Spanish Literature

What is peer review? 

Your professor might require you to use peer-reviewed articles for your research paper or project. Why is that? Scholarly journals strive to make sure any article that appears in their publication is of high quality and adds to the literature in that field. To accomplish this, they use a peer review process. This process takes months, or sometimes years! 

Authors thoroughly research their subject, write an article, and submit their article to a journal. The editor of the journal forwards the article to other experts in that subject area for peer review. Reviewers evaluate the submission for accuracy and quality, and suggest either revisions or rejection based on the quality of research and writing. The peer-review process is used in both traditional and open access journal publishing.

Want more information?

• Click here to see a helpful YouTube video that explains the peer review process. 
• Click here to see AU's "Scholarly, Trade, or Popular" information page.

Currency

• When was the information published or posted?
• Has the information been updated or revised?
• Does your topic require up-to-date information or will older sources work or perhaps even be preferable?
• Is there only one date for the entire website or do content pages have dates too?
• If on a website are the links still live or do they lead to dead or missing pages?

Relevance

• Who is the intended audience?
• Is the information at an appropriate level for your needs (i.e. not too basic or too advanced)?
• Does the information relate to your topic or answer your question?
• Is the information just summary of other perspectives or does it add its own content?

Authority

• Who is the publisher/author/source/organization?
• What qualifies this author/creator to provide this information?
• What credentials or affiliations does the author/creator have?
• Is there contact information where the publisher or author can be reached? (If a print or database source try doing a web search for the publisher/author to get more information)
• If on a website, what URL does the site use and what does that tell you about the source? (.com .edu .gov .org .net)

Accuracy

• Where does the information come from?
• Is the information supported by evidence?
• Are there any references?
• Is there a bibliography?
• Can you verify the information from another source?
• Are there spelling, grammar, or typographical errors?
• Is the language emotional or appear to be strongly biased?

Purpose

• What is the purpose of the information? Is it designed to entertain, inform, educate, sell, persuade?
• Is the intent of the information clear?
• Is the information fact or opinion?
• Does the point of view appear to be objective and impartial?
• Are the ads clearly separated from the information?
• What type of ads/images are included?