Google ScholarTools, Tips, and Tricks

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Ben HockenberrySystems Librarian

SJFC Lavery Library

In this Session, We’ll Answer:• What’s in Google Scholar (GS)?• What are the pros and cons of using it?• How do I search GS?• How do I narrow my results?• How do I link to Library Resources?• How do I find related results?• How does reference management software work with GS?• What else can I do with it?

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What’s in Google Scholar?

• Articles• Theses• Books and book chapters• Abstracts• Court opinions• Technical reports• Conference papers•…and much more

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What’s in Google Scholar?

These resources are gathered from “academic publishers, professional societies, online repositories, universities and other web sites.”1

A 2009 study found Google Scholar, on average, 17.6 percent more scholarly than materials found only in library databases.2

This is a relevant tool that should be understood. 4

Pros and Cons

The Good

• High number of journals• Keyword searching in

many articles• Broad array of resources,

with comparable “scholarliness” to subscription databases• Powerful “cited by” tool

The Bad• Full coverage unknown, as

GS doesn’t publish a list of sources

• Few search options—can’t limit by source type

• Peer-review indeterminate• Limited information about

articles (metadata)• Citations from non-journals

may skew “cited” counts5

“Advanced” Searching• Google has made a name for themselves with intelligent search

results – a keyword search gets you far.• Click the down arrow from the search box to see advanced

options.

More tips: http://scholar.google.com/intl/en/scholar/refinesearch.html

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“Advanced” Searching• You can use these search boxes to get to a specific article, to find

articles published in the last five years, or to make a subject search more exact.

More tips: http://scholar.google.com/intl/en/scholar/refinesearch.html

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Narrowing Results• A results page looks like this:

• There are not many “limiters,” but limiting by date is very useful.• You can remove patents or citation-only results from your list.• If you see many irrelevant articles, use a “-” sign before a term in your search to

remove results that contain that keyword.Example: [potter –harry]

• You can set up an email “alert” for new articles published about your search topic right from this screen

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Full-text and Library Links• For many “open access” resources in Google Scholar, clicking

the title will get you to full-text.• If there’s no full-text, or if a site asks you to pay for access,

look for access elsewhere through open access sources or Library Links.

• If not, there may be a PDF link on the right.• Otherwise, use a Library Link!

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Full-text and Library Links• The library link, labeled “Get it @ Fisher,” should display automatically if

you’re in a campus academic building.• If you’re off-campus or in a dorm, you may need to set up a library link –

click the icon to add a library link.

• In this screen, search for St. John Fisher College, select the Get it @ Fisher option, and click Save.

• Detailed instructions to set this up are at http://libguides.sjfc.edu/googlescholar 10

Finding “Related” Results• In a results screen, you can click “Cited by” to see articles in

the future that cite the article you’re looking at.• The “Related articles” link is a little less clear:

“It finds documents similar to the given search result.”1

• This appears to find articles with similar keywords and cited references – but Google doesn’t say what it is.

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Reference Management• Zotero users can gather basic citation data from a result list using

the Firefox, Chrome or Safari addons.• EndNote or RefWorks users can set an option by clicking the Settings

“gear” and selecting a Bibliography Manager option. You’ll then see an “Import into” link in your results list.

• The automatically-generated citation data may be very inaccurate: please review your bibliography data to ensure it’s consistent with citation standards.3

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There’s More?• Google Scholar, thanks to its citation index, has become a powerful tool for

academics to track their publications.

• More information about Google Scholar’s author and journal metrics, check out http://scholar.google.com/intl/en/scholar/metrics.html

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LET’S DIVE RIGHT INBecause it’s Google, after all…

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Image: http://www.flickr.com/photos/nagy/195726977/ CC-SA License

What I’m working on…I’m working on a paper for Philosophy Day on the topic of Aaron Swartz’s bulk download of JSTOR articles.• I have enough news

and popular sources– need scholarly stuff• Topic is really current• I don’t want to dwell on

his death

Aaron Swartz, 2011, fromhttp://www.flickr.com/photos/creativecommons/3111021669/

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I’m going to try Google Scholar.• I tried a few library databases first• Maybe I didn’t get the results I want• Maybe I want to find more• Let’s see what we can find!

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What I’m working on…• What keywords

should use?

• What limiters should I use?

• How do I get the articles? Aaron Swartz, 2011, from

http://www.flickr.com/photos/creativecommons/3111021669/

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Resources

More info on Google Scholar and Open Access Sources:1. Research Guide:

http://libguides.sjfc.edu/googlescholar2. PowerPoint on Open Access Resources:

http://citadel.sjfc.edu/staff/bhockenberry/documents/OA_Resources_and_Search.pptx

(linked at the above Research Guide)

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References

1. http://scholar.google.com/intl/en/scholar/about.html2. Howland, J. L., Wright, T. C., Boughan, R. A., & Roberts, B. C.

(2009). How scholarly Is Google Scholar? A comparison to library databases. College & Research Libraries, 70(3), 227–234.

3. Jacsó, P. (2010). Metadata mega mess in Google Scholar. Online Information Review, 34(1), 175-191. doi: 10.1108/14684521011024191

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