LIB 1010 Module 6 - Dixie State University Library
Download
Report
Transcript LIB 1010 Module 6 - Dixie State University Library
Selecting a Topic and
Using Search Techniques
Selecting a topic – consider the product (audience)
Fulfills the assignment
Can be focused to fit the assignment (length, time)
Has produced enough academic information to support
the assignment
Can be written about objectively
Something you can develop an interest in
10,000 Ideas for Term Papers, Projects, Reports, and
Speeches: Intriguing, Original Research Topics for
Every Student’s Need
Kept at Library Reference Desk
Current Issues
HN 59.2 .C87 2003
Encyclopedia of Applied Ethics
BJ 63 .E44 1998
Step 1: Clearly stating the need for information
Step 2: Formulating a research question or series of
questions based on that need
Formulating the research question
Defines the topic
Identifies main concepts
Helps narrow or broaden the topic
The topic can be developed further as you do your
research
Start with a very broad topic
Do an information scan to find potential topics
Example: psychology
Narrow to the first level of specificity
post-traumatic stress disorder
Step 3: Sometimes it is necessary to narrow the topic further in
order to meet the goals of the assignment.
It also can be helpful at times to broaden the topic if you have started
out with something very narrow and are not finding enough
information.
However, you may need to
clarify the question by narrowing the focus or broadening the scope
revise the search strategy to include different search terms or additional
resources
refine the original question
be willing to adapt the question to fit the information available
… in College Research
When you can select your own topic, don’t fixate on a specific topic until you
have gathered your information. Allow yourself to adapt.
Be willing to adapt the topic based on the information you find!
Revising the topic to narrow or broaden the scope is NOT dropping a topic
and starting over. Don’t waste the time and effort you’ve expended on a
topic.
Check with your instructor or a librarian before you throw away the time
and effort – the cost – that you’ve invested.
The grass does always look greener, like grandmothers say. Just because
another topic looks inviting doesn’t mean it will take any less effort and time to
fulfill the research process.
Before abandoning a topic, reevaluate your original question, and seek advice
from an expert. You may be closer to completing your research than you think!
Further narrow the topic Post-traumatic stress
disorder (PTSD) as you find information
Subject encyclopedia
From an article in Sage Reference Online, we can
learn a bit about this topic
PTSD commonly associated with war veterans,
but there are other really interesting topics
Terrorism and PTSD (geographic region)
PTSD and natural disasters
Effect in first responders (specific population)
Treatments for PTSD induced by terrorism vs. treatment
for PTSD which developed after being a victim of natural
disaster (compare / contrast)
Relationship between events shown on television
produce PTSD (specific discipline)
What post-traumatic effects have been recorded in
children born between 1995 and 2000 who lived near
the September 11, 2001, terrorist attacks?
How many children were impacted?
What factors impacted development? (physical or
familial proximity to disaster, previous exposure to
trauma, parental mental health, etc.)
Does treatment for terrorism-induced PTSD differ
from other types of PTSD, particularly PTSD induced
by natural disasters?
Develop a list of keywords for your topic
post-traumatic stress disorder
terrorism
children
treatment
Now, develop equivalent terms for the keywords
Equivalent terms: words that serve the same purpose
in the search, maybe synonyms
In other words, what other word might be used?
Post-traumatic stress disorder
PTSD
psychological trauma
psychological disorder
Terrorism
Violence
Abuse
Natural disasters
(These are not synonyms, but they may help us find
relevant sources about PTSD)
Treatment
Therapy
Medication
(Obviously, these are not synonyms, but are equivalent
terms for the purposes of this search.
Children
Kid
Preschooler
A database is a collection of information that has
been systematically organized
One method of organizing information includes using
controlled vocabulary
Controlled vocabulary refers to terminology selected
for use in a specific database
Many systems of controlled vocabulary
Many databases have their own lists
Can be called subjects, thesaurus, descriptors,
subjects headings, etc.
Do thesaurus searches for Post-traumatic stress disorder
in a database under Article Databases > Alphabetical List
PsychINFO
Post-traumatic stress disorder
No hyphen! posttraumatic stress disorder
A lesser condition is stress reactions
Also refers to acute stress disorder
Also, to accommodate alternative terms, change
post-traumatic stress disorder to separate items
Post-traumatic
Posttraumatic
stress disorders
PTSD
Keyword searching
Keyword searches look for the entered terms anywhere
in the item, often including the full-text if available
Will return some irrelevant results as well as results
that are not really “about” your topic but just mention it
Some keyword searches can be limited to certain items
Keyword subject search will look for a term anywhere
in the subject headings for the item
Browse (Alphabetical)
Works like the phone book
Goes through a specific item, letter by letter in order
We’ve done several browse searches in this class
Browse (alphabetical) searching
Determine appropriate terminology
Find a specific author, title, or subject
Browse Searching
Can be helpful in determine terminology
Useful when you have an exact author, title, or subject
Keyword searching
Not as precise, but gets more results – look everywhere!
Many specialized techniques can be used with keyword
searching that will not work in browse (alphabetical)
searches.
We’ve already covered some search techniques (1-3 were
included in Module 5)
1. Eliminating unneeded and common words
2. Capitalization – doesn’t matter for keywords!
3. “Phrase searching”
4. Equivalent terms
5. Controlled vocabulary
The quiz for this module may include questions about
these search techniques as well, so review if you need
to!
We’re going to cover three additional search
techniques
Truncation
Logical Operators
And
Or
Not
Nesting
In most databases, searching “stress disorders” will
bring up just that exact term “stress disorders”
But what if the term used was “stress disorder” (no
plural)?
Google does word stemming, but many databases do
not so they can preserve the specificity of the search
What to do?
Truncation!
Truncation is a technique of cutting a word off and
using a symbol to stand for all the possible endings of
that word
Example: a search for the term pollution may be too
limited. Why not try truncation so you can get all forms
of the word pollution?
Some databases use different truncation symbols, but
the asterisk ( * ) is common
Pollut* = pollute, pollution, polluted, pollutant, polluter,
pollutive, etc.
Great for singular and plural nouns as well as verb
forms!
Logical operators are connectors that establish the relationships
between search terms.
Also called Boolean operators, after George Boole, a nineteenth century
English mathematician considered the founder of logical algebra
Most common logical operators are
And
Or
Not
A note about capitalizing logical operators:
Operators are capitalized for clarity in the modules, but capitalization
is not required in any DSC database
Some search engines require capitalization of logical operators
Example: cats and diet
Requires both terms to appear in all results, anywhere
in the item, in any order
Best used with unlike terms – keywords with different
meanings (house and home doesn’t work well)
AND narrows a search because it produces fewer results
that the term searched alone
Using the logical operator AND to connect additional
but unlike search terms is the most effective method
of narrowing search results
Can keep adding unlike terms connected by AND
Example: cats and diet and protein
If you are retrieving too many records or the results
are too broad, add a new search term connected with
AND
Example: drug abuse and teenagers
Results will contain both the term drug abuse and
the term teenagers
Example: pencils or pens
Requires at least ONE of the terms to appear in all
results; any of the terms, anywhere in the item, in any
order
Best used with similar terms (equivalent terms!)
house or home works well here!
OR broadens a search because it produces more results
than any of the terms searched alone
Use the logical operator OR to connect additional, similar
terms to give the databases choices!
Can keep adding equivalent terms connected by OR
Example: pencils or pens or markers
If you are not getting enough results or want to expand
the results, add an equivalent term
connected with OR
Example: crime or theft
Results will include either the term crime or the term
theft – or both terms!
Example: trees not pines
Requires the second term not to be present in any of the
results
NOT is the minus sign ( - ) in Google
NOT narrows a search, but it can be dangerous.
What if the result was about your topic and only mentioned
the second word?
Adding unlike terms connect by AND is a much more
efficient method of limiting search results
If you are retrieving too many records on an unrelated
topic, try eliminating a word by using NOT
Only use NOT when irrelevant items are cluttering the
results
Can eliminate relevant results!
Example:
depression not economic
Results must contain the term depression and must not
contain the term economic
Going back to our equivalent terms, here’s how we would
connect them with logical operators:
post-traumatic OR posttraumatic or PTSD
AND
terrorism OR natural disaster
AND
children
AND
treatment OR therapy OR medication
We could add NOT veteran if we found too many results
about war veterans
The problem is that databases search things in order
We need to group these terms so our search makes
sense
Grouping is called nesting in databases
Nesting is using parentheses (
a search
) to group terms in
The 5 rules of nesting:
1. If only one logical operator is used, no nesting is needed.
Example: pens or pencils or markers
2. If both the logical operators AND and OR are used, then
nesting should be used to clarify your search.
Example: pens or pencils or markers and children
Must be formatted using nesting:
(pens or pencils or markers) and children
(pens or pencils or markers) and children
In our example,
3. The logical operator AND is outside the parentheses
4. The logical operator OR is within the parentheses
5. The logical operator OR must connect equivalent terms
NOTE: Rules 3 – 5 sometimes do not apply to extremely
advanced search statements, but for this class (and
probably all the searching you’ll ever need to do), these
rules work!
Putting the search statement together means using all
the techniques we’ve learned:
Keywords
Phrase searching
Equivalent terms
Controlled vocabulary
Truncation
Logical operators
Nesting
(post-traumatic OR posttraumatic OR PTSD)
AND
(terroris* OR “natural disaster*”)
AND
child*
AND
(treatment* OR therap* OR medicat*)
(post-traumatic OR posttraumatic OR
PTSD) AND (terroris* OR natural
disaster*) AND child* AND
(treatment* OR therap* OR medicat*)
You’re now ready to take Quiz 6.
It’s located in Module 6. Although the quiz is open
book, remember that the Final Exam is not, so you’ll
need to actually be learning the content not just
filling in the bubbles.
If you have any questions or run into any problems,
please let us know.
This class is much easier for students who work
quickly through the modules. Don’t be afraid to work
ahead and get the entire class done!