Many of our databases are incorporating AI research tools into their existing platforms. A quick disclaimer before we keep going: as of April 2025 most of these tools are in Beta (under development) and may have some quirks beyond our control. Many should hopefully improve over time.
Remember- these tools are added features to our databases and won't replace the awesome help you receive from our library team!
How and When to Use AI Research Tools
These tools have different applications. Some run a full query searching for a list of sources or data, others provide insights to articles, and others identify key concepts and terms in a text. Here's what we'd like you to keep in mind.
- Choose the database because it meets your content needs, not because you prefer the research features. When in doubt, go to Articles & Databases and search by topic to pick the right database for your research.
- Use the tools to help explain concepts you don't understand, or to get a summary of an article. Make sure you're using the AI tool to assist you and not replace using your information literacy skills to read the text.
What AI Research Tools Are Available to Me?
As of April 2025, we have access to AI tools in the following databases:
- EBSCO
- ProQuest Ebooks
- Science Direct
- Statista
Coming Soon:
- Nexis Uni
- Clinical Key
EBSCO (beta)
AI Insights are available for articles when permitted by their publishers. This means they aren't available for every article in EBSCO. Look for the "Generate AI Insights" button.
When you generate the insights, you'll get 4 bullet points with key information about the article in less formal language than typical for scholarly articles. This is especially helpful if you're researching a topic you aren't 100% confident you understand.
Pros: Easy to understand
Cons: New insights generated each time, so you can't always refer back to them.
ProQuest EBooks (Beta)
The ProQuest Research Assistant is strictly made for EBooks. First, choose your book. Then go to the table of contents and pick a chapter. After that, click the AI icon and it will give you the important concepts for the chapter, which are usually people, theories, or locations.
If you ask for the key takeaway for the chapter you'll get a one sentence synopsis of the chapter.
Pros: Doesn't overwhelm you with details.
Cons: Leaves out a lot of details, gives a VERY broad overview.
Science Direct (beta)
Science Direct's summary tool can provides a summary literature review of a topic. However, the sources are not guaranteed to be available through our library. The information is solid and the explanations are easy to understand as well as well-sourced. These do not take the place of doing your own literature review- you don't know what's being left out without checking for yourself first!
Science Direct also has an article-level research tool similar to the ProQuest research assistant where you can ask questions about the article, explain the research methods, the hypothesis, findings, and more.
Pros: Solid literature review, helpful article-level assistance.
Cons: Limited to topics covered in Science Direct.
Statista
Statista's strength is that it has a little information on most topics. However, it's primarily a data source and has limited textual analysis. Because of this, it interprets queries pretty literally. See the example here- it doesn't have the information it was asked for, so it answered using data and tangentially-related terms. It did not, however, sufficiently answer this particular question.
Pros: Great if you're looking for data to add support to your research.
Cons: Query format makes it seem like you'll be getting better analysis than is actually included at this point.
Closing Thoughts
It's exciting to see how credible sources can be used effectively within the databases. These tools shouldn't be the first and last stop for your research process; instead you should use them as part of a more comprehensive search strategy.
Interested in learning more about this? Contact Allison at the library!