Truncation Finds Multiple Word Forms
The asterisk (*) is usually used to search words with the same root:
Person* = Personal, Personality, Personable, etc.
Wildcard symbols (usually a ‘?’) replace a single letter:
Wom?n = Woman, Women
Need More Specific Results?
Sometimes keywords that worked well in one database won’t be as effective in another. If you find that your results are a bit scattered, try using that database’s terminology: the Thesaurus or Subject Terms link. Many databases have a list of designated words that are used to summarize a topic, but they may not be obvious to you.
To locate articles using Library databases, you can click on Databases from the Library homepage. Listed below are some of the most relevant databases for your research . All are accessible from off campus.
When conducting research, you will usually be asked to find Scholarly Articles, or artices from a Scholarly Journal, rather than popular sources (like magazines and newspapers).
Not sure what the difference is between scholarly and popular? Check out this short tutorial: Scholarly v. Popular
How can you tell if you've found a scholarly article?
Some of our databases allow you to limit your results to Scholarly or Peer-Reviewed (possibly Refereed) articles. In some cases, this isn’t so clear. You can either check with your professor or a librarian, or you can search for the journal name in Ulrichsweb (under Articles & Databases, on the Library homepage).
Once you’ve found the name of the journal you’re looking for, look for a small referee’s shirt icon (), to the left of the title. This indicates that there is scholarly (peer-reviewed, refereed…) value to the articles in this title.