Skip to Main Content

HLTH 450: Introduction to U.S. Healthcare and Public Health Policy

Information Sources

What is an "empirical article"?

An empirical article is an article that reports research based on actual observation or experiment; it may use either quantitative or qualitative research methods.

Need help determining if an article is empirical or not?

  • In what kind of journal is this article published?
    • ​Empirical articles are published in academic or professional journals, such as Journal of American College Health, American Journal of Health Education, or JAMA: Journal of the American Medical Association
  • Does the article's abstract mention an observation, analysis or study?
    • ​Empirical research measures something, meaning empirical articles will typically contain data collection, survey results, interviews, or an assessment of some sort.
  • Does the article contain the following sections:
    • Introduction
    • Methodology
    • Results
    • Discussion
    • Conclusion
    • References
  • How many pages is the article?
    • ​Empirical articles are typically of substantial length- think at least 5+ pages.