English 106 ~ Spring 2005

Professor Mach

Locating Articles in Library Databases

• What article databases should I use to find articles on my topic?

  • Academic Search Elite ~ A good place to start. Includes references to scholarly as well as popular periodicals.
  • WilsonSelectPlus ~ Includes indexing, abstracting, and full text for a variety of magazines and journals.
    
    
    
  • ABI Inform ~ Includes full-text in many business magazines and journals.
  • Art Index ~Indexes the world's leading arts and humanities journals. You will need a password to access this database and that will be passed on to you in your information literacy class in the library.
  • Proquest Education Complete ~ Contains more than 550 education titles covering all educational levels.
  • ProQuest Nursing ~ Full text and indexing for 250 nursing and allied health periodicals.
  • Periodical Abstracts ~ Includes indexing, abstracting, and some full text for magazine and journal articles.
    
    
    
    • This is only a description of an article -- where's the rest of it?
      • Search for the title of the journal or magazine in Illinet Online.
      • For example, search for the title Teaching Tolerance.
      • Click the link Check Availablility to get a listing of the volumes available.
      • If you don't find the periodical you need, take a look at the list, Full Text Periodicals Available Online. You can also call or email the library to inquire about a specific title or ask a question.
        
        

• Where can I find more articles?

  • Other databases available from the library.
    
    
    
    • How do I get an article from another library?
      • Articles can be retrieved via Interlibrary Loan (ILL). This process takes 7 to 10 days, so leave yourself plenty of time.
        
        

• How do I know whether an article is useful to me?

  • Learn how to critically analyze information sources.
    
    

• Is this a scholarly article or a popular article?

  • How to distinguish between the two.

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• How do I find books on my topic?

  • Use Illinet Online to find books held in the Elmhurst College library as well as books owned by 64 other Illinois academic and research libraries.
    • Quick Searches
      • A good way to start looking for books.
      • You can either look for particular items (such as a particular title), or you can do keywords searching.
      • Use the main words describing your topic.
      • For example, to find books about phonics, type the word phonics (with or without capitals).
      • The word phonics can be anywhere in the description of the item, like the name of the publisher.
      • To do a more focused search on, say, phonics and whole language learning, select Boolean, and type in phonics and "whole learning" .
        
        
• Browse Subject Searches
  • A more precise way of searching.
  • Illinet Online uses Library of Congress (LC) Subject Headings to arrange and organize information.
  • Subject headings are very specific; you can guess what they might be, but you can't make them up.
  • Some examples of subject headings:
    • Work
    • Labor
    • Occupations

• Guided Keyword Searches
  • Allow you more flexibility.
  • Click the appropriate tab, and fill in the blanks as desired.
  • You can change your searching options to look for either some or all of the words you've typed in, and to look in different areas of the item's catalog record.
  • For example, select all of these and type eating disorders treatment.
    
    
• Ordering books from other libraries ~ Illinet Online allows you to request books held by 64 other libraries in Illinois. 
  
  
• How do I get a book that is not available in the library?

How can reference books help me?

• There are often bibliographies at the end of their articles; these bibliographies can lead you to other useful books and articles. Reference books can also give a general overview of an issue, discuss the sub-topics of a larger issues and define terms.

• How can I find more reference books on my topic?
  • Try browsing the Reference section.
  • Browse the shelves around a particular book you like; call numbers tend to keep books on similar topics together.
  • Search Illinet Online using your discipline (like art or psychology) combined with the word "encyclopedia" or "dictionary."
    

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Created 20 October, 2003 by Ayanna Gaines, Assistant Reference Librarian
Last revised 17 February, 2005 by Jennifer Paliatka , Assistant Reference Librarian
A.C. Buehler Library, Elmhurst College