
Google Scholar is a specialized Google search which allows you to narrow to scholarly literature, including articles, theses, books, abstracts and court opinions. Some of these sources are available freely on the internet, while others are available through library databases and interlibrary loan.
There are benefits and drawbacks to using Google Scholar. The benefits begin with the ease and effectiveness of Google’s searching capabilities. Google Scholar looks and functions in a very similar fashion to a traditional Google search. Along with this end-user familiarity, the resource has competitively broad index coverage of sources and full text accessibility. Other benefits include citation analysis tools and researcher profiles.
Among its drawbacks, Google Scholar is a ‘black box’ product with a proprietary ranking algorithm and no traditional tech support. Bibliographic / citation information is often incorrect, and there is a lack of advanced search features. Locally developed online collections are sometimes hidden, grey literature coverage is weak as well as results for systematic reviews. Also, the resource also has a strong English language bias.