Finding Information
using UTPA's Online Databases
Finding
Journal and Magazine Articles
Once you are in Academic Search Complete, you
can find easily find articles from magazines and
journals. Just follow the steps below to get started!
1. Type your topic into the search box. Almost
all of the library's databases work with keyword
searching. This means that the computer will search
for the exact word you type into the search box.
Most importantly, it WILL NOT search for other
words that have the same meaning. For example
let's say that you need to write a paper on the
death penalty in Texas. You might start by searching
for the words "death penalty". You will
find many results with articles that talk about
the death penalty. However, you will not get any
results for articles that just talk about "capital
punishment" because, even though the concept
is the same, the computer is only searching for
the exact words that you put in the search box!
Here's what it looks like:
Note: Checking the Full Text box will ensure that
you get the full text of the article online. Databases
can contain both abstracts (descriptions) of articles
as well as the full text version.
2. Hit the search box to start your search.
3. You will get a results that look something
like this:
Note that there are links to academic journals,
magazines, and newspapers. You can modify your
search to include only articles from one of those
categories by clicking on the link. When you do
your initial search, the default setting will
allow you to see all types of articles.
4. Pick an article that sounds interesting to
you. To view a description of the article, click
on the title. To view the full article, click
on the full text link.
5. So far, we have been searching for articles
on the death penalty. However, our original topic
was about the death penalty in Texas. To narrow
down our topic, we need to modify our search to
include "Texas" as a search term. When
you want to add another term to your search, you
need to connect it with the work "and".
You new search, then, will be: death penalty and
Texas.
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