ResearchGate and Academia.edu are social networking sites for researchers to share their work and discover other researchers' work. The University of California Office of Scholarly Communication provides in-depth information about how these commercial sites compare to open-access repositories. For details, click here.
ResearchGate and Academia.edu may be most valuable when trying to find other researchers in your field conducting similar studies, or for providing access to your completed papers. However, please keep in mind that these and similar sites contain only a small number of publications and many appear not to have been updated for some time. Additionally, unlike Google Scholar, the Library does not have an arrangement with ResearchGate or Academia.edu to link out to full-text documents. For instructions on linking Google Scholar to the Library, click here.
ResearchGate and Academic.edu may not the best resources for retrieving full-text scholarly articles, but you may also review abstract or citation information for potential resources beneficial to your own research. Still, when searching online, you may encounter full-text access to articles from these sites.
Follow the instructions below to access full-text articles from ResearchGate and Academia.edu.
On Academia.edu, full-text articles appear under the "Read Paper" section. You do not need an account to view the article in this online format. Alternatively, you may click on "Get PDF" to login with Google or Facebook or complete a free registration in order to view the article as a PDF document.
On ResearchGate, you may view the abstract, citations, and references online without creating an account. Additionally, you may click on "Download Full-text PDF" to view the full-text document. This also does not require an account. However, if prompted, you may join ResearchGate for free by creating a username and password.
