ESL 400 Son-Chan

An article database is an online collection of resources.

• Databases often contain articles from newspapers, magazines and academic journals, but can also contain reference sources, books, reports and a variety of other resources.
• Databases are often grouped according to subject matter, like ERIC (education), the Psychology & Behavioral Sciences Collection or the Natural Sciences Collection.
• To find relevant information in a database, you will need to conduct keyword searches. (See the box below) about keyword searching.

Use a thesaurus if you need help finding academic vocabulary for your searches.

Using OR between words broadens your search. You will get MORE results.

Using AND between words narrows your search and gives you more specific, but FEWER results.

Adding an asterisk (SHIFT + 8 = *) to the root of a word will search for variations of that word. For example:

IMMIGRAT*  will search for IMMIGRATING and IMMIGRATION

IMMIGRANT* will search for IMMIGRANT and IMMIGRANTS

Lastly, using quotations around two words will retrieve those search words together as a phrase: For example:

"LOW INCOME HOUSING" "LOS ANGELES"