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Databases for Education: Google Scholar

The guide to databases, indexes, electronic collections and publishers' platforms in the field of education and relevant disciplines

Advantages of Google Scholar

  • Google Scholar's searching algorithm retrieve works based on relevancy and ranks them by the number of citations. It helps to find a landmark study and the most cited works.
  • Google Scholar displays a number of citations next to the record and makes it easier to find who cited the work and has been cited by the author(s). Citation Chaining Technique
  • Google Scholar ranks sources based not only on metadata (title, author, publisher, or source) but also weights full text (if available). It increased the number of relevant documents
  • It is one of the best search engines to "scan" for interdisciplinary literature
  • Finding "gray literature" (unpublished or published by not commercial publishers). It includes many articles that wouldn't get included in other indexing services.
  • Locating obscure references that are proving difficult to find in conventional databases.
  • Locating more information on partial citations.
  • Finding the source for a quote

Using Citation Manager

The quote icon shows formatted citations in a variety of styles - MLA, APA, Chicago, Harvard,  - and links to export the citation to various Citation Manager (including RefWorks).  

The star icon saves the search result to your personal library, so you can read or cite it later.  To review your saved articles, open the drawer and click "My library".

If you use a specific citation manager, you may add the icon for it next to the record - go to Settings - Search Results - Bibliography Managers and check the box for "Show links to import citations into:  "

Screenshot from Google Scholar Settings to illustrate how to set up an icon for a citation manager

 

Search Google Scholar

One of the most popular search engines for scholarly content is Google Scholar provides an easy way to search for open-access scholarly literature.

Google Scholar Search

Library Settings for Google Scholar

Note: If you're using Google Scholar from an on-campus computer, the KSU Library Full-Text links will display automatically without any special configuration.

If you search off-campus, from your own computer:

  • Go to Settings at the top left of the Google Scholar search screen, then select Library links from the drop-down menu.
  •  Search for Kennesaw State University and select the appropriate checkboxes.
  • Make sure this box is checked and click Save.
  • Google Scholar Settings for Library Links

Advanced Search Google Scholar

 

Google Scholar has advanced search features. Click on the icon at the left upper corner of the screen (before My profile and My Library). It'll bring up the drop-down menu with the advanced search option. It lets you search for the author, title, and publication fields, as well as limit your search results by date.

 

Advanced search options

Disadvantages

You cannot limit your search by:

  • by disciplinary field or topic
  • by type of a publication (research report, website, book)
  • by peer-reviewed or scholarly

Keep in Mind:

  • You may get a long list of results, but you will only have access to the text of articles that the KSU Library has paid subscriptions for, or that are freely available online.
  • A number of retrieved documents could be overwhelming and results not accurate due to the ambiguity of the search based on keywords.  See new Semantic Search engines and indexes that have Thesaurus for better results.
  • You will see different versions of the same document and it is hard to decide which one should be cited (pre-prints, published works, author's websites and documents).