Learning and Information Services
Literature Searching in Business
These are the main search tools for finding business journal articles, books, company reports and theses. It is recommended that you focus on using Summon and
ABI/INFORM or Business Source Complete in the first instance. This will help ensure that your searches are comprehensive, both in terms of covering all literature
available to you (Summon) and in terms of creating complex searches to get the most relevant articles (ABI/INFORM or Business Source Complete).
Here are some of the relative merits of the main search tools, accessible via the Key Databases tab at http://www.wlv.ac.uk/lib/business
Search Tool
Library Catalogue/Summon
http://www.wlv.ac.uk/lib/search
ABI/INFORM
Business Source Complete
MINTEL
KeyNote
Morningstar Company Intelligence
ProQuest Dissertations & Theses:
UK & Ireland
Scope
Searches all the University’s paid-for databases, ejournals,
books and ebooks. Cross-subject searching. Links out to full
text of many articles online and ebooks.
ABI/INFORM Offers the latest business and financial
information for researchers at all levels. It includes in-depth
coverage for over 3,730 publications
Business Source Complete contains peer-reviewed, business
related journals as well as searchable cited references for
more than 1,300 journals.
Independent expert research on UK consumer markets.
Market intelligence and UK company reports (7m+).
Focussed research into top 300,000 UK companies.
Most comprehensive listing of UK & Ireland higher education
theses, with abstracts. Check EThOS for full-text availability.
Search
Keyword search box, with ability to limit
by format e.g. journal article or date. Use
inverted commas for “phrase searching”
Advanced search allows complex
combinations of subject terms and limits –
e.g. peer reviewed
Advanced search allows complex
combinations of subject terms and limits –
e.g. geographical region
Includes basic and advanced searching
Includes basic and advanced searching
Search by company, director or sector.
Searching by keyword, author or
institution available in advanced search.
Features*
RefWorks
RefWorks
Personal account
Search alerts
RefWorks
Personal account
Search alerts
RefWorks
Search Alerts
*Features : RefWorks – references can be downloaded into our reference management software (see below) Personal accounts – e.g. "My Account" or "My
Folder" enable you to save your searches and documents, and set up alerts. Search alerts - automatic emails sent from a database, notifying you of new
documents that meet your search parameters.
Note:
You will find this symbol in many of our databases, including Business Source Complete. If full text isn’t immediately available, click on this
symbol to check whether the University has access to the full-text.
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Finding Open Access Resources
It is becoming increasingly important that you consider searching for full-text resources made available through subject or institutional open access repositories.
These may give you access to e.g. full-text articles, PhD theses or government document archives not available to you elsewhere. Useful sources include:
WIRE - Wolverhampton Intellectual
Repository and E-Theses
OpenDOAR – the Directory of Open
Access Repositories
Academia.edu
OAIster
http://wlv.openrepository.com/wlv
Growing collection of research outputs from the University of Wolverhampton.
http://www.opendoar.org
Directory of academic open access repositories
https://www.academia.edu/
http://www.oclc.org/oaister
Platform for sharing research and following the work of others in your subject field.
Catalogue of resources from open-archive collections worldwide
What about Google Scholar?
Google Scholar is a quick way to find journal articles, but you should not rely on this alone. Access Google Scholar via the Find Resources tab at
http://www.wlv.ac.uk/lib/business to ensure you are logged in to access the full-text of any of the University’s full-text journals you locate in your searches.
Search Tool
Google Scholar
Scope
Will return results from open access repositories. Covers pre-prints of
articles and un-reviewed articles as well as peer-reviewed articles.
Search
Hard to refine your search and
limited ways to sort the
thousands of results.
Features
RefWorks
Constructing Searches
You will need to experiment with your searches to find the most appropriate subject terms or keywords for your topic. ABI/INFORM and Business Source Complete
both have a Thesaurus, which you can use to check whether you have identified the best words to describe your subject.
When searching, you need to consider combining your terms with either and, or or not, to include or exclude concepts. You also need think about:
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Alternative terms (synonyms)
Alternative spellings (e.g. behaviour/behavior)
Broader terms (if you find insufficient information on your precise topic)
Geographical limits (does your search need to be UK specific)
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Date limits?
Format limits – e.g. peer reviewed articles only to exclude magazines
Language limit – e.g. English only
Wildcard/truncation to include variants e.g. motiv* for motivation, motivating
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Setting Search Alerts/Keeping Up to Date
If you are undertaking research over a period of months it may be worth setting up search alerts, so you are informed when new journal articles are published in
your area of interest. Alerts can be received by email or RSS feeds. This can be done through the databases as listed above, or through Zetoc
http://zetoc.mimas.ac.uk/ or JournalTOCs http://www.journaltocs.hw.ac.uk/ . See http://www.wlv.ac.uk/lib/research for further guidance.
Reference Management
It is possible to save references from the above databases into reference management software such as RefWorks. RefWorks can also be used to format your
bibliography in the Harvard Referencing style. If you are interested in using RefWorks see http://www.wlv.ac.uk/lib/referencing , including information on
workshops and the Guide to RefWorks.
Found a Reference but Can’t Access it?
If you have identified a useful journal article or book, but don’t think we have it online or in print in the Learning Centre, you can request a copy via our InterLibrary Loan service. Copies of higher degree theses may be obtained through the British Library EThOS service. See http://www.wlv.ac.uk/lib/interloan for advice
on these services.
Need Further Assistance
If you would like further help, please contact the Liaison Librarian team via LISliaison@wlv.ac.uk or 01902 323648.
Cite this work:
Learning and Information Services (2014) Literature Searching in Business [online]. Wolverhampton: University of Wolverhampton. [Access date]. Available from
http://www.wlv.ac.uk/lib/research.
To request this document in an alternative format please contact LISliaison@wlv.ac.uk
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