ACCESS TO INFORMATION IN BOTH CITADEL AND FIRSTSEARCH - A COMPARATIVE-STUDY OF DISSERTATION COVERAGE

Theses and dissertations submitted to universities and colleges in the United States are accessible in many different formats and through ma ny different vendors. Electronic access is provided by such vendors as DIA-LOG, BRS, FirstSearch (OCLC), and CitaDel (RLIN), and CD-ROM acce ss is also available. This article presents a comparative analysis of CitaDel and FirstSearch. The effectiveness and ease of use of these tw o systems in providing end-user access to thesis/dissertation informat ion, and the strengths and weaknesses of the searching capabilities of these two systems are discussed. Examples of direct retrieval compari son of thesis/dissertation information from the FirstSearch WorldCat d atabase and Dissertation Abstracts on CitaDel are provided. It is conc luded that both FirstSearch and CitaDel offer great potential to libra ries seeking convenient access to dissertations and theses. FirstSearc h WorldCat offers the added advantage of providing the option for user s to pay for information as they use it, whereas CitaDel's Dissertatio n Abstracts database can be subscribed to only through an annual fee. One drawback to searching for thesis/dissertation information through the WorldCat database, however, is that, unlike CitaDel, this source p rovides no abstract. Given the fact that both systems offer benefits a nd that both retrieved unique citations not duplicated by the other, i t is concluded that both systems should be used for truly comprehensiv e thesis/dissertation retrieval.