Primary Sources and Original Research

Scholarly journals can be great places to locate primary research, however they also contain articles which review books, editorials, and review articles. 

Review articles may be long and contain citations, so at first glance they may look like a primary research article.  The authors of a review article usually evaluate, discuss, and analyze other's research on the topic, but offer no original research themselves and cannot be considered primary sources.  They can be helpful to gain an overview of the research that has been done in that area, and can help identify primary research articles by other authors. 

Primary research articles will generally follow a standard format; including sections with titles like "Methods" , "Results", and "Discussion".  Most will also have an abstract at the beginning of the article and a works cited list at the end.  Like with other types of articles, reading the abstract can often give you clues as to what the article will be about.   Look for phrases like "we measured", "we tested" , or "in our study we found" as these are often used in the presentation of original research.  Many primary research articles in the social and natural sciences will also contain graphs, charts, data tables or illustrations.

There are three types of sources:

1) Primary Sources

• Original materials that provide direct evidence or first-hand testimony concerning a topic or event.

• Primary sources can be contemporary sources created at the time when the event occurred (e.g., letters and newspaper articles) or later (e.g., memoirs and oral history interviews).

• Primary sources may be published or unpublished.  Unpublished sources are unique materials (e.g., family papers) often referred to as archives and manuscripts.

• What constitutes a primary source varies by discipline. How the researcher uses the source generally determines whether it is a primary source or not.

2) Secondary Sources

• Works that interpret, analyze, and discuss the evidence provided by primary sources (e.g., scholarly books and articles).

• Secondary sources are generally a second-hand account or observation at least one step removed from the event.

• Secondary sources, however, can be considered to be primary sources depending on the context of their use. For example, Ken Burns' documentary of the Civil War is a secondary source for Civil War researchers, but a primary source for those studying documentary filmmaking.
  

3) Tertiary Sources

• Books or articles that synthesize or distill primary and secondary sources, often in a convenient, easy-to-read form (e.g., dictionaries, encyclopedias, indexes, and textbooks). 

Source:  David Kupas's "Finding  Primary Sources" libguide:  URL: http://pitt.libguides.com/primarysources

Source:  David Kupas's "Finding  Primary Sources" libguide:  URL: http://pitt.libguides.com/primarysources