially throughout the volume, which is a collection of issues published within a specific time frame, typically a year.

For instance, if volume 20, issue 1 ends on page 151, volume 20, issue 2 will begin on page 152. Page numbering only resets with the start of a new volume (e.g., when volume 20 ends and volume 21 begins).

Peer review 

A fundamental aspect of science is peer review, also referred to as refereeing. Peer review is the process in which an article is evaluated for quality by experts in the same field before being published. Articles that have undergone this process are known as peer-reviewed or refereed. Most scholarly journals utilize peer review as part of their publishing process.

Check out this 3:15-minute video to learn how peer review works:

Please note Book reviews published in scholarly journals are typicallly NOT peer reviewed.