• Where can I find recent articles on phenomenology?

• I need to do a literature search for my dissertation. Can you help?

• Has this author written any more articles?

• Most students will have used the internet for research. However they may be unaware of other sources where references to academic journal articles may be found. This section introduces some good general services which are available in many academic libraries. Examples of specific subject-based services are provided in all the subject sections.

• A common mistake is to search for journal articles in the main library catalogue. In most cases this will not retrieve any results because this type of material is not usually indexed.

• When confronted with this situation many students go for the easy option of searching on Google. The power of the internet means that this may retrieve many useful materials, including references to recent items which may not have been included yet in scholarly indexes! However, it is advisable to recommend that they use journal indexing services provided by the library as their starting-point because these will enable them to limit their searches to academic materials. Then, once this initial stage has been completed, supplement it with research on Google Scholar, scholar.google.co.uk, which searches the internet specifically for academic articles and books.

• Students often need help choosing which journal index to use. Many may be confused about the difference between journal indexing and abstracting services and e-journal databases. It may seem to them that databases which offer full-text e-journals must be better. However, it is advisable to recommend that indexes usually offer more comprehensive searches across larger numbers of journals. Many libraries have also implemented a facility that links them directly to their e-journal holdings so that full-text articles can be downloaded immediately.

• A final point to note is that students frequently need advice on how to access the full text of the articles they find. It is common for them to assume that all the items must be online. They may also have followed links that have taken them away from the subscription database.