LibGuides: Information Literacy, Level Two: Articles and databases

Articles and Databases

General vs. Subject databases

A library database is a searchable collection of library sources, primarily articles. Learn about the two types of library databases:

General Databases

Usually include both scholarly articles AND popular articles from magazines and newspapers
Contain selected articles from a wide range of subject areas
Are useful if your topic is interdisciplinary (that is, it spans across multiple subject areas) and you want a sampling of relevant articles from multiple subjects
Examples: ProQuest Central, Academic Search Premier

Subject databases

Consist primarily of scholarly articles, plus citations to scholarly books and book chapters
Contain all (or most) articles from a particular subject area
Are useful if your topic is discipline-specific and you want a more comprehensive search for relevant articles from that subject field
Examples: MLA International Bibliography (English), PsycINFO (Psychology), Scopus (Sciences)

Finding databases

Tips for finding articles

Because many library databases contain a vast number of sources compared to the books found in the "Books and More" search, it's often a good idea to make your searches in databases more specific, using multiple keywords and advanced searching techniques to get to precisely the kind of information you need.

Limiters will appear on the left side of your search results screen. (See the limiters highlighted in yellow in the screenshot below!) Limiters can help you quickly sift through your results to find the most relevant sources. Helpful limiters include Limit to peer reviewed, Source type, Publication date, Subject, and Language.

Search results page in a ProQuest database. The limiters/filters are highlighted in yellow on the left side of the screen, including Sorted By, Limit To, and Source Type.

Many articles in library databases will provide abstracts. An abstract is a summary of the article, and reading it can help you decide if the article is relevant to your topic. But it's not a suitable source for citing in a paper, so if an article's abstract seems useful and relevant to you, you should look for the full text of the article, and cite that article's information in your paper.

The detail view of an article in ProQuest. The abstract, in the center of the page, is highlighted.

The permalink for an article is less prone to glitching than the URL at the top of your web browser, so it's more reliable to use if you'd like to be able to get back to the article. The button to get the permalink is usually symbolized by a chain.

The detail view of an article in ProQuest. The Copy Link button on the top right, symbolized by a green circle with a white chain link in the center, is highlighted.

When you find an relevant article in a database, a link to its full text will often be available right in the database. But sometimes, you may see a "Check for Full Text" button instead.

"Check for Full Text" means that the article itself isn't contained in that database, but it may be available in another library database. Clicking on this button will look across our library's databases to see if we have the article. If we do have it, you'll be taken to the article itself; if we don't have it, you'll be able to request the article for free via interlibrary loan.

The detail view of an article in ProQuest. The blue, rectangular Check for Full Text box on the top right is highlighted.