Trek 11:
Understanding the information cycle
Trek 13:
Finding statistics
Trek 14:
Finding Acts of Parliament,Bills, Regulations and Hansard
Trek 15:
Finding law case reports
Trek 16:
Finding theses
Trek 17:
Who has cited this author? Citation indexes
Trek 18:
Keeping up-to-date
Trek 19:
Finding unpublished information
Trek 20:
Managing your information
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Do you find it difficult to choose a database to find relevant journal articles? Do you know how to limit your search so that you don't get too many references? This Trek can help you to become a more effective searcher. Trek on!
(If you need an introduction to databases, try Trek 6.)
Which database is the best for my topic?
Choosing the best search terms: thesaurus or index
Using shortcuts: truncation and wildcard symbols
Narrowing your search
'Capturing' references: saving and emailing
Helpful hints
Because not all databases give the full-text of journal articles and one database will not cover all subjects in depth, this information may help you to choose a relevant database.
There are two kinds of 'full-text' databases:
Multidisciplinary databases index journals from many subject areas. Examples are ProQuest databases, ScienceDirect and Current Contents Connect. These databases, especially if they provide the full-text of articles, are good to start with if you only need a few articles on a topic.
For a thorough search on a specific topic, choose a subject-specific database. Some, such as Business Source Premier and ProQuest's Health and Medical Complete also provide some full-text articles.
However, Current Contents Connect is one very large, current, multidisciplinary database, which indexes about 7,000 peer-reviewed journals. You can search it for very specific and technical topics, although it does not have the full-text of articles.
Some databases only provide the reference or 'bibliographic' details of journal articles, book chapters etc. Most do provide an abstract and a very few, such as some Informit databases, use subject headings to describe the content of articles. Most subject-specific databases are 'bibliographic'.
As these databases do not have the full article, you must check local library catalogues, follow the Find It link or search a union catalogue, such as SIAL (Serials in Australian libraries) or WorldCat (for books) to find which library has the journal (or book). No library will hold every reference you find in a database.
Although the databases mentioned in this Trek are purchased by Curtin Library for Curtin students and staff, some are also freely available on the Web. These include:
Use the Links below to connect to these databases.
International databases may not index many Australian journals. Some databases only cover Australian material and you should search these for references about Australian topics. Examples are:
At Curtin Library, Gecko's menus have an icon which indicates if a database has an Australian focus.
If you search ABI Inform with the phrase 'organizational culture', you may get less relevant hits than if you search on 'corporate culture'. If you search Medline on 'genes and cancer' you may find less relevant articles than if you use the term 'oncogenes'. Why?
Each reference in a database is given subject headings, (also called 'descriptors', 'identifiers' or 'index terms') from a list of set terms (an 'index' or 'thesaurus'), so that all articles on the same topic, regardless of their title, should have the same heading/s.
Searching on Subject terms is one way to narrow your search, but you must know the correct term to use. Looking at the subject headings of a relevant reference and using Thesauri and indexes can help you to choose the best terms.
On the search screen, look for a link to Index, Subjects or Thesaurus. If you type a term into a Thesaurus search box, it will link to the set term/s used by the database, an explanation ('scope notes') and a list of broader terms, narrower terms and terms that you cannot use in a Subject search.
For example, here is an extract from the ERIC Thesaurus (ERIC is a major database in education).
ERIC Thesaurus (extract):
COMPUTING (this is the term that was typed into the Thesaurus search box)
EDUCATIONAL COMPUTING, see COMPUTER USES IN EDUCATION (you now click on this term )
The next screen will look like this:Subject: COMPUTER-USES-IN-EDUCATION
SCOPE NOTE: THE USE OF COMPUTERS FOR INSTRUCTION, TESTING, STUDENT/PUPIL PERSONNEL SERVICES, ......EDUCATIONAL PURPOSES (NOTE: USE A MORE SPECIFIC TERM IF POSSIBLE............
USED FOR: EDUCATIONAL COMPUTING
More specific (narrower) terms:
COMPUTER ASSISTED INSTRUCTION
COMPUTER ASSISTED TESTING
COMPUTER MANAGED INSTRUCTION
Related terms:
COMPUTER LITERACY
COMPUTER ORIENTED PROGRAMS
COMPUTER SCIENCE EDUCATION
COMPUTER SOFTWARE
So, in a Subject search, you should find more relevant references if you use the terms 'computer uses in education' or any other relevant 'narrower' or 'related' terms from the list, than if you search on Keywords and use terms such as 'computing' or 'computers and education'.
A database's index gives less information than a thesaurus. It may just be a list of the database's subject terms, author, business or product names with the number of references for each heading. You can select and search on these terms directly from the index.
Truncation and wildcard symbols such as the (*) asterisk, (?) question mark, and (!) exclamation mark, are efficient ways of searching for similar terms. Not all databases use the same symbol for the same function, so always check their search Help information.
The truncation symbol stands for a string of zero or more characters. It is useful for searching for the singular, plural or variations of a term in one search. Here are examples from different databases:
ABInform (ProQuest) australia* Searches for:
australia, australia's, australian, australians or australis, australites etcCurrent Contents Connect australia* Inspec (Ovid) australia* ScienceDirect australia*
The Wildcard symbol can stand for zero or a specific number of characters. It is useful for searching for the English and American spelling of terms in one search. Again, different databases use different symbols. For example:
ABI Inform (ProQuest) wom?n women or woman or womyn Current Contents Connect colo?r color or colour Inspec (Ovid) organi?ation organisation or organization ScienceDirect behavio?r behavior or behaviour
Most databases have a Basic Search option with a few ways to limit your searches. You can specify the year/s, ask for the terms to be in the article title, limit to articles in refereed (peer reviewed) journals or to full-text or English language articles. Look for clickable buttons or boxes with these 'limit' options.
There can also be Advanced Search, Guided Search or Search Builder options. These provide more limits - to Subject terms, articles in a particular journal or by a particular author. Some health science databases also enable you to select Human or Animal, Male or Female examples.
Here are some alternative ways to narrow your searches. Don't try to use them all at once, as you may not get any hits at all!
Most databases allow you to save your references or the full article. The options can differ with each database, so check the online Help.
When you have a list of records, look for the option to 'mark' or tick relevant records from the list, then 'view the marked list', so that you can print, save (download to disk), export or email only the records you select.
If you want to be sure that you can read your records with word processing software (eg Word ), you should save them in 'plain text' format, rather than 'html'. Adding '.txt' to your file name e.g. [leader.txt] should ensure you are saving them as a text file.
If you mistakenly save your references as '.html', you will need to use your Web browser - Netscape or Internet Explorer to open the file to read them. In the 'plain text' format, graphs and images in the article will not be saved.
Many databases also provide the articles in PDF format which looks like a scanned page of the printed journal with graphs and images, and page numbers. To save these articles, with the graphs and images, you must add .pdf to the file name and have Adobe Acrobat software on your computer to open the file, read and print the articles.
Most, but not all, databases enable you email the selected references to yourself, either in plain text or .pdf format. So quick and convenient! Look for this option on the screen when you are looking at your references.
Another way to find specific subject terms is to choose a Word or Keyword search, find a relevant reference, look at its Subject terms and use these in a Subject search.
MeSH: Medical Subject Headings is the thesaurus for the Medline and PubMed databases, while PsycINFO has a huge thesaurus of psychological terms. Use these to find the database's preferred term for a disease, syndrome, therapy etc.
You can import references from some databases directly into your EndNote library (see Trek 20).
Curtin Library has many Step-by-Step Guides and Viewlet tutorials to help you learn to search a particular database. See the Links below.
Try some examples in our Quiz, then voyage into the world of statistics in Trek 13
Links:
Curtin's Gecko: Gateway to Library Databases (Curtin staff & students)
Curtin Library's Online Tutorials
AustArt:Australian art journals index (Free database)
ERIC (Education - Free database)
PubMed (Medical Sciences - Free database)
HighWire Press (free database with some full text)
ingenta (Free database)
The InfoTrekkPlus team welcomes your comments
