Google Scholar
1. What is Google Scholar?
2. Why use it?
3. Things to be aware of
4. Searching Google Scholar
5. Getting the full text
6. Shortcomings?
7. Further information
1. What is Google Scholar?
Google Scholar (nicknamed "Schoogle") is a search engine that searches a database of books papers, journal articles, theses abstracts and citations. It claims to be restricted to more "scholarly" or academic types of publications. Publishers are being invited to contribute their products to the database. Libraries are being invited to offer searches of their holdings to their library users through Google Scholar.
Actual access to the full item is variable. When it has found your search results it provides a list of libraries that hold the item and this can be searched by country.
Google searches the full text of an article but if it is not available online in full-text for free, then users will either need to have access to subscription service to the database or pay for access to individual articles. But you will at least end up with a reference and possibly details of where you might be able to get hold of it.
2. Why use it?
- You don't need a subscription to search it and you don't need to go to a library to search it (although you might need the services of a library to view the full-text item)
- It aims to cut down on the number of search results you get if you searched the main Google site, thereby increasing your likelihood of finding something relevant to your search
- It offers material that is peer-reviewed or "refereed publications" What does this mean?
It acts as a citation database. What does citation mean? - It searches the full-text of PDFs wherever possible What's a PDF?
3. Things to be aware of
- Library participation is still growing - but this might not be of help if you are not affiliated to a participating organisation
- Whose material is included? Google doesn't make it clear whose material is covered at the moment
- Technical restraints mean that scanned images of documents or within files aren't searchable
- Single documents with sections that are made up separate files aren't included
4. Searching Google Scholar
By using advanced search options in Google Scholar, you can:
- Search by author (note: editors are not treated as authors, so don't search for authors in this field)
- Specify where you want your search terms to appear in the results, such as in the title field only
- Search within specified publication titles only
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Search by date
What do the search results mean?
In your search results list you may see links to some of the following information attached to the titles of the items you have located:
- Find it at - library links (online) - locates an electronic version of the work through your affiliated library's resources . These links appear automatically if you're on a campus with access, or ..library links (offline) – locates libraries which have a physical copy of the work.
- Web Search – Searches for information about this work on Google.
- BL Direct – Purchase the full text of the article through the British Library.
In order to work out what all the links mean on your search results, look at the explanation on Google at: Understanding a search result
(TIP: If you've already tried a search in Google Scholar and got some results, click on Advanced Search and it will automatically carry your terms across to the Advanced Search box).
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5. Getting the full text
You may get access to a full-text article via your organisation's journal subscription service, or the item may not have any restrictions so is free to view.
Alternatively, results may take you through to the Library information page or straight to the catalogue for the library that holds the item, or to a service that allows you to buy the item, such as BL Direct, the British Library service.
Check to see if your Library can get it on Inter-library loan or via a subscription service before you rush to buy anything.
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6. Shortcomings?
- Google Scholar is still being called Beta project - that means it is still being developed, and therfore it should not be used as a "one stop shop" for searching
- Access restrictions for full-text items. Once you've found your document(s), you may only be able to view the full-text if you are a member of a library with access rights
- Library participation is not comprehensive yet
- It's not clear what is included a what is not
7. Further information on Google Scholar
- Google Scholar blog from University of British Columbia Library
- Review by Medical Library Association
- Google Scholar versus Scirus
- Try a search in Google for reviews about Google Scholar then try the advanced option to search for recent articles!
- Using Google Scholar
