Web of Science for Library Research

Citation tracking is an excellent technique for discovering how scholars converse and debate issues in their publications. Scholars cite each others' work each time they build on existing research, compare, contrast, evaluate or otherwise relate to the ongoing academic conversation.

To track back in time, choose a book or article that seems important, and start looking up the listed references.  Identify a reference that seems central or significant, look it up, then work back to the resources listed in its reference list or footnotes, and so on.

We can get help in this technique from many databases.  For example, in Esearch, look for a link to "references" in the record of some articles. In ProQuest databases, look for the "references cited" or "related articles" links on the right column.

To track forward in time, we need tools that will show us what articles have cited the work we have in hand. Quite a few databases, as well as Esearch, provide such tools, including Web of Science, Google Scholar, and Proquest.  Keep your eye out for the tell-tale "cited by" link.

EMU short video tutorial:  Finding Articles by Tracking Citations

RECOMMENDATION for papers with more than five sources:  keep track of the references you gather using a bibliographic tool such as EndNote or Zotero.

Guidance from the Web of Science help pages (see the original help pages below)

How to Perform a Cited Reference Search in Web of Science

1. Enter a last name in the Cited Author field.
2. Enter a journal title, book title or patent number in the Cited Work field.
3. Click Search. The search will return entries from the Cited Reference Index that contain the cited author/cited work that you entered.
4. If you retrieve too many hits, return to the Cited Reference Search page and add search criteria for Cited Year, Cited Volume, Cited Issue, or Cited Page.
5. Select references and cited reference variations from the Cited Reference Index.
6. Click Finish Search to go to the Results page. The system retrieves all records of publications that cite the references you selected from the Cited Reference Index.

Winter 2025 semester: Librarians are available for drop-in help Monday - Thursday, 10am - 6pm, in the Academic Projects Center, 1st floor.