Google is renown as a powerful search engine that can help you find just about anything. This is a wonderful tool but its large range of results can sometimes be overwhelming. This is especially true for academic research where credible sources must be found and cited. This is where Google Scholar comes in handy. With the tagline “Stand on the shoulders of giants” this is the part of Google’s search engine dedicated to finding scholarly material.
Besides the link to each relevant scholarly article and a brief description of its contents the Google Scholar search results page also offers links to cite the article in commonly accepted formats such as MLA and APA. You can also save articles to a virtual library to read or cite later. Another useful feature of Google Scholar is the related articles link which allows you to search for content similar to the current search result.
Google Scholar is a great tool for academic research and a useful tool for escaping generic search results. The next time you have a research project give it a try to see for yourself.
Last Updated on September 4, 2015 by Nathan Vidal