Google Scholar has become many peoples’ go-to search interface for locating research articles of interest to them. The ability to “Cite” the retrieved search results is a great option, especially since it includes the functionality to directly export the Google Scholar citation record to a citation manager like Endnote. Unfortunately, the data provided in the Google Scholar citation is not always as high in quality or as complete as the corresponding citation record retrieved from PubMed or via another commercially-produced literature database.
Figure 1: Directly exporting citation information to Endnote (Click on “Cite” > Endnote > Open)
Once the Google Scholar citation has been transferred to Endnote, it can be easily upgraded using Endnote’s own built-in search functionality. By going to References > Find Reference Updates, Endnote will run an online search for the citation. It first searches PubMed and, if the citation is not found there, it tries Web of Science and CrossRef.
(Note: Thomson Reuters owns both Endnote and Web of Science which explains why the search defaults to this proprietary database after attempting to locate the citation in PubMed, which is freely available to all.)
Figure 2: Using Endnote’s “Find Reference Updates” (Click References > Find Reference Updates)
Endnote provides users the opportunity to review the available updates found in order to determine if the new citation record retrieved is indeed a better citation record with richer data. They also have the option to either completely replace their Google Scholar citation record or to simply enhance it by updating only the empty fields (ie. the missing data points). Once the update is made, the edited Endnote record then simply needs to be Saved.
Figure 3: Comparing the Available Update to the existing record previously saved to Endnote
Endnote’s “Find Reference Updates” (5:32 min. video) functionality is also very useful for updating already harvested PubMed records that may need to be updated with PMCID information. The PMCID assignments are usually added to the PubMed records months after the record for that citation is first added to the PubMed database so this function provides a quick way to capture the missing information once it becomes available without a total duplication of effort. The same applies to “Epubs ahead of publication” citations which will only be updated with complete citation information in PubMed once the article is officially published, or even for citations that the user has created manually by hand-typing only a minimal amount of the citation information.
If you have questions about this or any other library resources/tools, feel free to Ask Us!