Tutorial on Library Research

After reading the sections on this page, you should be able to:  

1. Identify the four most helpful tools in library databases and explain what they do. 

Most library databases provide similar filters to help you narrow down your search results. The most helpful filters are full-text, peer-reviewed, publication date, and source type.

The full-text filter removes all search results that do not include the resource itself, such as the full-text of an article. Why do the companies that produce these databases leave records in them that do not include the corresponding resource? The answer is that they still want you to know that these resources exist even if they can't provide the resources themselves. Furthermore, the companies know that academic libraries usually are able to borrow items that they do not have from other academic libraries that do have the items. This service is called interlibrary loan and is often abbreviated as ILL.

The peer-reviewed filter removes all search results that were published in journals that are not peer-reviewed. For more information about the peer-review process, see the video named Peer Review on the Types of Sources page in this Guide. 

The publication date filter removes all search results that were not produced during the time period that you specified.

The source type filter removes all search results that are not the type of source that you specified. Examples of source types are academic journals, magazines, and newspapers.

Most library databases provide similar tools to help you manage the resources that you find. The most helpful tools are citation, email, permalink, and print.

The citation tool gives you the citation for the item that you've selected. The citation is given in three different styles: APA, Chicago, and MLA. For more information about citing sources, see the Citing Sources page in this Guide. 

The email tool lets you send the record of the item that you've selected to the email address that you enter.

The permalink tool is an important, but often overlooked, tool. You've probably copied the address of a webpage and saved it somewhere so that you can return to the website later. It's important to understand that this process does not work when you're using library databases. So, you won't be able to return to an article that you found in a database by copying the contents of the address bar and saving it somewhere. This is because the strings of characters that appear in the address bar when you're using a library database contain information about your current browser session. This means that once you close your browser, thereby ending your browser session, the strings of characters that were in the address bar will no longer be valid. As a result, you won't be able to return to the page you were on when you copied the string of characters. You can avoid this problem by using the permalink tool, which generates a link that will get you back to the page that you were on when the link was generated.  

The print tool allows you to print the record of the item that you've selected.