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Search Literature Effectively for Business Research : Scholarly Literature

A guide on searching literature effectively for postgraduate business students

Databases for Subject-specific Journal Articles

The library subscribes to a number of databases that provide us with peer-reviewed journal articles. 

Multidisciplinary databases such as Scopus and Web of Science provide abstract (not full-text) of articles from most of the disciplines. 

Aggregated Databases such as EBSCOhost Research Databases and ProQuest allow us to search through multiple databases and provide full text for most of the articles in the database. 

There are also databases that focus on specific subjects. Using these databases could help you limit the search results to the journal articles within specific subject(s). These databases could be access through the platforms of aggregated databases, such as ProQuest and EBSCOhost.

For Example: 

EconLit (ProQuest) for Economics

Business Source Premier (EBSCOhost) for Business and Management

APA PsycArticles (EBSCOhost) for Psychology

Find Journal Articles in EBSCOhost Research Databases

  1. Enter keywords in the search boxes. Choose the search field from the Select a Field drop-down menu (e.g. Author, Abstract, etc). You can also use the following commands to build your search string.
     
    • Phrase search ("...") - Put two or more words in quotation marks ("...") to ensure the words are searched as a phrase. Watch a 1-min video.
       
    • Truncation (*) - Use truncation symbol to search words with a common root. Example: Ethic* will retrieve ethic, ethics, ethical, ethically, etc. Watch a 1-min video.

  2. Select a Boolean operator (AND, OR, NOT) to combine different search terms.
     
  3. If you want articles from a particular publication source, enter the journal title (e.g. Journal of Business Ethics) in the search box, and select SO Source from the Select a Field drop-down menu.
     
  4. Click Search.
     
  5. If necessary, refine your search using the limiters or options on the left side of the results page.  

Find Journal Articles in ProQuest

  1. Select Advanced Search from the top menu bar.
     
  2. Enter keywords in the search boxes. Choose the search field from the Anywhere drop-down menu (e.g. Author, All subjects & indexing, etc). You can also use the following commands to build your search string.
     
    • Phrase search ("...") - Put two or more words in quotation marks ("...") to ensure the words are searched as a phrase. Watch a 1-min video.
       
    • Truncation (*) - Use truncation symbol to search words with a common root. Example: Ethic* will retrieve ethic, ethics, ethical, ethically, etc. Watch a 1-min video. 
       
  3. Use search operators (AND, OR, NOT) to combine different search terms.
     
  4. Add rows to enter more search terms or publication titles (e.g. Journal of Business Ethics) if necessary.
     
  5. Check Limit to: Full text to retrieve those results with full text.
     
  6. Choose Publication date (e.g. Last 3 years).
     
  7. Click Search.
     
  8. If necessary, refine your search using the limiters or options on the left side of the results page.  
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