Cited Reference Searching: Introduction

Cited reference searching is sometimes called citation chasing or following citation trails.

You have an article that is interesting for some reason, and you want to find newer articles that have cited that article in their bibliographies.

You may do this kind of search to follow a trail of research or to examine research impact.

Several tools enable you to do cited reference searching.  Choose a database that suits the subject of your article and the purpose of your search. 

• Web of Science, Academic Search Complete, Google Scholar, and Semantic Scholar cover a broad range of subjects including sciences, social sciences, and humanities;
• PubMed Central contains biomedical journal articles;
• PsycInfo covers behavioral and psychological literature.

Many publishers' websites also offer cited reference searching.  If you find your article on its publisher's website, you may find quick links to other articles by that publisher that have cited your article.