Be sure to use commands, called Boolean Operators, to further specify your search.
Librarian Tip: When searching for names of people and/or places be sure to include alternative spellings to capture all pertinent results.
Librarian Tip: When searching for names of people and/or places be sure to include alterative spellings to capture all pertinent results.
You can find a link to all of our databases below. There you can limit by subject or even content type. Depending on what you are researching you will want to pick a database that corresponds to that topic or utilize a multidisciplinary database (like ProQuest Research Library).
Librarian Tip: When searching for names of people and/or places be sure to include alterative spellings to capture all pertinent results.
| Keywords | Subjects |
| Natural language words that describe your topic | Pre-defined "controlled vocabulary" that describe what an item is about |
| More flexible search - looks for anywhere the words appear in the record | Less flexible search - only the subject fields will be searched |
| Broader search, but may yield irrelevant results | Targeted search; results are usually more relevant to the topic, but may miss some variations |
Keyword searching is how we normally start a search. Pull out important words or phrases from your topic.
Subject Terms and/or Headings are pre-defined terms that are used to describe the content of an item. These terms are a controlled vocabulary and function similarly to hashtags on social media.
We are indebted to the MIT What are subject headings and keywords? box for some concepts displayed here.
In the Catalog, subject headings are displayed under "Description" in the record of an item. Click on the arrow to the left of "Description" and then scroll down to the section called "Subjects."
In the Databases, subject headings may be listed as Descriptors, Subjects and/or Subject Headings and are typically located in the Abstract and/or Details of an article.
Information is created in different formats and at varying times. The formats are usually dependent on the time in which the information is being produced. This process is sometimes called the Information Cycle or Timeline.
Some forms of information do not adhere to this timeline, but rather can be created or modified at any time (for example: social media posts or online encyclopedias).
For more detailed information on these formats see the TRU (Thompson Rivers University) Libraries Information Cycle page.
For more information about utilizing resources from different time periods see our Primary Sources box.
We are indebted to the VIU (Vancouver Island University) Library Information Cycle page for some of this content.
If a database doesn't have the full text of an article you are looking for, you can copy and paste the title of the article into our catalog to see if we might have that item here. If we don't have it, request it through Interlibrary Loan (ILL).
Google, and more appropriately Google Scholar, can be valid places to search for articles and organizations. However, subject specific databases will have more advanced search options and articles. Here are some key differences between databases and Google.
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| Credibility & Review |
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| Discovery |
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