Research Guides: TSEM 102: Green Eating on a Blue Planet (Pruett): Finding Scholarly Articles

Getting Full Text Articles

If you do not see a way to download or view a pdf or html file of an article you may see a yellow icon with the words "find it":

Follow the icon in order to:

Access online full text (when available)
See if the journal is available in print (library catalog)
Request a free pdf of the article if full text is not available online (Interlibrary loan)

If you have the citation for the article you are trying to access, you can also search the Journal List to check if the library subscribes to your specific article.

Head of Library Teaching

Elisabeth B. White

she/her/hers

Email Me

Contact:

Email: ebwhite@towson.edu

Phone: (410) 704-8026

Subjects: Biology, Chemistry, Environmental Science/Studies, Forensic Chemistry, Math Education, Mathematics, MB3, Research Impact, Research Metrics, Science Education

How to Search

Searching a scholarly database works a little differently than the typical Google or web search that you are probably used to. Here is the process you can take to come up with an effective search strategy:

Identify the main concepts in your search. These are your keywords.
Brainstorm synonyms and related terms for your keyword concepts. Think about how other researchers might describe your main concepts.
Put your keywords together using AND, OR, and NOT as necessary. Each main concept gets its own search box, and synonyms / related concepts are separated with OR.
Adjust your search using database filters / limiters (restrict to peer reviewed articles, adjust the date range, etc.). These options usually appear on the left side of a database results screen.
Search again based on what you learned from your first search. Try using keywords that you found from the articles in your first set of search results or brainstorm additional keywords that you think will help. Don't be afraid to ask a librarian if you get stuck; we're here to help!

Here is an example of what a scholarly database search would look like for the following research question: What are the environmental impacts of a vegan or vegetarian diet? Note that the quotation marks tell the database to search those words as a phrase (so we'll find articles that say "environmental impact" as a phrase, rather than articles that say "environmental" in one paragraph and "impact" in another, for example).

Where to Search: Scholarly Databases

Academic Search Ultimate This link opens in a new window
Indexing and abstracts for over 7,000 journals. Full text of articles for over 4,000 scholarly publications, including more than 3,100 peer-reviewed publications. Multidisciplinary subject coverage, including social sciences, humanities, education, computer sciences, engineering, physics, chemistry, language & linguistics, arts & literature, medicine, and ethnic studies.
Environment Complete This link opens in a new window
It is a leading full-text database for environmental studies and provides hundreds of top environment journals covering ecosystem ecology, energy, environmental policy, sustainability and other related subjects.
GreenFILE This link opens in a new window
This resource indexes scholarly and general interest titles, as well as government documents and reports, and offers a unique perspective on the positive and negative ways humans affect the environment. Drawing on the connection between the environment and disciplines such as agriculture, education, law, health and technology, this database contains nearly 300,000 records, full text for selected titles and searchable cited references for more than 200 titles as well.
ScienceDirect This link opens in a new window
ScienceDirect includes over 2,500 full text journals and 7,500 eBooks covering all aspects of science - including life sciences, physical sciences and social sciences. Terms and Conditions.
Scopus This link opens in a new window
Scopus is a large, multidisciplinary abstract and citation database of peer-reviewed literature. It also has tools to track, analyze, and visualize research.
Agricola This link opens in a new window
The NAL Catalog (Agricola) provides citations to agricultural literature from the National Agricultural Library, one of four national libraries of the United States that houses one of the world's largest and most accessible agricultural information collections.
Cook OneSearch This link opens in a new window
Find books, articles, media, government information, and other library resources all in one place. Search what Towson owns as well as resources at other USMAI Libraries.
Google Scholar This link opens in a new window
Google Scholar enables users to search for scholarly literature from a wide variety of academic publishers, professional societies, repositories and universities. Use Google Scholar to find journal articles, peer-reviewed papers, theses, books, technical reports and preprints on the web.

Accessing Articles Later

If you find an article that you would like to come back to, do not copy and paste the URL from the top of your web browser. In many databases, these URLs change frequently as articles are added and removed, so the URL you copy may not work later. The safest option is always to find and download the PDF and save it in a safe place. However, you can also create a permalink, which is a stable URL that will work for you later. Different databases will put the permalink icon in different places, but the icon usually looks like a small chain.

Some databases may not have a permalink icon for you. If you find an article and you don't see an option to save a permalink, you can use the Cook Library's Proxy Builder to create your stable URL. Copy and paste your URL into the first box, and a stable URL will be created for you in the second box.

Find an Article with Cook OneSearch

This video, "Find Journal Articles with Cook OneSearch" from the Albert S. Cook Library, discusses how to search for and access articles in Cook OneSearch. This video runs 3:05 and was last updated in October 2024.

ScienceDirect Demonstration

The video below demonstrates how to use ScienceDirect to find research articles. ScienceDirect is designed to be fairly straightforward to use, which makes it a great resource to start with for anyone who is new to database searching.

Ask a Librarian

TSEM 102: Green Eating on a Blue Planet (Pruett)