1. Accessing and searching for journals and wider material
By Paul Biggs Librarian for Psychology, Sport & Exercise, Biology & Biomedical Sciences and Education
Title Slide

2. In This Session We Will Cover
Define what a journal is and differentiate between journal titles and articles
Introduce electronic databases
Look at databases for your subject area
Detailed look at EBSCO databases for the area of Sport, Psychology & Health
Tips when searching and identifying keywords
Using Summon to search for journal articles
How to search for journal titles
Using Google Scholar to search for journal articles
Access newspapers
Searching for academic material on the internet using Google Advanced search
What we will cover in this session

3. Journals
Journals like magazines, newspapers and annual reports are in a group of publications known as serials or periodicals. This is a term used to describe publications that are issued at regular intervals, either daily, weekly, monthly, quarterly or annually. You will need to carry out further reading as your studies progress.
Why Use Journals?
Timely – journals are published more often than books, as a result you will find up-to-date information in recent journals
Authoritative – articles are written by experts and in peer reviewed journals the articles are screened by a ‘jury’ of other experts before they are published
What are journals?

4. Journals can be divided into 3 types:
Scholarly: written reports on research, articles are written by researchers or subject experts, articles are peer reviewed and include references and bibliographies
Trade and professional : Articles relate to an industry or profession, contain information about  products or services, cover current issues affecting an industry or profession.  
Popular magazines: Written to entertain, have a glossy appearance & photographs, information is reported second or third hand by freelance reporters.     
Types of journals

5. Electronic Databases
We have a number of databases at the university. These databases house journal titles. Inside these titles you will find articles. Just think of databases as giant electronic shelves. All you have to do is enter the correct keywords to locate your journal article! Summon can help you get what you want from these databases!
About electronic databases

6. Databases for your Subject Area
There are a number of databases for your Subject Area. We have listed these on your Subject Resource page via the Finding Articles tab
Databases for your subject area

7. EBSCO Databases
The EBSCO databases such as CINAHL, MEDLINE, PsycINFO, PsycARTICLES, PsycBOOKs and SPORTDiscus will be useful resources. We have created detailed guides on how to use these resources and they are available via your Subject Resource Page

8. Journals
Journals can be divided into 3 types:
Scholarly: written reports on research, articles are written by researchers or subject experts, articles are peer reviewed and include references and bibliographies   
Trade and professional : Articles relate to an industry or profession, contain information about  products or services, cover current issues affecting an industry or profession  
Popular magazines: Written to entertain, have a glossy appearance & photographs, information is reported second or third hand by freelance reporters      

9. Tips when searching E-Resources
Think about your assignment question. Always try and identify keywords. Keywords can be taken from class literature and background reading as well!
You can also use a Thesaurus to identify synonyms for keywords this will widen your search
It can be a good idea to have some keywords noted on a pad before you start to search the resources. You can also speak to us if you need further help familiarising yourself with all of our eResources

10. “How does sport psychology actually improve athletic performance?”
Identify Keywords
Tip 1: try to identify the main keywords that describe your assignment or academic work:
“How does sport psychology actually improve athletic performance?”
Sport, psychology, psychological….
Improve, enhance, better….
Athletic, sporting…..
Performance, action, efficiency ….

11. Search Tips Techniques
Use the * symbol to find words starting with a common stem. The * is a TRUNCATION symbol.
For example, Sport* will find Sport, Sports, Sporting etc..
Or Psycholog* will search for Psychology, Psychological..
You can also use a * or ? Wildcard for English & American spellings of words e.g. colo?r would bring back color and colour
AND, OR & NOT are used to combine search terms…
AND will find all search terms (probably the best to use as it narrows your searches)
OR will find one or another or both
NOT will exclude terms

12. Search Tips Techniques Continued
If you are looking for a particular phrase just typing it into a search box on a database may not give you the exact results you are looking for. However, if you use quotation marks “” you will get more exact hits as this searches for a phrase side by side
For example, “Enhanced Performance”
“Psychology in Sport”

13. Other search techniques
n retrieves records with both search terms in the same sentence. For example if you search for psychology n2 sport this will retrieve records where psychology and sport appear within 2 words of each other (in any order)
w retrieves records with both search terms in the same field. For example if you search for psychology w3 sportthis will retrieve records with both psychology and sport in the order specified

14. Use Summon to search for journal articles around a subject
If you are searching around a particular topic Summon can be a useful tool to use. Summon also suggests searches for you and you can filter your searches. Access Summon via the Subject Resource page

15. Use The limiters to narrow your searches
You can limit your search looking for Scholarly & Peer Reviewed material. Always make sure Full Text is selected as well
You can also narrow your search by discipline
Don’t forget to also narrow your search by date! You might not want out of date material?

16. Accessing a journal article
To access an article via Summon you need to select the Full Text Online link
You will need to enter your University Username & Password and you will be able to access the article. Always search for the PDF Icon to download the article

17. What is an abstract?
If you select preview below an article in Summon it will display an abstract. An abstract gives you a summary of the article so read it carefully

18. Summon will suggest searches
If you select preview below an article on Summon will also suggest additional keywords and searches for you.

19. Summon will show you apa!
If you select the cite button you are able to choose APA as a referencing style

20. Summon will show you related articles
Summon will also suggest similar articles for you. Just select the related articles link

21. Journal titles
You can also search for Journal Titles via your Subject Resource page

22. You can use Google Scholar
You can use Google Scholar to search for journal articles
Google Scholar is useful as it links to our collections and also has free Open Access materials
It is worth using Scholar as a secondary resource after you have searched our own online resources
If you are using Scholar Off Campus you will need to configure it so you can search our collections to find out how to do this visit

23. Newspapers
We have a database called International Newsstream where you are able to access newspaper articles via

24. Searching for information on the Web
You might need to use Google to search for information on the Internet. When using Google I would suggest using the Advanced Search Tool. This allows you to enter keywords and search specific Web Domains such as .gov.uk .ac.uk or .org.uk
You can also specify the last time a document has been updated so you know that you are getting up to date material.
Access the advanced search on Google here