cm121 Basic Library Info Part 1

Introduction toLibrary Research

Part 1:

The research process

and searching strategies

Welcome! Contact me if you have questions.

Elaine Settergren: [email protected]

Jan 2009 – Elaine Settergren

Today’s Library Lessons

• The Research Process

• Three Types of Searching– Subject Searching

– Citation Chasing

– Keyword Searching• Boolean operators! • Narrow and Broaden your searches

What is research anyway?Research is a PROCESS

• Step 1: Choose a topic

• Step 2: Exploratory research

• Step 3: Working bibliography

• Step 4: Research question / tentative thesis

• Step 5: Focused research

• Step 6: Final thesis

Choose a topic1. Understand the assignment

2. Pick a topic that interests you

3. Start general• Explore possible avenues to your topic.• Think about related issues.

Brainstorm: What causes road rage? Why are people angry while driving? Has road rage increased recently?

Topic: road rage

Exploratory research

• Read some basic works on your topic– Reference materials, textbooks

• Use your topic term(s) in your search– A basic search on “road rage” to shows us a selection

of what’s been written on the topic

• Get ideas for future searches– Anger? – Psychology? – Aggressive driving?

Exploratory research

Why not skip this step? You need it to:

1. Get a basic understanding = intelligently refine your research question

2. Start gauging the scope of your topic.Is it feasible?

* There may be so much written on your topic you

will never fit it all in one class paper

* OR it may be really hard to find information on your topic.

It’s not cheating to adjust your topic to make it feasible.

3. Get ideas for keywords, topics, sources

Use your sources efficiently

• Articles– Focus on: Abstract, introduction, conclusions

• E-books– Search the book for relevant material

• You don’t have to read the whole thing!• But DO read enough to UNDERSTAND the CONTEXT

Working Bibliography

Start a bibliography and get in the practice of making proper citations for everything right away.

Why?• Need citations later anyway

• Harder to lose your work

• Easier to go back (to check info, for “chaining”)

Sample Working Bibliography

Brewer, A. (2000, January). Road rage: what, who, when, where and how?. Transport Reviews, 20(1), 49-64. Retrieved July 18, 2007, from EBSCO MegaFILE database.

Mann, R., Zhao, J., Stoduto, G., Adlaf, E., Smart, R., & Donovan, J. (2007, July). Road Rage and Collision Involvement. American Journal of Health Behavior, 31(4), 384-391. Retrieved July 18, 2007, from EBSCO MegaFILE database.

Lawton, R. and Nutter, A. (2002). A comparison of reported levels and expression of anger in everyday and driving situations. British Journal of Psychology,3  93, 407-423. Retrieved July 18, 2007, from ProQuest Psychology Journals database.

Joint, M. (1995, March). Road rage. The Automobile Association Group Public Policy Road Safety Unit. AAA. Retrieved July 18, 2007, from http://www.aaafoundation.org/resources/index.cfm?button=agdrtext#Road%20Rage.

Research Questionand Tentative Thesis

Research Question• Based on Exploratory

research• Usually more specific

than your brainstorming question

• Open ended

Tentative Thesis• Best guess to the

answer of your research question

• You’ll try to support this with your research

Research Questionand Tentative Thesis

Compare:

• Research question:

What causes road rage?

• Tentative Thesis:

The relatively recent phenomenon of road rage is caused by the latest influx of traffic and stress.

Does that sound like a lot of work?

Well don’t be depressed – in reality, you could easily go through steps 1-4 in an afternoon.

The heavy-duty work comes next!

Focused Research

• Answer your research question• Refine your tentative thesis with

specific information

With the road rage example, we might look for:– Case studies of road rage victims– Research papers on aggression or anger– Scholarly psychological analysis– Facts, figures, statements from authorities

Final ThesisUse your research and the arguments you’re going to use in your paper to revise your thesis.

At this time, you can take your tentative thesis• revise it to better reflect your findings, and • settle on your final thesis statement.

The final thesis often doesn’t finalize until you are working on your rough draft.

There’s also a lot of wiggle-room here.You can go back for more research and more thesis refining, as many times as you need to.

Final ThesisOh NO! My research findings are the opposite of

my thesis statement!

Don’t trash it!

Not every research paper has to prove that something is – lots of research proves that

something is not the answer.

Example Final Thesis

Example: Research question: Is hypnosis a good weight loss strategy?

Tentative thesis: Hypnosis helps you lose weight.

Research shows: Hypnosis has never been proven to aid weight loss.

Final thesis: Hypnosis has potentials to be a good weight loss strategy, but several medical studies show hypnosis to have no effect on weight loss or dieting.

In sum…

• Start with a question or general idea

• Research to find information, facts

• Build thesis statement that is based on reality (the information that you found)

THIS IS BACKWARDS

1. Brainstorm a specific thesis right away

2. Decide your arguments for the paper

3. Start writing your paper

4. Now start your research!

5. Despair and sorrow

Tragedy of Backwards Research

You might find:

• No facts to support your arguments

• Lots of data that disproves your thesis

• Research may partially support your thesis, but not with the arguments you had planned (and started writing out)

• You = Rewriting your paper =

OK!

Let’s research!

When you jump right in to research you may find that you

are…

www.sba.gov“Begin the endnotes on a new page after the last

page of the paper and preceding the bibliography.”

www.google.com/unclesamJames Knox Polk was born in

Mechlenburg County, NC on Nov. 2,

1795.

Matsushita is the largest

manufacturer of electrical

consumer goods in the world…

Certosina: a style originally associated with Carthusian monasteries, made with pieces of wood, bone and mother-of-pearl arranged in geometrical patterns

Alveolitis: inflammation of the alveoli

…by emphasizing different

components of the syllogism

covered in section A.

Vibrissae: stiff hairs within

the nostrils at the anterior

nares

Epoetin Alpha: Trade and other names: Epogen, epoetin alfa. Drug class: hormone.

www.msbcollege.edu 156846843

5165531313543216541321651

651681606546465404

65354 3541651035466

4384

654

6

364

3541

654065460454

540543

6361

4

FEELING OVERWHELMED

BY INFORMATION?

No need to panic!

Make sense of the information overload!

• Plan your search– Use the Research Project

Calculator tool: http://rpc.elm4you.org/

– Set aside the time!

• Trial and Error: Discover synonyms and related terms– Keep track of what & where you search and what you find

to stay organized

• Choose the right research tool– Match the sources to the topic

• Look for recent news on the web or newspapers • Look for scholarly info in a database

3 Ways to Search

• Subject Searching

• Citation Chasing

• Keyword Searching

Types of searchingSubject Searching“What’s the secret word?”

Databases and catalogs have indexes of words that their search already “knows”

Using the Subject Index will help you:

• Find the most efficient search terms for that resource

• Get ideas for new search terms to try

Subject Searching

These are all ways to search by subject:

• Search the subject index

• Some databases offer subject suggestions. Click on these to access the subjects.

• Or click on subject headings in your search results or in the article record.

Types of searchingCitation chasing

“Please sir, can I have some more?”

One great resource = many great resources!!!

Use the Bibliography!

Pros of citation chasing:• Authors usually cite sources that discuss similar topics• You’ll have all the information for easily searching the databases

Con of citation chasing:• No guarantees that the cited sources will also be in available online in the Globe Education Network library

Types of searchingKeyword

“Okay does ANYTHING mention left-handed Indonesian stunt kites?”

Always remember:

1. Keyword searching = “everywhere” • including author names, summaries and sometimes even full text of article (book, website, etc.)

2. Keyword searching by default is kind of “stupid” (unless we help it out)

Here’s an example…

Potential problemsof keyword searching

Topic = cats, as in :

A basic keyword search will give you results about

But also author’s last name of “Cats”,

even articles he wrote, even though

they may be about new

socket gears

or something unrelated to:

Potential problemsof keyword searching

And what about:

Reviews of “Cats: the musical”?

Excerpts from the book “Cat’s Cradle?”

Or writers using the word just once in an article, like in a saying or cliché: “The cat’s out of the bag: Apple introduced its new iPhone today at…”

All of this could come up when justkeyword searching on “cats”

The Good News about Keyword

Keyword is very useful when you:

• Are using specific terminology

• Building specific search strings

• Need to search full-text

• Need to do any sort of broad search

Okay - does ANYTHING mention left-handed Indonesian stunt kites?”

Keyword Word Choices

• Word (term) choices are important

• Be selective. Choose descriptive words.

• Strategies– Brainstorm– Select from thesis– Broader, narrower, and related terms

• Time, Place, Population, and Viewpoint• Trial and error

Strategies Brainstorming Keywords

• How many keywords can you think of that are related to the word “pitch”?

Selecting Search Terms

It’s good to have options so you can try different terms in different databases

Say your topic is: The economic impact of the great dust storms of the 1930’s on the farmers of the great plains.

What are the important terms here?

Selecting Search Terms

The economic impact of the great dust storms of the 1930’s on the farmers of the great plains.

Using the word “impact” on its own is useless. It’s not descriptive enough of the topic.

Using agriculture instead of farmers is a good option.

Selecting Search Terms

You can use these strategies to narrow or broaden your search:

Time, Place, Population, and Viewpoint

i.e. original topic: dust bowl

narrowed topic:

The economic impact of the great dust storms of the 1930’s on the farmers of the great plains.

Strategies Brainstorming Keywords

• Notice that some are broader or narrower keywords. Others are related.

Fruit

Agriculture Apples Canning

Keyword Strategies

• Use quotation marks for phrases– “total quality management”– “right to choose”– “macaroni and cheese”

• Truncation– Symbols (* ? !) take place of letters– Politic* = politician, politicians, political, politics– Wom?n = woman, women

• Combining with Boolean operators: AND, OR, NOT

Boolean Operators: AND• AND makes your search more specific

– The more ANDs you include the more specific/narrow your search becomes

– children AND anxiety only items with both words

Children

in

Iowa

Anxiety

in

Iowa

Anxiety

in

Children

Anxiety

is

Okay

Children

in

Anxiety

Children

are

Okay

• OR broadens the search– The more ORs you include the more broad your search becomes– wages OR salaries items with either term

Wages

for

Mediocre

Work

Salaries

of Good

Salesmen

Getting

Paid

to Sleep

Dogs

Earn

Salaries

Minimum

Wage

Raise

Your

Wages

Boolean Operators: OR

May or may not be included in the results because it’s singular and you were searching plural

• NOT excludes unrelated terms– e.g. jazz NOT Utah leaves out items about the Utah

Jazz basketball team

Jazz

Through

Time

2004

Utah

Jazz

Lineup

Music

Is

Nice

History

Of

Utah

Jazz

Music Weekly:

Jazz Scene in

Utah

History of

Jazz

Music

Boolean Operators: NOT

Boolean Operators

Combine these as much as you need • Cats AND declaw* AND humane

– A more specific search

• Gender AND (movies OR film)– Combine them!

Get fancy!• (Gender OR women) AND (movies OR film) NOT “adult film”

Refine – Do it Again!• Too much? – Narrow it!

– Specific terms– Quotation marks– AND, NOT

• Too little? – Broaden it!– Broader terms– Synonyms– OR

• All wrong?– BE CREATIVE – brainstorm more keywords– Try a different database/search tool/source– Ask the librarian for help!

Stay tuned for Part 2:Using the GEN Online Library

and Evaluating Sources

Questions? Comments?

Contact the Online Librarian:

Elaine Settergren [email protected]

http://www.globeeducationnetwork.com/library/

Read the Library Lowdown Blog!