Typically, "scholarly" articles are written for other scholars. Scholarly articles are intended to make a contribution to knowledge in that field. 

These journals use a peer-review process prior to publishing an article to ensure the reliability, validity, and methodology of an original research study. The review process ensures that the published article reflects solid scholarship.

Scholars critically assess a draft of the article before publication.

Scholarly articles often take a year or more to publish from the time of the study.

Peer-Reviewed journal articles almost always have:

• Biographical information about the author(s) including their professional affiliations
• Extensive bibliography, footnotes, or endnotes
• Technical jargon specific to the field
• A structured abstract containing distinct parts such as introduction, methodology, data, results, discussion, conclusions