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Information Literacy

This is a learning guide designed to teach students about information literacy and why it matters.

Scholarly Articles

Scholarly sources are considered to be credible and trustworthy because they have undergone the peer review process. Scholarly articles usually present, in detail, the evidence of research on a topic. Scholarly articles generally follow a standard pattern of organization. This pattern can help you identify an article as scholarly. Here are the basic parts of a scholarly article (in the order that you'd usually encounter them):

Abstract

Introduction/Literature Review

Methods

Results

Discussion

Conclusion

Bibliography/References

How to Read A Scholarly Article

Reading a scholarly article is not light reading. Because a scholarly article can be dense, packed with jargon, and complex, you need to read it in a different way than you would most other things. This means reading it from start to finish is not the best method. Instead, you'll want to read it strategically. Some parts are more important than others. Follow this strategy from BYU's Reading & Writing Center: