The Association of College & Research Libraries defines an article as "a brief work—generally between 1 and 35 pages in length—on a topic. Often published as part of a journal, magazine, or newspaper." To learn about the differences between popular and scholarly articles, click on a link below.
Use the library catalog to find books, print magazines and journals, CD's, and DVD's.
Using the library homepage, click on Books, Journals, & More.
You have a single search bar or click on the Advanced Search to locate items in the catalog.
The Advanced Search provides more options to focus or narrow your search.
You can schedule a meeting with a librarian to learn how to search the catalog. Meeting with a librarian is free.
Keyword Searches use specific words or phrases to search for information. You can search for keywords in full text, titles, authors, and abstracts.
An example of a keyword search: "broken windows theory" and poverty
If you are using a phrase, consider putting quotation marks around the phrase.
Boolean Searching is using AND, OR, or NOT to focus the search
An example of a Boolean search: colleges NOT universities AND drop out rate of students
Subject Searches are precise, they use defined subject headings to search for information.
You can schedule a meeting with a librarian to learn more about searching the catalog.
If you are off-campus and want to use the library resources, you may need to read the Off Campus Access to Library Resources to make sure you computer can access the ISU library.
You can find scholarly and popular articles using the library databases.
Go to the library homepage and click on Databases.
You can search by Keyword, Subjects, or Types.
You can also scroll the list of databases from A-Z.
It might be helpful for you to schedule a meeting with a librarian to learn how to use the databases. Meeting with a librarian is free.
