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Education

Examples of Primary Sources

Primary source materials come in many formats.  Here are some examples:

  • Books, magazine and newspaper articles published at the time
  • Hand-written documents like diaries and journals
  • Maps
  • Laws & court cases
  • Speeches, interviews, letters
  • Memoirs and autobiographies
  • literary manuscripts
  • Records of government agencies
  • Records of organizations
  • Public opinion polls
  • Fiction from a particular time and place
  • Research data
  • Religious or philosophical texts
  • Artifacts of all kinds: physical objects, furniture, tools, clothing, etc.
  • Photographs, audio recordings, movies and videos
  • Art, including paintings, prints and other media

Primary vs Secondary Sources

For some research projects, it is important (or you may be required) to use primary sources, instead of or in addition to secondary sources. Scholarly journals often contain primary source research.They also contain review articles.So what's the difference?

Primary sources

A primary sourceis an original object or document -- the raw material or first-hand information. Primary sources include historical and legal documents, eyewitness accounts, results of experiments, statistical data, pieces of creative writing, and art objects. In the natural and social sciences, primary sources are often empirical studies -- research where an experiment was done or a direct observation was made. The results of empirical studies are typically found in scholarly articles or papers delivered at conferences, so those articles and papers that present the original results are considered primary sources. If you are trying to identify a primary source research article, there is a specific format that is used:

  • Identifies what the researcher is studying
  • Identifies the method by which the research was conducted,
  • Reports the data and eventually the findings and conclusion of the study

Secondary sources

A secondary source is something written about a primary source. Secondary sources include comments on, interpretations of, or discussions about the original material. You can think of secondary sources as second-hand information. If I tell you something, I am the primary source. If you tell someone else what I told you, you are the secondary source. Secondary source materials can be articles in newspapers or popular magazines, book or movie reviews, or articles found in scholarly journals that discuss or evaluate someone else's original research.

Research versus Review Articles

Although scientific and other peer reviewed journals are excellent sources for primary research, not every article in those journals will be a research article. Content may also include book reviews, editorials, and review articles. Since review articles include citations and are often quite lengthy, on first glance, they can be difficult to differentiate from original research articles. Since the authors of review articles are discussing, analyzing, and evaluating others' research, not reporting on their own research, review articles are not primary sources. They can be of great value, however, for identifying potentially good primary sources. 

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