So, you've found the perfect article that covers your topic for your research? Congrats!
The next step is finding additional resources which are similar or related. Using a single article to locate more resources relevant to your topic is a very effective research technique. There are simple ways to do this, though these methods can sometimes be easily overlooked.
The following sub-pages will describe techniques for finding similar resources in the Library’s databases, as well as outside of the Library.
One of your first steps in finding similar resources should be to thoroughly examine the reference list of your article to identify the sources used by the author(s). The sources included in the bibliography will be older by nature, so make sure to keep any date restrictions as described in your assignment in mind.
If a title in the reference list looks like it could be of use, you may want to search for this new article in the Library. You can easily do this by copying/pasting the article title into the ONEsearch box on the Library’s home page.
A number of Library databases will include hyperlinks to Cited References or Bibliographies. While you can always review a list of references at the end of any scholarly / peer-reviewed article or eBook.
Publications are often quite subject-specific, as they are written to disseminate information around a specific trade or subject matter. Therefore, searching within the publication in which your original article appeared may lead you to similar or related articles.
You may locate a particular publication within the Library by going to Publication Finder (Pub Finder) which is also linked in the Resources Guide. Enter the name of the publication you would like to find and press search. The results screen will tell you if the Library subscribes to the publication, what years the Library subscribes to, and in which database(s) the full text is contained, as shown below.
Click on the linked database name in order to browse the publication by volume/issue, or to search within the publication. Many databases will display a “Search within” box into which you can enter your keywords.
Many Library databases provide the ability to create alerts for content related to your research topic. Depending on the database's service, an alert can provide the table of contents to new issues of journals or a list of new articles based on search terms. Some databases even offer citation alerts, to inform you when a particular article has been cited. Setting up database alerts is a great way to find articles related to those which you have already included in your research. Additionally, it will help you to stay up to date with the latest research and trends in your discipline.
When you set up a search alert, the database automatically runs your search and sends you any search results added since the last time the search was run. You can set searches to run once a day, once a week, or less often.
Most alerts are provided by e-mail or RSS feed. Therefore, you will need to create individual database accounts in order to set up alerts, and in some cases have an RSS Reader account.
You may either set up a journal alert to be notified when new issues of a particular journal are published, or you may set up a search alert from a search screen. See the links below to learn more about how to set up these types of alerts.
You may either set up a journal alert to be notified when new issues of a particular journal are published, or you may set up a search alert from a search screen. See the links below to learn more about how to set up these types of alerts.
You may either set up a journal alert to be notified when new issues of a particular journal are published, or you may set up a search alert from a search screen. See the links below to learn more about how to set up these types of alerts.