Bibliographic Databases for Educational Studies
via Dialog DataStar
- Introduction
- Access to Dialog DataStar
- Easy searching
- Search Results
- Saving/printing/emailing results
- Help
- Exit the Database
- Academic Liaison Librarian: Sue Cumberpatch
Introduction
The Dialog DataStar web service hosts the British Education Index, Australian Education Index and ERIC, three of the most important bibliographic databases for Educational Studies students and researchers. The information contained is updated quarterly.
- British Education Index (BEI) (1975-) is the most comprehensive record of articles published in British educational journals, providing information on research, policy and practice in education and training in the UK. Over 300 journals are indexed, plus books, reports, conferences and theses.
- Australian Education Index (AEI) (1979-) is its Australian equivalent, covering over 200 Australian journals plus a further 300 international titles, with particular emphasis on South East Asian publications.
- ERIC (1966-) is an international database, sponsored by the US Department of Education. Over 2000 journals are indexed, plus conferences and unpublished reports, and abstracts (summaries) of articles are provided.
All three databases have similar search interfaces, and it's possible to select to search any combination of the three simultaneously at the Dialog DataStar opening screen.
Access to Dialog DataStar
Dialog Datastar databases can be accessed from any networked PC.
For members of the University of York, all bibliographic databases are accessible via the MetaLib gateway. Find the MetaLib website by following the links from the University's homepage:
Student home| Library | MetaLib gateway
or
Staff home | Library | MetaLib gateway
Or go directly to MetaLib at http://metalib.york.ac.uk/
Then choose the Find Database tab at the top of the page, and enter the title of the database you require (ERIC, BEI or AEI).
Click on the database title, to open the Dialog DataStar interface in a new window. Enter your University of York network username and password as prompted.
From the database selection menu, tick the box next to any database, or combination of databases, that you wish to search.
Dialog DataStar provides two search interfaces: Easy and Advanced. This guide will focus on the Easy Search interface.
Easy searching
The Easy Search screen looks like this:
Searching for a keyword or phrase
Enter your keyword or brief phrase in the first search box. By default, Dialog DataStar will search the whole document, i.e. the full details of each entry in the database. If you wish to search for words which appear in the title of an article, or an author's name, or a journal name, select the appropriate option from the drop-down menu to the right of the search box.
Truncation
Use a dollar sign $ to expand a word stem by an unlimited amount of characters, e.g.
assess$ will match assessment, assessments, assessing, assessed etc
Andrews-R$ will match Andrews-Richard, Andrews-Richard-J etc
Combining search terms
Boolean operators are words that can be used to combine terms, either to broaden or to reduce the scope of your search:
| AND | Both words will appear in the articles found (e.g. citizenship and ethnicity) |
| OR | Either word appears in the article (adolescents or teenagers) |
| NOT | The second term will be excluded (English not second) N.B. Use NOT with care as this may also discard useful results |
Enter your first search term in the first box, use the drop-down menu below to select the correct Boolean operator, then enter your second term in the second box. Up to three terms can be combined in this way, to specify your search as precisely as possible.
Limiting your search
The menus beneath the search boxes allow you to:
- Restrict your search (e.g. to articles with abstracts)
- Specify the Publication year of the material you are searching for
- Specify the Language of publication (please note that the vast majority of material indexed in these databases is published in English)
- Specify the Publication type you are looking for (e.g. conference paper, thesis, interview, etc.)
Click on the Search button when you have completed your selections.
Thesaurus searching
The British and Australian Education Indexes and ERIC each incorporate their own thesaurus - a comprehensive directory of subject terms ("descriptors") used by the compilers of the database to index each entry. Enter your keyword or phrase, tick Thesaurus mapping, and click the Search button. You will be prompted with a list of relevant descriptors, from which you can select the most appropriate terms for your search.
- Tick to select a descriptor. If you select more than one descriptor, specify which Boolean operator you want to use to combine them
- Click
to view a definition of the descriptor - Click on a descriptor name to view its position in the thesaurus tree: the hierarchy of terms
- Tick Explode if you wish your search to include all subsidiary terms in the hierarchy.
Search Results
Search results are initially displayed as a list of brief records, each including the article title, journal name, volume number, pages (or further publication details if the item is not a journal article), and author's name.
Follow the Link to abstract/database record to view the article's abstract (if available) and further details, including the subject descriptors.
If you wish to read the full text of an article, click the button 
to open the SFX window. If the University of York has electronic access to the full text, click the Go button to read the article. If electronic access is not available, you will be prompted to search the Library catalogue for the publication.
To return to your list of results, close any SFX windows open, and click 
the button at the top of your document display.
Saving/printing/emailing results
Select individual records for further action by clicking in the tickbox to the left of each record in the Titles display. Use the menu at the bottom of the display screen to proceed:
To print selected records, click Print Preview, then File | Print on your web browser menu.
Help
Follow the help link at the top of every screen to open a new window, with context-sensitive help. Scroll to the top of the Help window to view the full contents.
Features that you may wish to explore include:
- The Advanced Search menu, which allows you to keep a record of the searches you have performed, and combine them to expand or narrow your results
- Saving a search, so that you can quickly re-run it next time you access the database (ignore the message about the charge for this service)
- Creating an alert (your search will be automatically re-run when the database is updated, and the results sent to you).
For further information please contact the Academic Liaison Librarian for Educational Studies, Sue Cumberpatch, or ask at the Enquiry Desk in the JB Morrell Library.
Exit the Database
To exit Dialog DataStar, click on Logoff at the top of the screen.
