How can I assess the quality of a paper outside my field?
This question concerns assessing the quality of papers outside one's field.


The question seems to be more leaning towards the quality of journals outside of one's field. Here's a brief list of pointers (some of which also appear in this question):


check if the journal has an impact factor (some good journal's don't and vice versa, so beware of false positives and false negatives)
find out the most prominent literature indexes in the area and see if it's in there (e.g., DBLP for Comp. Sci., PubMed for life sciences, etc.)
check the Australian ranking tables (don't take them too seriously: there is no such thing as a total ordering of journals)
check for journal citations in Scholar/Academic Search/Scopus
otherwise check paper citations in Scholar/Academic Search/Scopus
find out if the publisher is reputable (Elsevier, Springer, a good university press, etc.)
check Beall's list to make sure the publisher is not "predatory"
find out if the editors-in-chief are established academics (e.g., high h-indexes in Scholar)
talk to experts in the area
apply common sense.


The last point is particularly important. Though it is easy to discover if a journal is excellent or terrible, in between those extremes, there's a lot of grey. For example, new journals may be much-needed and drawing quality work from quality people, but they won't have a high h-index or an impact factor, etc.

For those grey areas, talking to an expert who knows the field is important.


  AllPsych Journal


This doesn't seem to be a formal journal, but rather an informal way for authors to publish educational articles online. All papers are published on the web-site, there's no mention of an editorial board, a publisher, a means of submission, etc.

Of course, this says nothing of the quality/utility of the papers published there: just that it would probably not count in academic circles as a "traditional journal".

For the quality of a paper itself independent of the venue, check how many citations it has in Scholar versus it's age, check the nature of those citations, check the h-index and background of the authors, etc. (Of course these methods are only an approximation for reading it and making up your own mind as to its quality, but since it is outside your area ...)