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Search Techniques


Sections
1: Research
2: Articles
3: Books
4:Other Resources
5:Evaluate/Cite
6:Evidence Based Prac.
Glossary
Resources
Evaluation
About the Tutorial 

SECTION 2: FINDING ARTICLES

A.  Choosing a Database 

What is a database? A database is an electronic collection of records. There are many types of records: citations, tables of contents, datasets, directory information, etc.  Records are designed to be a brief representation or surrogate of the original work.

The type of database you'll need for finding articles is also referred to as a periodical index or abstracted index (abstract). The records in these types of databases are made up of fields, such as Author, Title, Year of Publication, etc.

Many databases include the full text for some or all of the articles indexed. If the full article is not available, you will still find the bibliographic citation and perhaps the abstract, and you will need to find the full text of the article elsewhere. 

The periodical databases that you would use to identify articles are usually part of a larger search system. For example, EBSCOhost, FirstSearch, and Cambridge Scientific Abstracts are all large search systems that offer a number of databases covering various topics.

Next:  Sample Record from a database


For further information contact Karen Vaughan (kvaughan@odu.edu)
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