WEST HAVEN–Journal articles, especially from “peer-reviewed”
scholarly research journals, are at the core of academic research and essential
background for writing research papers. Magazines are a good source for news
about the world, sports teams, celebrities, hobbies, etc. Until a few years
ago, the best place to find a good collection of all these was the library
shelves, where they sat lined up in rows by title and date. But increasingly
these days the best place to find them is on the computer, as more publications
become available in electronic form, more people have access to computers, and
there are more routes to access the publications (such as the library web site,
the journal or magazine’s own web site, or Google).
The UNH library pays for subscriptions to thousands of
e-journals for your use. We have many databases which include their published
articles-both general ones with broad subject coverage, and subject specialty
databases such as Criminal Justice Periodicals, PsychArticles, Literary,
Science, and
We also subscribe to collections from various publishers whose journals cover
topics relevant to academics at UNH, such as Sage Publications and the IEEE
Computer Society. Then there are the many “open source” journals, which make
their contents available freely on the web. You can find a great collection of
these listed with under the Journals link on the library home page, along with
the many journals which we pay for.
E-journals provide many advantages to students. You can
search for your topic across many years of many journals at once by entering
your keywords in the database or publishers collection search box. You can also
open these journals from anywhere with a computer and your campus ID card. No
pages in these journals will be damaged or torn out. There is value-added
content to e-journals: many have hyperlinks to other related articles or web
sites. The IEEE Computer Science Digital Library includes, along with full text
of their journals and for the same price as their print journals alone, many
hundreds of conference reports, which the faculty have said are essential for
research in the field.
Why did I mention Google, you ask, when your professor has
said that you may not use web sites in your research? Well, in Google, and
especially Google Scholar, search results include citations for many published
journal articles. And if our library subscribes to the journal’s online
version, and you are searching within the campus IP network, then you can often
access this legitimate research source from Google.
If you haven’t already, please do jump in to this great pool
of scholarly research and general interest information on the Library web page
of the UNH web site. Swimming instruction (searching assistance) is always
available at the Library Information Desk, or by calling 932-7189, or visiting
the Ask-a-Librarian link on the web page.
