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503-725-4424
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503-725-5874
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503-725-3879
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If you don't find the answer to your question, please Ask Us!
Databases - Basics & Searching
Database Basics
- A Database is a search engine that searches scholarly journal articles that are NOT available on the free internet.
- Different databases cover different subject areas, but there are some general, multi-disciplinary databases, such as Academic Search Premier
- The trick is to pick the right databases for your topic
- For a list of PSU's databases by topic, click on the "Find Databases & Articles" link on the homepage for lists by Broad Category or by Subject
- If you know the title of the specific database you want, you can look it up by Title A-Z
- Databases will give you citations to journal articles.
- Sometimes a link to the full text of the article will be there for you to print, save or email to yourself, but not always (See the How Do I Find...Articles page)
Hint! When a database only gives you a citation, hit the green button  to possibly link to the full text from another database. Otherwise, Ask Us!
Searching Databases for Articles
You can search databases much the same way as you search our library catalog, by keyword, subject heading, author, article title, publication title, or a combination of these with an advanced search.
Note: Different databases will look and work differently, but they all perform the same basic functions.
- Create a list of as many synonyms as you can think of for your topic and related themes to your topic
- Plug in one or two at a time, click on titles, read the abstracts, and note the subject headings for more words to plug back into the search boxes; play with the combination of terms you plug in to be more specific or more general to your topic
When you find citations for articles you want, you can usually print, save, or email the citations to yourself (and the full text when available), or export them to bibliographic software such as RefWorks.
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