Five steps to finding articles:

1. Identify a database
2. Search the database
3. Identify interesting articles
4. Track down the actual articles
5. Ask a librarian if you need help anywhere in this process

• Under the Resources heading on the library home page click on the Search By Subject link and use the subject guides to identify databases appropriate to your topic, or
• Under the Guides heading on the library home page click on the ...for CCC Students or the ...for UWB Students links and find your course-specific web guide with recommended databases, or
• Ask a librarian at the Information Commons Desk in the Library.

• Full-text or citation-only?
  Some databases provide the full-text of articles. Others only provide citations to articles. "Full text" means the whole article is available, usually in electronic format, while a "citation" should list the author, title of the article, title of the publication (journal or magazine), volume number, date and page numbers of the article. Sometimes a citation includes an abstract (a brief summary of the article) or subject headings or descriptors (words or phrases assigned to the database record that describe the subject(s) of the article).

SEARCH TIPS:
Each database requires slightly different searching techniques; so if you get stuck, read the "Help" pages or ask a librarian.
But, here are some general tips useful for all databases:

• Write several sentences about your topic.  For instance, I want to write about how pollution affects bald eagles trying to nest.
• Go through what you write and identify the two or three key concepts that define your topic.  For instance, 
  • Concept 1: pollution
  • Concept 2: bald eagles
  • Concept 3: nesting
• Write the concepts across the top of a page and write down synonyms and related terms under each concept. For instance.
  • pollution: environmental damage, toxic waste, habitat destruction, contamination..
  • bald eagles: eagles, birds, Haliaeetus leucocephalus...
  • nesting: mating, reproduction, breeding...
• Learn more about this process.

2. Use Boolean operators (AND, OR, AND NOT) to combine terms.

• Using OR retrieves all the items with either word in the record. For instance, if a search on pollution gets too few results, try  pollution OR contamination
• Using AND retrieves all the items that contain both of the words or phrases.  For instance, if bald eagles gives too many irrelevant results, try bald eagles AND nesting
• Using AND NOT excludes irrelevant items.  For instance, you may search on eagles but retrieve irrelevant items about the music band The Eagles.  Modify your search to eagles AND NOT band.  Note that some databases require NOT instead of AND NOT.
• Use parentheses to combine operators. For instance
  • (eagles or birds) AND (pollution or contamination)

3. Use truncation symbols (such as *, !, ? or #).   

• Some databases automatically search for the various forms of words.  For instance, a search on eagle may find document containing eagle or eagles.
• In other databases, you must use truncation symbols to find all forms of a word.  For instance, in some databases, pollut* will find all the word that begin with "pollut":  pollute, pollution, pollutes, and polluting.  In other databases, it will be pollut! or pollut?  See the help menu for the database you are searching.

4. Modify the fields you're searching in.

• Most databases offer some way to specify the fields you search in.  Fields are the specific pieces of information about a document, such as title, author, subject, abstract, etc.
• For a broad search that retrieves many results, search several fields at once.  This is often labeled "keywords" or "words anywhere" in the database.
• For a narrow search that only retrieves the most relevant items, narrow your search to only the "title" or "subject" fields.
• Consult the "help" menu of your specific database for details on this.

5. Lastly...

• Check your spelling.
• Try searching while in the Campus Library, so we can help when you need it.

Some of the factors to consider in evaluating your article:

• Who wrote the document? Why?
• What are their biases?
• What are their credentials?
• Do they back up their statements with citations to their sources?
• Read more about evaluating sources

A. Some articles are available full-text in the database.  Click on the "full text" or "PDF" links to read them (databases use different language for their full-text links, but generally these are the ones to look for).

B. Some articles have only a citation in the database.  An article citation will look something like this:

CHANGES IN PRODUCTIVITY AND CONTAMINANTS IN BALD EAGLES NESTING ALONG THE LOWER COLUMBIA RIVER, USA
Jeremy A Buck, Robert G Anthony, Carol A Schuler, Frank B Isaacs, Donald E Tillitt. Environmental Toxicology and Chemistry. New York: Jul 2005. Vol. 24, Iss. 7; p. 1779 (14 pages)

• Option 1:
  If you can't click right to the full text of the article, you will need to track it down using the "Find a copy" or "Check UW Holdings" links, or the button in the database. This searches our other databases to see if the full text of your article might be offered in another database the UW Libraries subscribes to. When the system is done searching, a window will open to tell you where to find the full text of the article online. Click on the appropriate link to access the article. Please ask us if you have any questions about finding your article!

• Option 2:
  Try the UW Libraries Catalog to find out if we subscribe to the publication and have hard copies in the collection.

  Search the title of the journal (NOT the article) in the catalog (make sure to select "Journals" from the drop-down menu on the far right). For example, the title of the journal in the above citation is "Environmental Toxicology and Chemistry." 

After searching the library catalog, you can find the full article in one of the following ways:

a. Full-text linked from the catalog. The catalog may link to the full-text of the publication. If so, the online options will be listed as links below the journal title. It will say something like, "Full text available from ProQuest Newspapers."  This doesn't mean that all issues of the publication are available.  Check the dates listed to the right of the link to see if your article would be included.

b. Campus Library (Bothell/CCC) periodicals or microforms. The catalog may tell you the journal is available in print or microform at the Campus Library. Check the date of the article you want; make sure it matches the dates available in our collection.  Then, go to the shelf or to a microform reading machine and read the article. If you need any assistance with this, please ask us!

c. Document delivery from the UW Seattle or UW Tacoma campus libraries.  If the UWB/CCC Campus Library does not have the item you need - and it's available from the UW Seattle and/or UW Tacoma campus libraries - or even another library system - you may request it via our Document Delivery service.  For additional information on using this service see About Document Delivery. It takes approximately 2-5 working days for articles to arrive - longer if we need to get it from another library system (interlibrary loan).

C. If you can't find the article, ask a librarian about additional options.  

Some articles may be in electronic journal collections that are not listed in the catalog.

For articles unavailable at any UW Libraries branch or database, you can also request the article from a different institution via our Document Delivery service.  Check with a librarian to make sure we don't have the article before filling out the request form.