University of Southern Maine

A Quick Guide to EbscoHost Databases

Materials You'll Find
Materials indexed in each database vary. However, as a general rule Ebsco databases provide only citations, abstracts and some full text for articles from newspapers, magazines, and scholarly journals. If you are looking for books, use URSUS, the University of Maine System Libraries' online catalog.

Logging On
1) Go to the USM Libraries Webpage (http://library.usm.maine.edu)
2) Under "Research", Click Find Articles
3) Scroll through Database names in alphabetical order, or click Databases by Subject
4) From the resulting list, click on the name of the EBSCO database you want to use

(Note: To log in from an off-campus computer, follow the above steps and enter your name and library barcode number when asked. Off-campus access is available for current USM students, faculty, and staff only.)

Advanced Search (Default)

Begin by typing your search terms in the Find: box(es). Use the dropdown menus to choose which parts of the record to search and to choose AND, OR and NOT connectors for your terms (see below). Refine your search by using the following when appropriate.

Boolean Operators and Nesting
Begin by linking individual terms with the Boolean operators AND, OR, and NOT. AND tells the computer that both terms must be present, OR says that either term must be present, and NOT says that the first term must be present, but not the second. These operators can be combined in the same search. Notice, however, in the example below that OR terms have parentheses around them, which is called "nesting." Just be sure to include these parentheses, or the computer will not read the search in the way you had intended.

Example: television AND violence AND child*

Truncation
Use an asterisk at the end of a word to look for variants (called "truncation"). This will tell the computer to look for any words that start with those letters.

Example: television AND violence AND (child* or kid*)

Limiting
You can also limit your search to a specific periodical or date of publication, or to items that provide full text, and to scholarly (peer reviewed) journal articles. To do so, checkmark or fill in the appropriate boxes at the bottom of the search screen. CINAHL, PsycInfo, ERIC and other subject-specific databases provide additional database-specific limiters at the bottom of the search screen. Be sure to read through these limiters carefully to see if any are helpful in narrowing your particular search.

Basic Search

To do a Basic Search, click on the Basic Search tab on the green bar at the top of the page. Basic Search is very similar to Advanced Search, but provides far fewer search options. It is generally better to begin with an Advanced Search.

Browsing Subjects/Thesaurus

While it is often easier to start with a keyword search, it is also important to follow up with a subject heading search as well in order to assure completeness. Subject headings are official words or phrases describing topics, and are applied consistently to every record in the database. For example, all articles on executions, the death penalty, and lethal injection have the same subject heading, "Capital Punishment". To see a list of subject headings used, click on Subjects. Type a word or phrase into the For: box to search for it as a subject heading. You can also choose a category of subject headings (People, Products & Books, Companies, etc.) by clicking on its link. Results will be returned in alphabetical order. To see the list in order of relevancy (how many times your words appear in the subject heading), click on the circle in front of Relevancy Ranking before clicking "browse".

If you are using the CINAHL, ERIC, or PsycInfo databases, you will notice that the Subject Search button is replaced with a CINAHL Headings or a Thesaurus Search button. This button will serve the same function as the Subjects button in other databases, but will give you additional options for searching the subject headings you find.

Search Results

"Search Options" are located on both the "Basic" and "Advanced" screens. Here you may limit your results to full-text articles, to a particular journal, a particular type of journal (i.e. "peer reviewed"), or to a particular range of years. Note also that you can return to the results of a previous search by clicking on the blue "Search History" tab next to Search Options.

Full Text

“HTML Full Text” indicates that the complete article is available online in a plain text format. “PDF Full Text” indicates that the full text will include a reproduction of all texts, tables, graphs, pictures, footnotes, and other graphics. To see the full text and graphics (if available), click on the PDF link. If no full-text is available, look for a USM Libraries Own This Title link to see if the library has a copy of the article in print. If none of these links appear, click on the title of the article to see a full citation and abstract (summary).

Printing/Emailing/Saving Search Results

Mark an item for printing/emailing by clicking the “Add” icon to the right of the citation. When you’re finished going through your results, click on the View Folder icon in the upper right of the screen. Choose whether you want to print, email, or save your results, then respond to the options that result.

Getting Help

Last Update: 05.21.2004
Comments: Ask-A-Librarian