Academic sources

An academic source is a source that is scholarly in nature: that is, it adheres to objective standards of scientific, legal, or historical research, rather than simply being opinion or advocacy. Peer-reviewed journal articles are the epitome of an academic source, but debaters often consider professional academics (such as professors and research scientists) to be "academic sources" even when not writing through peer-reviewed channels.

Advantages
Academic sources are generally considered superior to other sources such as political pundits and partisan think-tanks, for several reasons:


 * Academic authors are generally recognized experts in their field.
 * In theory, academic sources use proven, objective, scientific techniques to arrive at their conclusions, rather than subjective personal analysis. This makes them less susceptible to personal bias. (This is more true in some fields than others, however.)
 * Peer-reviewed articles must be recommended for publication by other experts in the field, reducing the likelihood of major mistakes in methodology or thinking.

Use
Many debaters make a special effort to seek out academic sources. For example, early editions of the Ethos sourcebook had the explicit goal of providing high-quality academic sources to debaters who otherwise lacked them, and the COG sourcebook has included statistics on the number of academic sources it quotes in its advertising.