Reference Services Review

Purpose – The purpose of this paper is to compare the efficacy of two approaches to finding articles on a topic by measuring student perceptions of the ease-of-use of the search process and the perceived relevancy of search results retrieved using both a single multidisciplinary database and a federated search tool.

Design/methodology/approach – Students are asked to search both a federated search tool and a single multidisciplinary database, record their searches and respond to a series of quantitative and qualitative questions regarding their experiences with searching both search tools.

Findings – Study results indicate a slight preference for federated searching over single database searching based on perceived relevancy of results and likeliness of future use. Study data supports equal promotion of single database searching and federated searching to undergraduate students.

Practical implications – The results of this paper have practical implications for reference and instruction librarians teaching undergraduate students and library users in general to find the most effective, efficient and manageable approach to finding articles on a topic.

Originality/value – Previous research comparing federated searching to other research methods uses prescribed topics outside of an actual class setting, while this is a naturalistic study in which students searched for articles on a research topic of their own choosing for a required research assignment. A previous study compared federated searching to navigating and searching numerous databases. This paper compares a federated search tool to a single multidisciplinary database.