Where to find research paper to read?

Utilising search engines 

An important first step while starting with literature review is to zero down on the actionable key words, as that will help lay out the initial direction for the research. In today’s world, the power of Google as a search engine is unmatched, and it naturally serves as the first port of call. Additionally, there are other search engines as well, such as Bing and Yahoo, which perform the role with similar effectiveness. The same keyword may generate different results on different search engines. Thus, using different search engines to search for the same keyword introduces variety in the results and ensures that no important work is missed out on.

There are some useful tips and tricks which one can adopt in order to optimise the search results. These include using quotation marks for specific phrases so as to narrow down on results having the terms in the same order, changing the order of different keywords, restricting searches by date, etc. One can also improve the efficiency of searching for research papers by using Boolean searches and then filtering search results by location, date of publication, citation analytics and publication venue. (Mazumdar) Many search engines have advanced features that enable this. Additionally, “search for research papers in a private browser to prevent Google from using information about your device, past search history, and data from other Google services to determine and influence the search results” (Bisht).

There are some specialised search engines like Google Scholar and digital libraries of journals like JSTOR that can help find research papers and articles. One can search on JSTOR by either using keywords or by a subject area. Also, these platforms provide related articles at the bottom of each article page, which can also turn out to be useful.

Other important search engines and databases specialising in academic research include PubMed Central, Google Books, Science.gov, Digital Commons Network, ResearchGate, etc. There are many journals and databases which cater to a specific subject or discipline. These include the Education Resources Information Center (in the field of education), Social Science Research Network, dblp: Computer Science Bibliography, Econbiz (for economics and business studies), PubMed (for science and medicine), PsycINFO (for psychology and neuroscience), etc. Using specialised databases help researchers streamline their search process and find relevant research material in a much more efficient manner.

Quality of research papers, and Open-Access databases

What sort of research material should a researcher prioritise? Journal articles are usually the top draw because they undergo a thorough peer review process before getting published. “The peer review process provides accountability to the academic community, as well as to the content of the article. The peer review process involves qualified experts in a specific (often very specific) field performing a review of an article's methods and findings to determine things like quality and credibility” (“21 Legit Research Databases for Free Journal Articles in 2024”)

The double-blind review process is objective as the author removes all identifying information and has no idea about who will be reviewing the article. There are many other factors which need to be kept in mind while assessing the credibility of scholarly sources. These factors include publisher reliability (whether these journals are indexed or not), author credentials (their affiliations, academic credentials and past publications), the journal’s impact factor, and the veracity of citations and references in the article. 

A major problem often encountered while looking for research articles is the issue of paywalls. Many databases and journals will only allow access to articles upon payment of a subscription fee. Expensive subscription fees often make it difficult for researchers to access data, especially if they do not have institutional access. In contrast, open-access journals are those wherein articles can be accessed without any payment. A legitimate open-access journal would have characteristics such as a mission statement, a long publication history, a credible editorial board, indexing on a reliable database like Scopus, a sufficiently long peer review process, and a good impact factor. Open-access journals have played an important role in democratising access to quality research articles for scholars. Some important examples of open-access journals and databases include CORE, ScienceOpen, Directory of Open Access Journals, OpenDOAR and BASE (Bielefeld Academic Search Engine). Additionally, for PhD scholars and early-career researchers, the university libraries are also a great place to start, as they generally keep copies of research journals. 

Finally, and most importantly, researchers should keep a track of all papers and articles they have read, or are going to read. These resources can also be catalogued and categorised along different lines such as chronology or subject-discipline, so as to make it easier to refer back to them.