Tips for Using Google Scholar

Google Scholar finds large sets of scholarly articles

Pros

Most Google Scholar searches do provide a large set of results, including scholarly articles, books, conference proceedings, and other types of literature.

Cons

The set of results you get may be way too large. Trying to sort through this set may mean that you miss some good articles. Do you really want to sort through 500 to 1000 results to find a few good ones?

Plus, you need to be careful, as not all search results are scholarly.

How to Make it Better

1. When you find a good result, evaluate it carefully to make sure it is scholarly.
2. Try the "Recent articles" link at the top of the Google Scholar results:

   

   This gives you only the most recent results and helps reduce the total number of results.

3. Use the Advanced Search in Google Scholar. You can limit by author, journal, or date, and other special features such as subject area or title.
4. Now that you are developing some search skills—try one of the specific databases for your subject area selected by the library just for your research. See the lists of databases.
5. And if you need help— Ask Us.

More Tips

Goolge Scholar is fast and easy to use

Does Google Scholar cover all the scholarly literature?

Using Google Scholar with NCSU Libraries