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II. Library Research Tutorial

Using One Search

A great place to start your search is on the library's website. Our Search All function will allow you to search the majority of the library's holdings using your keywords.

screenshot of One Search search bar on library website with the search terms student athletes and academic success

Searching in a database

You can also search within a specific database, which may give you results that are more specific to your specific field of study. If you know what database to use, you can locate it from the "databases" drop-down menu.

screenshot of library homepage with "databases" tab, and a drop-down menu showing the library databases, arranged alphabetically


You can also click on the "Browse by subject" menu and select your topic, which will take you to a list of databases for that subject area, usually with a Best Bets section to help get you started.

screenshot of databases dropdown bar located on the library homepage. Beneath the dropdown bar is a link saying "browse by subject," highlighted in a yellow box

Finding resources for your discipline

Not sure which database will be best suited for your research topic? Librarians have created subject guides and course guides for your specific class or field of study that will list the most useful research databases.

screenshot from library's course and subject guides page, showing the words "research strategies" and "subject guides," with "subject guides" highlighted in yellow

 

You can click on "Subject Guides" or "Course Guides," the select the relevant topic/course from the list. From there, you can find suggested databases from the "Databases" tab.

screenshot of a subject guide with the words "showing 10 databases" and two databases listed beneath: Business Source Complete and CoRR - Computing Research Repository