The SearchBank databases are:
You can access the SearchBank databases from both on- and off-campus.
To get to the SearchBank databases, click the links above, or go to the library's welcome page at http://library.furman.edu/ and click "Research Resources by SUBJECT." You will see Expanded Academic in the list of General Databases on the right. The General Reference Center can be accessed by clicking the "General Databases" link. Health Reference Center is available under "Health and Exercise Science," and Business and Company ASAP is available from the "Economics & Business" link. Click the link for the database of your choice. If you are on campus, no user ID will be necessary. If you are off campus, the database will ask you for your library barcode number. Enter your social security number, without the hyphens. If you have a current library card, the database should let you in. If you have trouble getting in to the database, please call Mary Fairbairn at 294-3226 for assistance.
Subject Guide Searching
If you choose a Subject guide search and your search term matches one or more of the indexed entries, you will be given a list of choices, including references, subdivisions, or related subjects. In some databases, you may see other options, including dictionary entries, pamphlets, and so on. The list of subdivisions breaks your list of articles down into various subtopics and may aid in narrowing your search. If you do not find what you need with a subject search, you may want to try a keyword search, which allows for more flexibility in combining terms. If your search terms do not match anything in the subject guide, SearchBank will automatically switch to a keyword search instead.
Keywords
A keyword search offers greater flexibility than a subject search, and may also yield more records since it looks for your search terms in the full record, including the title, abstract, etc., rather than just the subject field. Keyword searching also allows you to use all of the standard searching techniques, such as Boolean operators (AND, OR, NOT), nesting (using parentheses), and truncation (using the asterisk*). You can also use the "with operator" (w1) to specify an exact phrase. For more information on searching techniques, see the "How Do I Find…" section of the library Website.
Limiting Your Search
If your search yields an unwieldy number of records, you may wish to limit your search using one of the limiting options on the search screen. (Click "Back to...Search" to get back to this screen and still keep your search terms.) The limiting options will vary among the four databases, but will include at least some of the following:
- Full Text: Click the box to limit your search to articles which have the full text online.
- Refereed: Click this box to limit your search to articles which are in refereed or peer-reviewed journals. (Many professors ask you to do your research in refereed, or "scholarly", journals).
- Date: Use this to limit your search to articles published on a particular date or within a particular date range. This field is very flexible, and will accept many variations in the entry of dates. It will accept any of the following:
- may 16, 1999
- 16 may 1999
- 5/16/1999
- 19990516
It will NOT, however, accept any single date with hyphens or a date with slashes in which the day comes before the month. Hyphens may only be used to indicate a date range. Range operators may be used with dates. These include the following: since, after, gt, >, ge, before, lt, <, le, to, -. Always enter the year as four digits (Y2K compliance).
- Journal: Use this to specify words which must be in the name of the journal or source. To get an exact match, enclose the name in double quotes.
- Words: Use this to include additional words in your search. You may enter the words with or without operators.
Advanced Search
Advanced Search offers a more extensive set of searching tools. In this mode, you can search specific fields of the record (such as the author field, source field, date field, etc.) then combine your searches to retrieve the records most suited to your research needs. Click the box to the left to select the field you wish to search. This will put the field code in the box to the right. Click to the right of the field code in the right-hand box and type in the term(s) for which you wish to search in that field. Click "Search" or press the "Enter" key. The results of your search will display in the box at the top left of the screen. To view the results, highlight the set number and click "View." To combine that set with additional terms, click in the bottom right box, type the set number, then link it with "and" to your additional terms. To combine two sets, use the two set numbers linked with an "and."
Viewing Your Results
Once you have narrowed your search to a reasonable number of records (we recommend no more than 50 for browsing), you can begin to look through them. As you scroll through, you will see a variety of entries. Some will say "View extended citation and retrieval choices." Others may say "View abstract and retrieval choices." This means that a summary of the content of the article is available online. Many of the citations will say "View text and retrieval choices." This means that the full-text of the article is available online, and you can simply click to read it. Some of the articles will even have the graphics to accompany the text. If they do, the citation will say "View text with graphics and retrieval choices." You may find a few citations which say "View full content retrieval choices." This means that the text alone is not available, but you may use Acrobat Reader to view the article in its original format. See a reference librarian for information on Acrobat Reader.
Viewing Full Text
If your article is one which says "View text" or "View text with graphics," you can read your article on the screen. Simply click the "View" link. At that point, you can print the full text for ten cents a page, or you can e-mail it to yourself for free. If your article has accompanying graphics, they cannot be e-mailed with the text, but can be printed. Whichever you decide to do, click the "Print or E-mail" link in the bar to the left of the screen. If you choose to print, be sure to click the "Browser Print Reformat" link to make sure you get all of the text. If you choose to e-mail it to yourself, enter your FULL e-mail address and a subject line, if desired.
Marking Records
If there are several articles you want to retrieve, it is more efficient to mark them than to look at each individually. To mark records, click the box to the top left of the record. When you are finished marking all the records you want, click "View Mark List" on the left side of the screen. Only the citations for the records you have marked will be displayed. At that point, you have several options:
- Printing (Click "Print or E-mail," then click "Browser Print Reformat") This option will reformat all of your marked articles and display whatever is available for each as one long scrolling screen. That is, it will be a combination of citations, abstracts, and full-text, depending upon what is available for each of your records.
- E-mailing (Click "Print or E-mail," then enter your e-mail address and click the "submit" button) This option will send each of your marked records to you as separate e-mail messages. Once again, it will only send as much information as is available online for each. Not all of the records will include the full text. Some may simply be an abstract or a citation.
- Clear Mark List: CAREFUL! This will delete all of your marked records. Be sure you have a hard copy or have successfully e-mailed the records to yourself before you do this. If an error occurred, you don't want to have to go back and mark them all over again.
- Keep Checked: If you decide you don't want some of your marked records after all, uncheck them by clicking in the box next to them again, then click this "Keep Checked" link. The ones you have unmarked will be deleted. This can be handy if you have some full text articles and some citations, because you can e-mail them all to yourself, then go back and delete the full text ones so you can reformat the citations and abstracts and print them for free (we only charge for the full-text articles). After you print them, you can check ALCUIN to see if we carry the journal that the article is in.
If you have any questions about the SearchBank databases, please ask at the Reference Desk.
