Distance Learning Students: Library services: Finding Articles / Journals

A guide to the services and support the Library offers to Flexible and Distance Learning Students

Journals

What's a Journal?

  • Sometimes also referred to as "Periodicals" or "Serials"
  • Academic Publications - each journal has it's subject
  • Published in volumes - normally one volume each year
  • Each volume contains a number of parts, or issues, can be weekly, monthly, quarterly, etc.
  • Each part or issue contains a number of articles, or papers written on the theme of the journal
  • These are available in print format or online
  • Some journals are peer-reviewed (see the peer review tab for a short video about the peer review process)

What's an article?

  • A paper in an issue / part of a journal
  • Written by experts, and often peer-reviewed
  • Original research, commentary on existing evidence or ideas
  • New research appears in journal articles before it appears in books.

Searching for Journal Articles

Use the Search box below or on the Library Homepage to search for journal articles.

When you know the details of an article:

  1. Search using the most unique piece of information about the article, which is normally the title of the article
  2. From the results select "Journal articles" under Format on the left of the screen
  3. From the results select "Full text".  
  4. Some of the results may advise "Please log in to see more detail" - click to login, and login using your university username and password
  5. If the article you want isn't listed, then the Library may not have a subscription to the journal the article is from.  If you want to double check you can search using the journal Publication title to see if the Library has a subscription.
  6. If the article you want is listed in the results, click the button on the right to access it, this will be labeled as "PDF" or "Full text from ....." or "Find Full text"
  7. You may need to login a second time to access the journal article, use your University email address and password.

When you search by topic:

  1. Enter your keywords or phrases into the search box 
  2. From the results select "Journal articles" under Format on the left of the screen
  3. From the results select "Full text" in the left of the screen
  4. Some of the results may advise "Please log in to see more detail" - click to login, and login using your university username and password
  5. You should now see all the articles which are available full-text for you to access.  Click the green button on the right to access an article, this will be labeled as "PDF" or "Full text from ....." or "Find Full text"
  6. You may need to login a second time to access the journal article, use your University email address and password.

When you request journal articles through Inter-Library Loan the Library will find other libraries that have that item and request it from them, either as a scanned document or photocopy.

Please search the Library first and check if we already have access to the article you need. If it is something we don't have, you can use the Inter-Library Loans service to request it.

Search the Library

Get lean library for easier access to eresources

Graphic: Research like a pro with Lean Library! Install the plug-in to unlock free legal access to academic spapers and ebook resources. Lean Library Technology from Sage.

Ever been stuck behind a paywall for a journal article, newspaper article, or ebook?

Lean Library is a browser add-on that makes it easier to get access to these resources. Land on a webpage where you can't access a resource and Lean Library can give you a link directing you to the full-text version available through the Library subscription, or an open-access version. It saves you time looking for a login button or having to go back to Library Search to look up a title. 

You can install the Lean Library browser add-on in most browser download.leanlibrary.com/

More information about Lean Library can be found in our guide libguides.st-andrews.ac.uk/lean

Requesting journal articles not available online

Inter-library loans

When a journal article or book chapter is not available from our collections, distance learners can request scanned articles and chapters through our Inter Library Loan Service. These will be sent directly to your University email account.