This page focuses on finding academic or scholarly articles.
Researchers write articles to communicate new research findings and advance the conversation around specific areas of research.
There are many different types of scholarly articles, including peer-reviewed journal articles and articles from conferences. Watch the "Peer Review in 3 Minutes" video linked below to learn more about peer review.
One type of peer-reviewed journal article that can be helpful when beginning your research is called a review article. Review articles are written to summarize and synthesize previous research in a specific area. Review articles often include extensive works cited and can be a great resource for understanding a new topic. You can watch the brief "Review Articles" video linked below to learn more. Some library databases or search engines, like Web of Science, Google Scholar, and PubMed, have limiters that allow you to refine a search to just review articles.
Research articles can be found from many sources. Most frequently, Engineers locate articles using search engines or databases meant specifically for locating sources for research. Here, we define research databases as a collection of published sources of information.
Types of Research Databases: General vs. Subject-specific
There are many types of research databases. Some research databases are more general and cover many different disciplines or subjects, while others collect sources mainly for particular areas of research. The examples below includes publication from a variety of publishers.
Examples of general databases include Google Scholar and Web of Science.
Subject-specific database examples include Compendex for Engineering, PubMed for Medicine and related areas, and SciFinder for Chemistry and chemical information.
Publisher-specific Research Databases
Some databases only include publications from a specific publisher. Examples include ScienceDirect, which includes publications from the publisher Elsevier, IEEE Xplore, which includes publications from IEEE, and ASCE Library, which includes publications from ASCE.
Finding scholarly articles is a process that involves refining your topic, identifying relevant keywords, exploring multiple tools, and evaluating what you find. It is rarely a one-step procedure.
Start by brainstorming a few key terms related to your topic. It’s often helpful to begin with a basic search in Google Scholar to see how your keywords perform and to get a sense of what research already exists. Google Scholar works well for exploratory searching and will often lead you to a few relevant papers quickly.
Once you identify a useful article, try forward and backward citation chaining. This means looking at the sources cited by the article (backward citation) and looking at newer articles that cite it (forward citation). Web of Science is great for both backward- and forward-citation chaining and Google Scholar is very useful for forward citation chaining.
Next, move to subject-specific databases like Compendex (all Engineering fields), IEEE Xplore (Electrical and Computer Engineering), or ASCE Library (Civil Engineering) to perform more targeted searches. You can find these and other resources on the Libraries A-Z Database page.
Throughout your search, use Zotero to save information about promising articles and the full-text, if available. You don’t need to read everything right away—skim abstracts and introductions to gauge relevance, and read more thoroughly once you’ve identified a strong set of initial results.
Pro Tip: If you find a review article, it can be extremely helpful and a great shortcut. The literature review section often lists dozens of relevant sources with helpful context. Reading this section can quickly orient you to major studies and trends in the field. Encyclopedia entries can also be useful in this regard.
Note on Generative AI Tools: You can use tools like ChatGPT to help brainstorm keywords or structure your search, but they should not be relied on to locate scholarly articles at this time. These tools are not connected to academic databases and can generate inaccurate or fabricated citations.
Get Help! If you're intimidated by the search process, don't know where to start, or get stuck, reach out to your Engineering Librarian. They have expertise in searching and are happy to help!
Helps find current articles that cite earlier work. Covers STEM, social sciences, & arts and humanities. Has an emerging sources citation index. Useful for identifying review articles Note: Web of Science generally does not include conference proceedings in search results.
Provides a simple way to broadly search for scholarly literature across many disciplines and sources. (Note: To maximize access to Lehigh resources, when in Google Scholar, use the Menu icon in the top left, go to Settings, then Library links. Type in Lehigh University and select the check box next to “Lehigh University - Lehigh Links.” If we do not subscribe to an article, this setting will enable a Lehigh Link to obtain the article via other access or interlibrary loan.)
Comprehensive, interdisciplinary database of engineering research literature, searching across journals, conferences, preprints, dissertations, and select books and standards. Coverage from 1884-present.