Finding and searching databases

Databases index information about published journal articles, conference papers and other academic documents. Find databases that are useful for your subject on our Subject Guides.

If you know the database you want to use, search for the name of the database on the University Collections tab in StarPlus, click ‘View Online’, ‘Open source in a new window’ and then ‘Connect to...’  under the Quick links on the right-hand side.

It is worth spending time thinking about your search before you start- list relevant keywords and search terms and any alternatives. For example, if you are searching for global warming, you will also want to search for climate change and greenhouse effect. Consider different spellings such as colour/color, and any technical terms or abbreviations.

If you are searching for a phrase, use quotation marks to keep the words together, e.g. “global warming”, “old testament”.

An asterisk can be used to end a word in a variety of ways, for example, ethic* will find results that include ethic, ethics, ethically, ethical.

Our Successful Database Searching tutorial will help you plan your search further.