LibGuides: Journals and journal articles: Finding journal articles

Finding journal articles

You can find and access journal articles:

Through Library Search - You can search for specific journal titles (e .g the Lancet) or you can search for journal articles on a particular subject by using keywords

Through the A to Z Database list - We have 100+ research databases that contain journal articles.

Most of our journal articles are available online. However we do have a small collection of print journals available in our libraries.

Through BrowZine - browse academic journals and articles available through your Library on BrowZine. Login with your University of Exeter credentials and create a free account to save journals and articles.

Searching for journal articles in research databases

What is a research database?
Why use a research database?

Library Search provides access to some of our journal articles. However, it doesn't provide access to all of them. Many more can be found in our specialized research databases, accessible via the A to Z database list.

Research databases enable you to see what has been published in the area you are researching. They contain detailed records of thousands of journal articles, book references and conference proceedings. These records usually include the article's title, authors, abstract (a brief summary), keywords (to enable your search to find it) and more.

It's important to note:

Some databases provide full text access to the articles themselves.
Some databases are primarily indexes or bibliographic databases, and although they provide information about the content of a journal article, they may not provide full-text access to the actual article itself.
Some databases are a mixture of full-text and indexed/bibliographic access.

In most cases, it is possible to access the full text by following the links provided.

They are a valuable way of searching for published scholarly research across a wide number of sources
These databases index the contents of journals as well as other publications such as books and conferences
You can build complex searches ensuring that the results are likely to be relevant to your needs
They contain huge numbers of records, and thus provide comprehensive subject coverage
They also provide frequent (often daily) indexing, and so are very up to date
Where full text is available, you can log in with your University of Exeter username and password to access

Open Access journals

An increasing number of peer-reviewed journals are available as fully open access (i.e. free, immediate online availability, together with rights to use these publications subject to proper attribution), or with specific articles within subscription titles available on open access, thereby increasing the visibility and ease of use of scholarly literature.

DOAJ (Directory of Open Access Journals) provides access to thousands of quality-controlled open access journals.