Search Term Connectors:
Use AND to find articles that contain both words you enter. AND narrows your search.
Use OR to find articles that contain either word you enter. OR broadens your search.
Use NOT to find articles that exclude words or terms you don't want. NOT narrows your search. (Be careful using NOT, as you can unintentionally exclude articles that would be good for your topic.)
You can also narrow your search by putting a search phrase in quotation marks. For example, searching for "heart attack" will usually give you fewer results than just searching heart attack.
When you find an article you want, you can click on the UMLinks logo to get the full text.
UMLinks will find the full text online if it is available in any of the databases UMass has access to.
It will also search the library catalog to see if the library has it in print.
If an article or book is unavailable at UMass Amherst, current and retired UMass Amherst faculty and staff, and current students can get it using our Interlibrary Loan service. There will be a link to Interlibrary Loan when you use the UMLinks button.
More about Interlibrary Loan
To log into Interlibrary Loan use your UMass NetID and password (same as what you use for SPIRE and Moodle or Blackboard).
The first time you use Interlibrary Loan, you will be prompted to fill out a profile form, so we know who you are and how to contact you when your item arrives.
A couple of tips: the Interlibrary Loan profile form will ask for your library barcode. You can leave this field blank, even though it looks like it is a required field. The profile form also asks you to choose a campus pickup location. This does not mean you have to come to campus to retrieve your articles! All article requests are filled electronically.
After completing the profile, you should then see a pre-populated article request form. Make sure all the required fields are completed (sometimes they don't all transfer to the form), then submit it and usually in 1-2 business days you'll get an email that your article has arrived! The email will include a link into the Interlibrary Loan system, where your article PDF will be available to print or download.