Databases: searching the literature electronically
What's the purpose of databases
The purpose of databases is to help you to find relevant articles, quickly. As journals contain thousands of articles, browsing their contents individually for relevant articles is not efficient. You may find something, but chances are, you'll waste time.
Databases provide a fast, efficient, comprehensive and systematic approach to searching the journal literature and in some cases book reviews, conference papers, books and book chapters, to find articles and other material on a particular topic. You can cover a very large range of material over a number of years with one search.
The library subscribes to over 300 databases in many different subject areas and disciplines.
There is usually a short time lag between the publication of an article and its appearance in a database. Hence databases can be useful for finding current information on a topic.
What do databases contain?
Library databases contain electronic records for journal articles, conference proceedings, government reports, etc. Each record in a database contains a citation to a published item including author, article title, journal title (or conference proceedings, book or book chapter), publication date, and page numbers. Most database records also provide abstracts, which summarise the content of articles.
An increasing number of items found in databases are available online in full-text. Others may be found in print journals in the UNSW Library, or in other libraries.
Getting from a database record to the actual article
After a search you will need to locate the actual journal articles that you have identified in your search. Use the Library Catalogue to see if the library has a subscription to the journal. Some journals are available electronically (full-text) but some may be only available in print or not available at all. The UNSW Library does not subscribe to all journals indexed by databases.
SUMMARY: Finding journal articles on a topic
First...
Do a database search to find references to relevant articles
Second...
Do a Library Catalogue search to check whether the UNSW Library has the journal electronically or in print.
The Library Catalogue is different to what is generally termed databases. Library Catalogue contains only 'top level' information for journal items ie. you can only search by journal title. Hence you will need the citation/reference from a database search before searching the Library Catalogue.
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| 3.1 | Module 3 objectives |
| 3.2 | Databases: searching the literature electronically |
| 3.3 | Planning your search |
| 3.4 | Accessing databases |
| 3.5 | PsycINFO: Psychology database |
| 3.6 | Module 3 review |
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