LSBU Library: Occupational Therapy: Find Journal Articles

Search Strategy Worksheet document

Search Strategy Worksheet

Search Strategy Tips

Tip 1: Think of your keywords and use AND to link them

It is important that you don't just search for a whole sentence or question and instead think carefully about what are your most important keywords

e.g. Discuss methods of achieving success at university

Your keywords would be success AND university

Tip 2: Come up with alternate keywords (synonyms) and connect with OR

The database will just search for the keywords you enter into the search box, therefore you need to think about all the different ways something might be described

e.g. university may also be described as "higher education" OR college OR "educational institution"

Tip 3: Use quotation marks when searching for phrases

In order to keep two or more words together as a phrase, enclose them in quotation marks

e.g. "higher education" will look for the phrase "higher education" rather than individual words, "higher" and "education".

Tip 4: Use Truncation for words that start the same but may have different endings

A number of databases allow you to use the asterisk symbol * to save you time

e.g. manag* will find manage, manages, managed, managing, management etc.

Discovery

Library Discovery Search

Library account login

Guide to searching with Discovery

RCNi database is not included in the Discovery Service search. Please use the link below if you are looking for articles from RCNi.

A-Z Databases OT

Full Text Databases generally provide the pdf for articles in your results list. However these databases also contain records of articles published elsewhere. You may be able to access these articles by clicking the 360 Link button, provided we have a subscription to the journal they are in.

An abstract is a concise summary of the contents of an article. It is written using keywords (search terms) so that other researchers can easily find it through database searching. Please note that we may not have a subscription to the full text of the article. If you are final year student or postgraduate, you can apply for an inter-library loan.

Please go here to access the free databases

These databases are available without a subscription and you can continue to use them after you graduate.

Finding Journal Articles from your Reference List

If you would like to find a particular journal article that you have come across on your reading list, etc. you can easily search for this on the Library Catalogue. It is even easier, if you have the reference for this article.

Our reference example above is in Harvard style. However, no matter what referencing style you have in front of you - determining the various components of a reference is a practical skill to possess.

You can complete a simple Quick Search on the Library Catalogue - by typing parts of the journal article and/or the author's surname in the second search box. This box is connected to several journal databases, called "Discovery Service".
You can also try looking up the journal title on the Journals tab in the Library Catalogue - working your way to the article by selecting the correct publication date, volume number, issue number and page number range.

Please see the help guide below for detailed information on finding a journal article or journal.

Freely Available Databases

You do not need a LSBU username and password to access these databases:

BioMed Central
Publisher of more than 170 peer-reviewed open access online journals for the biology and medical research community
Campbell Collaboration
An international research network that produces systematic reviews of the effects of social interventions in Crime & Justice, Disability Education, International Development, Knowledge Translation and Implementation, Nutrition, Social Welfare
Cochrane Library
The Cochrane Library is designed to supply high quality evidence to inform health care decision-making. Includes systematic reviews and clinical trials.
CORE
Search hundres and thousands of open access articles.
PubMed
The US National Library of Medicine's bibliographic database of over 16 million references from more than 5,000 biomedical journals published in the United States and 80 other countries. Subject coverage is from the fields of medicine, nursing, dentistry, veterinary medicine, the health care system, and the preclinical sciences, and is worldwide, but most records are from English-language sources or have English abstracts. Records date from the 1950's onwards, many include abstracts. The database includes links to some full text articles, but this is not a full text database.
TRIP
Trip is a clinical search engine designed to allow users to quickly and easily find and use high-quality research evidence to support their practice and/or care.

Search multiple EBSCO databases

Database Filter Explanation
Learn what the filters on the left hand side do with your results.

A number of our databases are provided by EBSCO, this means you can search them simultaneously.

How To Guides - Databases

Trouble Accessing A Resource

Getting an error message when you try to access our e-resources? You may need to try a different browser (Chrome, Firefox, IE) or device, or clear your cache.

If you are unable to access one of our journal articles, e-books, or other online resources, you can contact our e-Resources Team who are able to assist. Please use this form to contact the team https://lsbu-uk.libwizard.com/f/E-Resources_Access including details of the item you are trying to access along with a screenshot of any error message. This will send your details to the e-Resources Team at llreres@lsbu.ac.uk

Should service issues occur, there is an alternative links page available for a select number of resources.

Off Campus Access HelpSheet