Make sure the scholarly articles discuss a methodology
Not all peer-reviewed articles are studies in which the author used a methodology. Make sure the ones you choose do have a section that discusses the research method. You can often tell from the abstract/summary of the article. The abstract will refer to the study, its variables, and/or its method of research.
One little search trick that can help, although it can unwittingly eliminate some excellent articles in the process, is to “and” in the term method* (yes, that is an asterisk that allows for any ending on the root of the word) along with the rest of your and-ed search. In addition, choose to search this term method* in TEXT, if citation/abstract doesn’t do anything. Please mind my caveat above: it is a lazy approach, but more so, it might mean some really good articles get left out of your search because not all articles have their TEXT in the database.
