A scholarly article is one contained in a scholarly journal (also called academic, "peer-reviewed" or refereed journals). Several features of popular magazines and scholarly journals make it relatively easy to distinguish one from the other, once you know what to look for. These features are highlighted in comparing of popular magazines and scholarly journals.
You can find scholarly articles in a number of different library databases. Some databases like JSTOR, Web of Science, and ScienceDirect contain scholarly journals, exclusively. Others have a mix of scholarly journals, popular magazines, newspapers and other material. In databases such as Academic OneFile, Academic Search Complete, or ProQuest Central, you can limit your search to scholarly (peer-reviewed) journals.
