How to identify a peer-reviewed journal
Some scholarly journals are peer-reviewed or refereed, meaning that articles submitted for publication must be approved by a panel of readers who are considered experts in their fields. Because they are highly selective, peer-reviewed journals are often regarded as the best in their field.
Not all journals go through the peer-review process. To determine whether your journal article is peer-reviewed or refereed, you must first find out if the overall journal that the article is published in is peer-reviewed or refereed. The following are several suggestions for determining if a journal is peer-reviewed/refereed or not:
- Check the journal
If you have the print/paper copy of the journal, look at the first couple of pages or the last few pages for information about the journal. Some journals will state that they are "peer-reviewed" or "refereed". You can also look at the contributor or author information. Is there a review policy? Is there an editorial board? Are authors required to submit more than one copy of their manuscripts? If yes, these are good indications that the journal is peer-reviewed/refereed. You could also check to see if the journal has its own website and look for editorial statements or instructions to authors there.
- Limit your search in a database
Some periodical indexes or article databases will allow you to limit a search to only peer-reviewed journals or have search results grouped by publication type (e.g. peer-reviewed journals). This is NOT a 100% guarantee that the journals listed as "peer-reviewed" are actually peer-reviewed. Try some of the other options provided to double check that the journal is peer reviewed.
- Search Ulrich's International Periodical Directory
Ulrich's International Periodical Directory provides useful information about all types of periodicals (academic and scholarly journals, popular magazines, newspapers, etc.) and can be used to determine if a journal is peer-reviewed.
Look up your journal. Type the journal title into the search box and press enter, or click on the green magnifying glass icon 
to search.
From your results, choose the journal you are looking for to get more information.
Information about the journal is provided. Look for the line indicating whether the journal is refereed (i.e. peer-reviewed) or not.
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NOTE: Even if a journal is peer-reviewed, an individual article in that journal may not be. Some article types (i.e. news items, editorials, letters, book or article reviews, etc.) may not have gone through the peer-review process.
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Need more help? Visit the Research desk at Bronfman Library.
