The easiest way to select the best database is to use the Subject Databases page. On the Subject databases page choose your subject area and click and you will get a list of databases that cover your subject.
The following multidisciplinary databases have both popular and scholarly articles and are good places to start your research:
The following multidisciplinary database has only scholarly articles:
The following specialized databases have only scholarly articles:
A database is an online index to magazine and journal articles, book chapters, etc. Databases often provide access to full-text of articles.
Why Use a Database?
You use a database to save yourself time and effort! A database scans thousands of journal and magazine issues to find articles that match your topic, so you don't have to look at individual pages and issues . It shows exactly which issue has the article(s) on your topic.
Use a database to find article information on your topic. After retrieving article citations, use Findit@MU to determine whether the article(s) is available fulltext online or in print. Use Interlibrary Loan to obtain copies of articles from other libraries.
Google Scholar provides a simple way to broadly search for scholarly literature across many disciplines.
If you don't see a link to the PDF of an article, click on the Find It @MU icon to find full-text. Check out our FindIt@MU guide for detailed instructions.
If you have an article citation, use the Find a Specific Article link to access the full-text of the article.