Which databases and other sources should you use to identify the key literature that will be relevant to you research question(s)? For the purposes of a literature review for a dissertation or thesis, you will search across a number of databases ranging from discipline specific databases to multidisciplinary databases.
Discipline specific databases are very comprehensive in their coverage of the journals published in a particular field. To find out which databases and indeed other relevant sources are relevant to your specific context, check out the guides developed by our Subject Librarians to see their recommended list of databases for particular subjects. Examples of discipline specific databases include Education Research Complete, Business Source Complete, PsycInfo covering the literature in psychology, Medline for medical literature. There are also broad disciplinary specific databases for example the Social Sciences Premium Collection.
We would always recommend searching one or more multidisciplinary databases in addition to discipline specific databases (where available) when conducting a comprehensive review of the scholarly literature. Two key multidisciplinary databases covering the literature across all disciplines (humanities/social sciences/sciences) are Scopus and Web of Science. These are citation databases and offer additional search features and information (see below). There is overlap in their coverage of scholarly literature but they do also have unique content so we always recommend searching both. Academic Search Complete is another cross-disciplinary database.
The Library also provides access to databases which enable you to search and access the journals produced by certain publishers for example, Science Direct (Elsevier Journals), Taylor and Francis Online or Sage Journals Online. However, for the purposes of a literature review, it is important that you search across all the key journals in a discipline not just those titles published by a certain publisher. It is therefore important that you conduct a search using the key disciplinary and multidisciplinary databases which index journals in your relevant field(s) from all major publishers.
Citation databases offer added value over other databases. In addition to providing bibliographic details of articles/papers (e.g. title, abstract, keyword, author) they also provide details of cited articles (list of references at the end of the article) and citing articles (articles that have cited the article).
Scopus and Web of Science are probably the most well known citation databases. They are both multidisciplinary databases and cover a large number of peer-reviewed scholarly journals.
Citation searching allows you to easily see which articles/papers have cited other authors' articles/papers (see: Citation Searching Diagram to the right). This allows you to track how a piece of work has influenced further work and investigations. Citation tracking is particularly useful if your search yields a small number of results or if you have already identified some seminal papers and want to see how others have further developed the original ideas/research. Citation databases can also help you identify the most cited papers on a particular topic or by a particular author.
Watch a video which shows how you track citations using Scopus.
Depending on your discipline, it may be necessary to consider a wide range of sources for your literature review.
Books
Research monographs will be a key source for many. Search Library Search using your key search terms for relevant books.
Conference Proceedings
Conference papers are an important source particularly in some fields for example, computer science and engineering where the latest research is often presented at major conferences. Key sources for conference papers include the two citation databases Scopus and Web of Science.
EI Engineering Village comprises two key databases Inspec and Compendex where you can search for journal articles and conference papers. IEEE Explore will provide direct access to the conference proceedings published by the IEE and IEEE (Note: these are also indexed in EI Village). Embase include conference papers in biomedicine and pharmacology.
Theses
Another potentially useful source are dissertations and theses. See our page here for information on searching databases/sources for DCU, Irish and international theses.
Government Reports
Most government reports, and documentation from the EU are freely available online and can be found by conducting a search on the internet.
Newspapers
DCU Library subscribes to the database Nexis UK which provides you with access to hundreds of newspapers from around the world (click on News via the top menu bar). You can narrow your search to a specific newspaper title or country for example, search all Irish available newspapers to analyse their coverage of a certain event or topic. See the library page on newspapers to find out about access to historical Irish newspaper collections.
Access a full list of all library databases via the A-Z databases on the library website.
All our databases are accessible off-campus using your DCU username and password.
You may also wish to see what databases are recommended for your discipline by your Subject Librarian. Check out our Library Guides - by clicking on image below.
