Research Basics | Library Home Page
NOTE: Be sure to follow the instructions for limiting to refereed journals.
EBSCO provides a number of different databases that include articles found in scholarly journals. Databases such as the Psychology and Behavioral Sciences Collection and the Sociological Collection contain articles only from refereed (scholarly) journals, so they do not offer the option to limit by Refereed Journals. Databases such as Academic Search Premier and the Professional Development Collection, on the other hand, include articles from both scholarly journals and general interest magazines; these databases do offer the option to limit to articles from Refereed Journals.
Select your database by clicking on the title of the database. You will see the following page:
Click in the box next to Scholarly (Peer Reviewed) Journals so that a check mark appears in the box. Type in your search terms in the Find field and click on Search.
The InfoTrac databases consist of three databases, the Expanded Academic ASAP, the Health Reference Center, and the Health and Wellness Resource Center. The first two databases would be appropriate databases to use for your research papers.
General instructions on using the InfoTrac databases
When you select your database, the search screen for that database appears on the screen. Look under the Search field for the phrase Limit the Current Search and then the phrase to refereed publications. Click in the box next to the phrase to refereed publications.
Many of the articles found in the EBSCO and InfoTrac databases will be full text. This means that they are available in the database as complete articles. If an article is available in its entirety, the words Full Text or View Text will be visible under the entry or citation for that article. Click on the phrases Full Text or View Text in order to pull up the articles. You can then print them or email them to your email account.
If the citation for an article does NOT include the phrases listed above, the article is NOT available as a complete article in the database. In these cases, treat the article citation just as you would a citation found in the Reader's Guide to Periodical Literature. Use the blue notebooks OR click here to determine if the library carries the journal and where it is located in the library. Use the photocopiers or the microfilm reader/printers to make copies of the articles.
If you find a citation for an article on your topic but it is not available as a full-text article and this library does NOT carry the journal, you can still obtain the article through Interlibrary Loan. The citation will provide the information you need to obtain the articles through Interlibrary Loan. This information will consist of the author's name, the title of the article, the title of the journal, the date of publication, page numbers and usually a volume number and an issue number. Write this information down or make a printout. Obtain an ILL form at the circulation desk; fill out the form, including the information next to Journal Request, and place the completed form in the bottom tray above the book drop at the right end of the circulation desk.