Research Guides: First Year Seminar: Databases

What Is a Library Database?

A library database is a digital collection of information, articles, and resources curated by experts.

Unlike a general search engine like Google, library databases focus on providing high-quality, credible sources.

These sources often include:

scholarly journal articles
academic publications
eBooks (electronic books)
news archives
and other in-depth materials

Why Use a Database?

Here's why library databases are the best choice for in-depth research:

Credibility: Librarians carefully select databases that contain information from reputable sources, authored by experts in their fields.
Accuracy: Library databases are well-maintained and contain a high percentage of accurate information. The content goes through a selection process to ensure it meets quality standards.
Advanced Search Features: Library databases offer advanced search options that allow you to refine your research by publication date, author, topic, and other specific criteria. These filters help you find exactly what you need!
Full-Text Access: QU pays for subscriptions to these databases, so you can often access the full text of articles and resources directly, instead of having to pay for them or search for them on separate websites.
Focus: QU offers specialized databases for specific subjects, like history, science, and business. This allows you to find targeted information relevant to your research.

Reference Databases

Reference databases provide you with reliable background information like definitions, historical context, key theories, and important figures. This background information helps you grasp the basics of your topic before you move on to more in-depth research.

Here are some suggested reference databases:

African American Experience
A wide-ranging research tool for African American history and culture. Includes more than 300 titles including reference books, primary source materials, WPA slave narratives, and thousands of photographs, maps and other images.
Biography Reference Bank
Offering the original profiles of Current Biography and World Authors series, and the periodical coverage of Biography Index. Search result limiters include occupation/activity, gender, place of origin, birth day or month, and lifespan. Includes a searchable image collection.
Biography Reference Source
Contains many of the top-ranked biographical reference collections and magazines. Offers a comprehensive collection of full-text biographies, as well as thousands of unique narrative biographies.
Credo Reference
Credo Reference is a library subscription database that provides access to thousands of articles from reference sources such as encyclopedias and dictionaries. Subjects covered include art, biography, history, literature, music, religion, and science and technology. You can use these types of sources to gain knowledge on a subject and to help you focus or narrow your topic.
Gale Opposing Viewpoints in Context
Discover pro/con perspectives from authoritative voices. Opposing Viewpoints in Context is the premier online resource covering today’s hottest social issues, from capital punishment to immigration, to violent video games. Opposing Viewpoints in Context is cross-curricular and supports science, social studies, current events, and language arts classes.
Gale Virtual Reference Library
Offers students, researchers, and professionals a wide variety of full-text interdisciplinary electronic reference sources on virtually any subject area to tackle their assignments, papers, projects, and presentations.
Global Issues in Context
Empower students to understand topics from a non-U.S. perspective. Designed to support global awareness, Global Issues in Context ties together news, perspectives, reference materials, primary source documents, audio, video, statistics, and more. Through these tools, students are empowered to critically analyze and understand the most important issues of the modern world.
MasterFILE Premier
Provides full text of magazines, reference books, and primary source documents and an Image Collection with photos, maps & flags.
Statista
Find statistics, consumer survey results and industry studies from over 22500 sources on over 80000 topics on the internet's leading statistics database.

Article Databases

For a full list of all the Databases the Library subscribes to, please access the A-Z Database list from the Library homepage.

You can sort the A-Z Database list by subject by selecting the "All Subjects" dropdown menu from the top of the page and selecting a subject from the list. Once you sort the list by subject, your "best bets" for databases within that subject will be listed at the top in a highlighted box.

Here's a list of the most popular databases for finding articles:

ABI/Inform Collection
[BUSINESS] - Nearly 1800 worldwide business periodicals for in-depth coverage of business and economic conditions, management techniques, theory, and practice of business, advertising, marketing, economics, human resources, finance, taxation, computers, and more. Expanded international coverage. Fast access to information on 60,000 + companies with business and executive profiles. Now includes The Wall Street Journal.
Academic Search Ultimate
[ALL SUBJECTS] - Provides comprehensive indexing and abstracting coverage for more than 13,800 journals with more than 9,000 full-text. The database is updated daily and includes more than 7,800 peer-reviewed journals, full-text periodicals, reports, books and more. PDF content dates back to 1887 and searchable cited references are provided for more than 1,400 journals. Contains a searchable image collection.
CINAHL Ultimate
[NURSING / HEALTH SCIENCES] - Features journal articles, dissertations, conferences, images and book chapters in Nursing and Allied Health professions from 1937 to present. Contains resources related to nursing and allied health; consumer health, biomedicine; and health sciences. Also includes research instruments, diseases and conditions, quick lessons, and evidence-based care sheets.

JSTOR
[ARTS & HUMANITIES] - An interdisciplinary archive of over 1,000 scholarly journals, with business and economic journals well represented. The majority of the database is full-text, with the earliest content dating back to 1665. Please note that the most recent few years may not be available.

PsycInfo
[PSYCHOLOGY] - Comprehensive database of citations, abstracts and full-text articles from major psychology journals, books, and dissertations. Journal coverage begins in 1894 and includes international material.

Science Direct
[SCIENCES] - Full text access to scholarly journals in business, the sciences and social sciences.

News Sources

While newspapers ARE NOT SCHOLARLY or peer-reviewed, they can be useful for reading about current events:

New York Times
Requires registration. Access to current NYTimes (excluding Cooking, The Athletic, and Crosswords) and the archive back to 1851.
When you first access the NYTimes, you must register an account. At the activation page, find and select Quinnipiac University. When you register your account you must use a valid Quinnipiac email address.
New York Times (1980 - current issue)
Each issue of the NYT is indexed thoroughly, to provide access to not only top news stories but also detailed information on the arts, sports, business, and popular culture. Even such items as editorials, editorial cartoons, obituaries, and letters to the editor from well-known people are indexed.
US Major Dailies
Collection of national newspapers: Chicago Tribune, Los Angeles Times, New York Times, Wall Street Journal, and The Washington Post.
Wall Street Journal (1984 - current)
This publication's detailed indexing helps users quickly find the news information they need. Each issue is indexed thoroughly, so they have access to not only top news stories but also the information contained on the various sections of the paper. The indexing covers not only complete bibliographic information but also companies, people, products, etc.

Wall Street Journal (Online)
Access to the Wall Street Journal Online is provided by Quinnipiac's Business School.

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To get access:

1. Enter Quinnipiac University into the University Name box. Click Search.

2. Log-In with your Quinnipiac credentials via SSO OR fill out the account information in the form:
- Account Type: Student / Staff / Professor
- First & Last Name
- Email (Use your QU email here)
- Password (Create a password)

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