Science writing assignments often require peer reviewed articles. What does that term mean? This page should help you understand this concept are so you can conduct your research successfully.
Peer review is "a process by which something proposed (as for research or publication) is evaluated by a group of experts in the appropriate field" (Merriam-Webster). Peer review has developed over many years as the primary system to make sure accurate, reliable and original research findings are published in the journal literature. The video "Peer Review in 3 Minutes" offers a quick explanation of the peer review process.
First make sure it IS a research article. Not every article in a journal is about research, they can include editorials, book reviews and other types of articles. If you are searching in OneSearch, the library's discovery platform, the simplest way to ensure that an article is peer reviewed is to limit the search results to "Peer-Reviewed Journals" using the filters on the left.
If you are searching outside of OneSearch, you can go to the journal's home page and check the "About" section. Most peer reviewed journals will include information about their process here.
Information on this page was modified from this Biology Subject Guide and is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution NonCommercial 4.0 International License.