Q. What are trade journal articles and where can I find them?

Trade journals (also called trade magazines, professional journals, etc.) are written for, and often by, people who work in a particular profession, such as teaching, nursing, engineering, advertising, and so on. 

Trade journals are written for people in a particular kind of work, so they assume that readers already know some of the issues and vocabulary specific to those jobs. But trade journal articles are usually not as difficult, specific, or long as peer-reviewed (also called "scholarly" or "academic") journals.

Many of our database collections include trade journals. You can often use a resource type filter (usually on the side or on the top) and select "trade journal" or "magazine" to find these kinds of articles. For detailed directions and screenshots, please see our Research 101 page on trade and professional journals.