Discover Your Databases - Prep
Introduction | Prep | Activity
Assess your database needs (10 minutes)
Reflect on practices in your own discipline
- What’s especially challenging about research in your field?
- Are there materials that are hard to learn about or get a hold of?
- What makes it hard to tell if you’re on the right track?
- What’s hard about using general databases for this field? If you think of the library catalog, Academic Search Premier, or Google Scholar, what features do you wish they had that would better serve the kind of research you do? Hint: you may find what you’re looking for in a discipline-specific database.
Reflect on the databases you use
- What problems do you encounter when you try to translate research tasks into a search?
- What databases do you use most often right now? What needs do they meet for you?
Compare different disciplines (5 minutes)
Library resources and search experiences often differ a lot from subject area to subject area.
Take a moment to learn a little bit about the top resources and search methods in a different discipline. Compare what you find with what’s true for your discipline: does this help you find new insight on your search habits and database options?
Explore our Subject Research Guides
UK's Library’s Research Guides Links to an external site. list the top databases for broad subject areas as well as suggestions for search strategies and tools.
Chat with a friend
Ask a friend in another discipline about how they would answer the questions above.
Introduction | Prep | Activity