It seems like Google will be the easiest way to search. You get lots of results with very little effort. However, if you aren't starting with the library's website, you might be missing out on books and articles that the library pays for you to have access to at no cost! Also, once you get really good at searching the library's resources, you'll never have to wonder whether you've found a peer-reviewed source or not.
The following will help you:
Subject headings describe the content of each item in a database. Use these headings to find relevant items on the same topic. Searching by subject headings (a.k.a. descriptors) is the most precise way to search article databases.
It is not easy to guess which subject headings are used in a given database. For example, the phone book's Yellow Pages use subject headings. If you look for "Movie Theatres" you will find nothing, as they are listed under the subject heading "Theatres - Movies."
Keyword searching is how you typically search web search engines. Think of important words or phrases and type them in to get results.
Here are some key points about each type of search:
Keywords
|
vs. |
Subjects
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
When you search a database and do not get the results you expect, Ask Us for advice.