Unit 2 - Understanding Library Databases

Goals and Objectives

As defined in the jargon list found in Unit 1, a database is a compilation of information (generally, articles or abstracts with citations) stored in electronic format that can be searched online.  Most often, these are accessible only to subscribers, similar to a subscription to cable provider being required for viewing certain television channels.  Searching a database, although delivered via the Internet, is not the same as searching an open web site.

Some databases are broad in scope, such as Academic Search Premier; such databases cover magazines and journals as well as newspapers and some book chapters, from a wide variety of subject areas making it useful to almost any researcher.  Other databases are subject focused; for example, ACM (Association of Computing Machinery), just covers those journals that are focused on computers and how to use them to make life better.  Some databases, as mentioned above, cover both scholarly sources as well as popular reading sources (Time, Sports Illustrated, BusinessWeek).  However, some databases only consist of scholarly titles, such as  Project Muse, JStor, Science Direct.  As you progress further along in your major field of study, you will be required to use primarily scholarly sources to support your research.  The more subject-specific databases will give you access to the greatest concentration of scholarly journals in that particular field.  Rowan Library Services maintains subscriptions to subject-specific databases in all the disciplines taught here.

Goals

After completing this unit, the student will be able to:

• Understand the differences between Internet search engines and database searching
• Easily locate a database that will best serve the research needs of the assignment
• Search the database efficiently and effectively by constructing a meaningful search strategy
• Understand the differences between keyword searching and subject searching
• Make sense of the search results and how to locate the full text of the article, as well as how to save the citation (either to the database save function or to RefWorks)