STEP ONE: Select article databases to search
Research@UWW searches across disciplines for articles, as well as books, ebooks, government publications, media, and more. You can search just the Articles, or after you've searched Everything you can use limiters on the left to filter results to only articles or only peer-reviewed journals.
In addition, UWW Libraries subscribe to many databases that can be used to locate periodical (journal, magazine and newspaper) articles, as well as book chapters, dissertations, etc. Some are discipline-specific and others are multidisciplinary. Ask a Librarian for assistance with selecting databases appropriate for your topic if needed.
Access databases by selecting Articles & Databases from the Library homepage.
Good databases to search for political science articles:
Other databases that may be useful:
STEP ONE: Select article databases to search (see box above)
STEP TWO: Set limits and select search words (and amend your search as you review your results)
Check the limits that you can set (below the search box). You may want to limit to articles of a certain length, e.g., >2 pages, or articles in scholarly (peer reviewed) publications (Don't check that one if you selected the newspaper database!).
Do not limit results to those that are full-text in the databases you are searching, because the full text may be in other databases (the "Find It" button will help you determine that later).
Now translate your topic into search words:
It is worthwhile to be both comprehensive and detailed when searching, although when you first start you may have only a broader topic that reading some articles will help you focus more narrowly. Pay attention to how many results you get and whether they are relevant or not. Adjust your search accordingly, using words you find in relevant articlea' titles, abstracts, and subject headings. Be thorough by using synonyms and truncation when there are multiple ways to refer to an concept. (Also see the box below called, "Using And, Or, and * in Searches")
- Use OR between synonyms (you don't care which appears in your results).
- Use AND between required concepts (words to the left as well as words to the right MUST appear in results
- Use ( ) to group synonyms for one concept if your search also uses AND to require another concept
- Use * (in most databases) to truncate if variant endings on a word stem are acceptable
Sample search:
radio and owner* and (consolidat* or concentrat* or restrict* or limit* or regulat* or legislat* or policy) and (local* or divers*)
You'll see how many articles are found in each database searched. Did you get too few? Too many?
You can see subjects assigned to the articles and you can add or remove them, or amend your entire search with words from article abstracts, subject headings, and titles. Watch how the changes affect the number of results and how relevant they are.
STEP THREE: Evaluate your results and select appropriate articles
How do you know whether an article is scholarly or not? Check out the Scholarly Journal v. Popular Magazine Articles guide.
Obtain citation information and either print or save the articles selected. In some databases you can get help with citation formatting (in this guide, see the "Citing" tab's segment on "Citing Help in Databases").
In some database vendor's databases, e.g., Ebscohost databases, you can also create an account and save articles and/or searches there. If you do not have an account, using folders provided in a database only lasts during your current session. If you have an account the saved materials will be there the next time you login.
STEP FOUR (optional): Run your search in other databases for additional results
In many cases you can just copy and paste a search from one database into another, e.g., copy a search used to search Ebscohost databses into ProQuest ABI/Inform (a business article database).
When an article's full text is not available in a database, click 
to learn if it is available in other databases or in the libraries' print or microform collections.
Search find journals for a journal, magazine or newspaper title to determine whether and where you can find full text articles in it.
If you use Google Scholar to find articles when you are off campus, then configure the settings to use UW-Whitewater libraries' full text access.
