Next, find information about your topic. What types of sources will be good for your topic, books, audio, journals, magazines, websites? What search tools can help you locate them, the library library catalog, journal databases, web search engines? Depending on what you find, you might need to revise your topic or search strategy. If you are having trouble finding information on your topic, always feel free to ask a librarian.
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According to the information cycle, different types of sources are generated.
1. Phrase Search-keep a phrase together so it will not get separated and lose intended meaning.
Examples
"World Cup winners"
"Kentucky River"
2. Truncations - to search words of various endings
Examples
comput* -computer, computers, computerize computerized, computerinzing, computational, computation
wom?n - woman or women
earth*-earthed, earthing, earths, earthlike, earthquake, earthquakes, earthmaster, earthmasters, earthwork, earthworks, earthen, earthling, earthlings, earthly, earthforms, earthwards
3. Boolean Operators - use AND/ OR/ NOT to connect your keywords - Boolean Machine.
Capitalize your connectors AND/OR
Examples- AND
California AND parks
"yellowstone park" AND "wild life"
Trump AND "Kim Jong Un"
Example- OR
women OR girl* OR female*
research OR survey or case stud*
Example- NOT (AND NOT)
yellowstone NOT park
clinton AND NOT hillary
4. Use parenthesis and quotation marks for logical execution of search terms
"sexual harassment" AND ("work place" OR office)
Use One Search to find articles from newspapers, scholarly journals and magazines.
Search tips:
1. Use Advanced search interface
2. Capitalize the connectors AND (for words of different concepts) /OR (for synonyms) to search with keywords
3. Choose date range from June to July 2017
4. Under "Content Provider", choose Newspaper Source Plus and Points of View Reference Center (databases) to find relevant articles.
Example 1: Find scholarly journal articles:
Topic: discrimination in workplace
Search statement: discriminat* AND women AND (workplace OR employ*)
Advanced Search Page of Library One Search:
1. Limit keywords in Subject field
2. Limit to online available full-text articles or e-books
3. Limit to more current publication date
4. You can choose academic journals, magazines or newspaper sources
Search the same way for New York Times and Wall Street Journal. They use ProQuest search interface.
Sample Topic: How does President Trump's travel ban influence U.S. economy?
Use Advanced Search page, Click Advanced Search.
1. Enter your key words. Add row if you want to enter more keywords with different concept. Limit to full-text if you like.
2. Choose the last 30 days' content.
13 full text articles are found. Click "Full text" to view the articles.
Nexis Uni has information on news, companies and legal sources.
Nexis Uni Research Guide teaches you how to search news in the database.
1. Use Databases & Indexes and in Alphabetical order, find Points of View Reference Center.
2. You may browse topics in the News, or select a topic in Browse by Category, to get background information on the topics.
3. Click Advanced Search, type your keywords in the search box, and limit to date range (June 2017 - July 2017)
4. Your result page.
5. You may select which news Publications you want to read from.
1. Find Books via the Library Catalog (advanced page)
2. Find Books via One Search (Advanced Page)
Databases:
One Search
Search Tips:
Points of View Reference Center
Your Topics
1. Tax incentives for international adoption.
international adopt* [Points of View Reference Center]
adoption* AND (foreign countr* OR international) AND child* [One Search]
2. Abolish reliance on SAT and ACT scores in admission.
(abolish OR eliminat*) AND (SAT OR ACT ) AND test*
3. The use of technological devices in Education.
technolog* AND education
(too broad, consider to narrow down with a specific technology)
4. It is important to have equal representation of genders and races in political office.
(gender OR race) AND politic* AND representation
5. Text books should be replaced by I-Pads and online resources.
(OER OR "open education* resource*" OR "college open textbook*") AND (college* OR universit*)
6. College students should exercise caution when posting on social media sites.
"college student*" AND "social media" AND (safety OR security)
7. More recycling must be encouraged.
recycling AND plastic
(too broad. be more specific of what to recycle)
8. Use music and art to rehabilitate prisoners.
prisoner* AND rehabilitat* AND (music OR art)
9. Special Education needs reform.
"special ed*" AND reform*
10. The effects of vaping.
vaping AND (helth OR risk)