When should I use it? Use the SearchCat when looking for a specific item (title of a book, journal, article, etc) or for general topic searches. Once you begin typing a search, you'll be presented with options to limit your search results by format (books, articles, etc). You can also use the options on your search results page to limit by format, publication date range, and more.

When should I NOT use it? When looking for scholarly articles for your research topic, it's almost always best to search directly in one (or more) of our Article Databases. These give you better search tools and a smaller, more relevant pool of literature to search through.