Popular magazine articles may be acceptable sources for research assignments, but instructors prefer that you use scholarly or professional journal articles. For some research projects (such as ones dealing with local topics or ones of limited duration), newspapers may be the only reliable source available.

Popular magazine articles are written for the general public who are not as familiar with the issues and problems as researchers are. Articles are written in everyday language, and the use of professional and scientific terminology is avoided. Magazine articles rarely cite the sources used to write the article.

Scholarly journal articles are written by and for subject specialists in their disciplines, and use a great deal of scientific and professional terms. Journal articles have a very defined format, consisting of the following:

• An abstract (a summary of the entire article in one paragraph);
• A hypothesis, thesis statement, or research question focusing on a particular topic, question, or problem;
• A series of arguments to support or refute the hypothesis, thesis, or research question;
• A section that describes how the study was conducted, what kinds of tests and experiments were devised;
• The results and outcomes of the study, and an analysis of how the information compares with other studies on the same subject;
• A conclusion summarizing the entire paper.

Newspapers articles publish timely articles of international, national, and local interest. Newspapers provide a public forum in which newspaper editors and the general public can discuss and debate important issues of the day. Newspapers are often the only credible sources of information for local community issues.

The video below, produced by Otis College of Art and Design, describes the differences between scholarly journals, professional articles, and popular articles using a collection of art, fashion, and architecture journals and magazines.