The connection between professional magazines and the research literature

This preliminary exploration of the characteristics of the trade press lays the groundwork for our future analysis of patterns of the impact of scholarly literature on professional literature. We have established that a substantial number of trade serials are indexed in Scopus, and so their references are accessible for analysis. We have argued that the trade press is not a homogeneous category and have identified meaningful dimensions on which titles differ. Finally, we have established that the trade press, even consumer magazines, does reference academic literature. The rich dataset that we have built promises to reveal important information about research that reaches application in professional work. We also intend to speak with the recipients of trade serials on their interaction with this knowledge to better understand this pathway and to validate these results.