Types of Periodicals:
	Scholarly & Research Journals	Professional, Trade & Industry Journals	Journals of Commentary & Opinion	Newspapers	Popular Magazines
Examples	African American Review Sociology of Education Plasma Physics Shakespeare Quarterly	RN Science Teacher Ceramics Monthly American Libraries	Mother Jones National Review Christian Century New Republic	New York Times Washington Post Christian Science Monitor Wall Street Journal	Time Newsweek Ebony Business Week
Purposes	Original research; In depth analysis of issues related to the discipline; Academic level book reviews; Refereed or peer-reviewed	Current trends, news & products in a field; Company, organization, & biographical information;Statistics, forecasts; Employment & career information; Book and product reviews	Commentaries on social & political issues; Some in-depth analysis; Political viewpoints, liberal, conservative & other; Sometimes acts as voice of activist organizations; Speeches & interviews; Book reviews	Current information; Hard news; Local and regional information; Classified ads; Editorials; Speeches; Book reviews; Primary source for information on events	Current events; Hot topics; Primary source for analysis of popular culture; Short articles; Generally not much depth; Interviews
Language	Academic; Often uses technical language of the discipline	Written for practioners; May use technical language	Written for a general educated audience	Written for a general audience	Non-technical language
Authors	Researchers, academics, professors, scholars, etc.	Practioners in the field or journalists with subject expertise	Varies widely; Can be academics, journalists, representatives of various "groups"	Journalists	Generally, journalists and freelance writers
Sources	Footnotes & bibliographies; Usually extensive documentation	Occasional brief bibliographies; Sources sometimes cited in text	Occasionally cite soures in text or provide short bibliographies	Rarely cite any sources in full	Rarely cite any sources
Publisher	Universities, scholarly presses or academic/research organizations	Commercial publishers or professional and trade associations	Commercial publishers or non-profit organizations	Commercial publishers	Commercial publishers
Graphics	Graphs, charts, formulas, depending on the discipline; No glossy advertisements	Photographs, charts, tables, illustrations; Sometimes glossy ads	Wide variety of appearances; Some very plain, others lots of gloss	Pictures, charts, ads of all sorts	Very glossy; Full of color ads
Example Indexes to Search	JSTOR; EBSCOhost (use discipline-specific databases & peer-reviewed option); Biological Abstracts	ERIC; SPORTDiscus (via EBSCOhost), Business Source Premier (via EBSCOhost), PAIS	Academic Search Premier (via EBSCOhost), PAIS, CQ Researcher, Reader's Guide	Academic Universe, Newspaper Source (via EBSCOhost), individual newspaper indexes	Academic Search Premier (via EBSCOhost), Reader's Guide