Written by Lakshmi Dubey
The University of North Texas contains an abundance of databases, which assists students in browsing through the best library databases for research. These databases provide access to many useful research materials ranging from articles, full text journals, abstracts, and e-books. UNT libraries has 644 databases available covering various topics, 38 of which are designed for information science students. Students may not be aware, but they have full access to all these resources.
Out of the 38 databases available for information science, a few of the most prominently used ones are mentioned below:
It is an online research platform utilized by millions of users and thousands of institutions. This interface provides access to e-journals and e-books. It is one of the most useful databases as it assists in identifying publications and journals based on the subject area. It is freely accessible to students through their institution if they subscribe to it.
It is a catalog of books and plethora of materials worldwide available through FirstSearch. It does not contain individual articles, newspapers, magazines, journals, stand-alone articles, but consists of over 179 million records which cover around 400 languages. It is operated by OCLC.INC, the WorldCat is the world’s largest bibliographic database and is maintained by the OCLC member libraries (Oswald, 2017). As research becomes more specific, WorldCat comes in the picture when you need to look or resources beyond UNT.
Science Direct is a peer reviewed database of scientific and medical publications, which includes thousands of open access articles. It supports the research and educational missions of academic institutions through access to peer reviewed literature. The database helps students discover new insights with greater efficiency and effectiveness. “ScienceDirect offers content from four major subject areas: physical sciences and engineering, life sciences, health sciences, and social sciences and humanities” (University Libraries). Several open-access journals are also published on ScienceDirect.
EBSCO host is a provider of academic search complete. It is one of the leading resources for scholarly research, which provides a collection of scholarly texts with full coverage for over 10,500 journals for all subject areas which include humanities, social sciences, computer sciences, education etc (University Libraries). It supports students with diverse projects or papers. This database helps students develop analytical abilities and critical thinking through practical learning by increasing their knowledge and comprehension on a certain subject or field.
Library and Information Science Abstracts
It is a global abstracting and indexing tool made for information specialists. It was originally published by the Library Association, Bowker-Saur began publishing it in 1991. Subject coverage covers all aspects given below: Knowledge management,
librarianship, information technology, information management, library technology and online information retrieval.
To access the above databases users must visit the UNT libraries page.They will find multiple options available on the left-hand side of the page under “Start your research.” Students must select the menu item “Databases” which leads them to either browse by subject or search for their own. They would then need to click on browse subjects and enter “Information sciences” to get access to the information science databases.
References (APA format):
Oswald, G. (2017). Library World Records. OCLC WorldCat.org. Retrieved April 8, 2023, from https://www.worldcat.org/title/library-world-records/oclc/959650095
Library and information science abstracts (LISA) – ProQuest. (n.d.). Retrieved April 8, 2023, from https://proquest.libguides.com/lisa
University libraries. A. (n.d.). Retrieved April 8, 2023, from https://guides.library.unt.edu/az.php?s=18132&p=1
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