Business

This page provides tutorials on how to use Google Scholar more efficiently in searching for scholarly information. The page illustrates the benefits of linking a Google account to your CSU Libraries account and how to do it through a step-by-step tutorial. It shows how to search for scholarly journal articles, search for cases, and how to save information to your personal library to be able to retrieve it later. 

One of the first steps to using Google Scholar is to link your Google Account with CSU Libraries. Often, many of the search results will be blocked by a paywall or are linked to another university. However, by completing this step, the search results list will be labeled with the articles you can access through CSU Libraries. This is very easy to do and below is a short tutorial on how to do this. 

Linking Your Account

• Go to the Google Scholar homepage

• Click on the hash lines on the top left of the page. Click on them to reveal the menu. Then click on 'Settings.' 

• Click on 'Library links.' 

• In the search box, search for Columbus State University. You will be given a prompt to log into your MyCSU Account. Then make sure the option box is checked. Then click on 'Save." Now your Google Scholar search results will let you know when an article in your search results list is available through CSU Libraries. 

Finding Articles Using Google Scholar

The following is a brief tutorial on how to search Google Scholar more efficiently when your Google account is linked to your CSU account. 

• Go to Google Scholar and type your search terms. Make sure 'Articles' is selected below the search bar. 

• On the left-hand side, there are several options to narrow your search. You can select the range of years you want to search within and you can select if you want patents included in the results, along with several other options to select. 

• If an article is available through CSU Libraries, or if it is an open-access article, it will be noted on the right-hand side. Remember, this will only appear if your Google account is linked to your CSU account. The tutorial above has instructions for how to connect your accounts. 

• This is what it will look like if you select an article that is not linked to CSU Libraries and hit a paywall. Do not pay for journal articles and check with the library to see if the article can be found via interlibrary loan. 

• There is also the option to save articles to your Google 'My Library' account. Click on the star as shown below. It will become solid once you click on it. 

• To retrieve saved articles, on the righthand corner, click on 'My Library.'

• In your library, you have options to edit and delete entries, make tags to organize, or download saved articles.