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In the social sciences, broad and commonly used databases and indexes are Academic OneFile (covering more than 8,000 journals); ERIC (Education Resources Information Center), which is funded by the U.S. Department of Education and covers education and related issues; and JSTOR (short for “journal storage”), which is full text for more than 2,600 scholarly journals. What distinguishes JSTOR, as its name suggests, is that it provides back issues of journals, usually 3–5 years (described as a moving wall) behind the most current issue of a particular journal. Project Muse is an electronic source for current journals (greater than 600 scholarly journals in the social sciences and humanities).

Nexis Uni® is almost always full text and covers approximately 11,000 sources of news, business, legal, medical, and reference publications. Incorporating information from newspapers or other current periodicals may supplement academic sources. Another good source of news articles is ProQuest®, providing news information that ranges from the mid-18th century to the present. Statistics from newspapers or other sources may catch readers’ interest, but always question the accuracy of the information and the credentials of the author. If possible, confirm the accuracy of the information by checking it against primary and/or academic sources. A primary source is a source presenting original material (e.g., journal article), whereas a secondary source provides descriptions, summaries, analysis, commentary, perspectives, evaluation, or conclusions about the primary source material. A textbook is considered a secondary source.

Primary source: An original source (e.g., data collected for the project or existing sources such as census data) that was created during a particular time period and is used to draw conclusions based on that research.

Secondary source: A source that analyzes or critiques the primary sources. Textbooks, magazine articles or blogs summarizing research, systematic review articles, or handbooks on a topic are common secondary sources.

Peer review: Used in the context of academic work to indicate that a submitted work has been reviewed (usually anonymously) by experts knowledgeable in the field.