Lindsey Aldrich

Website Analysis: EBSCOhost An Outstanding Research Engine and

Academic Tool

Finding Scholarly Articles can be quite the a hassle. Fortunately,

EBSCOhost has made it simple for students to find a variety of great

sources from one database accessor!

-As a communication major with a sociology minor, accessing, reading, and incorporating scholarly sources is a common task for me. EBSCOhost aids me in these tasks.

-EBSCOhost deserves a positive evaluation based on its organization, variety of features, and audience appeal.

Organization-EBSCOhost makes navigation simple for users-The Search Engine is located in the middle of a page that is otherwise mostly blank.-Search options include: Basic Search, Advanced Search, Visual Search, and Search History

-The Basic Search is a good place to start if one is broadly searching a topic.-The Advanced Search is helpful when looking at a topic more specifically, and trying to gather supporting evidence.-The Search History is useful when working over long periods of time.

Organization- Visual SearchThe Visual Search option is awesome for watching a topic being narrowed. It is simple to use and extremely organized, allowing for defined searches of any research topic. -The user types in their topic of choice. -The user then selects a keyword from the list of options. -The overall search is narrowed, and the user gets to choose another keyword as the search becomes more refined. -The user chooses another keyword, narrowing the list of matching articles further, each time.

Variety of Features

-Not only does EBSCOhost give users a good deal of choice, there are also a variety of helpful features!-There are over 70 different databases from which to search articles.-There are approximately 30 different languages to search articles, putting worldwide research at the user's' fingertips.

Variety of Features

-Online folders are available to store articles, which can be accessed through the home page.

-With an EBSCOhost account one can organize information stored in folders, save preferences, access others' folders, and share their folder with others.-Users can ask a librarian for help at any time, via the homepage.-Users can easily find articles that fit a very specific interest.-There are abstracts provided for almost every article, and many of the articles are instantly available for BG students to download.

Audience Appeal-Students of the social sciences tend to have a good deal of interest in human

behavior and social research.-There are default databases, as well as databases from a variety of fields-EBSCOhost is helpful in finding resources for annotated bibliographies, literature reviews, research papers, and other assignments.

Audience Appeal

-For me personally, EBSCOhost has been an invaluable asset when working on assignments and papers.-Provided are peer-reviewed and published articles, that serve as valid scholarly sources; rather than invalid information found on popular search engines

EBSCOhost Evaluation-EBSCOhost deserves a positive evaluation.

-It is an invaluable resource and learning asset for college students.-The organization and ease of navigation makes the website an ideal research tool.-The variety of features allows users to search information in whatever way suits their needs and preferences.-The Visual search in particular, is great for finding scholarly articles for both broadly related and specific subjects, because the user's search is narrowed step by step.

EBSCOhost Evaluation

-Given the multitude of research articles available from countless journals gives EBSCOhost audience appeal for college students.

-Overall, EBSCOhost is organized, offers a variety of features, has significant audience appeal, and is an outstanding research engine and academic tool.