Transcript Information Literacy: How to Access, Evaluate, and Use

Information Literacy: How to Access, Evaluate, and Use Information
Effectively & Efficiently
Colleen D. Anderson, Reference Librarian, Bryant University
Contact: [email protected], phone: 401-232-6299
Spring 2009
Learning Goals
After this lecture, you should know:
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How to use the HELIN library catalog to locate books, journals, & DVDs
The differences between library databases and the Internet and when to use each
How to search efficiently using Google and Google Scholar
How to evaluate information retrieved from the Internet
The difference between a trade journal, newspaper, news journal, and academic journal
Where to find library databases and the different types of databases by subject
How a database index is arranged and effective search strategies
How to search for an article and view or export the article citation in MLA or APA style
format
What tools are available to you for managing citations and creating bibliographies
Exercises
During this class, you will be asked to:
Locate a book held by another HELIN library and request the book using a HELIN request.
Sign up Bryant as your library preference in Google Scholar and locate an article or book on
the topic of gun control written by Bryant Professor, Gregg Carter.
Use the Journals List to find out which database (s) carries the full text of particular
publication.
Locate an article using Proquest Business Databases and view the article citation in APA
format.
Locate a listing of articles on a particular topic in Academic Search Premier and export the
article citations.
The HELIN Library Catalog
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Use the HELIN library catalog to locate books, government documents, journals,
DVDs, and videos.
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Bryant is part of the HELIN consortium, a consortium of Rhode Island academic
libraries. As a Bryant student with a working library barcode, you can request books
from other HELIN libraries and have them delivered to the Access Services desk at the
Krupp library. It will take approximately 3 days for the books to arrive, and you will be
notified by email when the books are ready for you.
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Once you have located one book on your topic, look at the full cataloging record for the
book and browse the Library of Congress subject headings. You can click on these
subject headings to link into more information on your topic.
The HELIN Library Catalog
Click here to search
by author , title, etc.
Click here to search for journals,
DVDs, and videos
Exercise #1: the HELIN Encore Library Catalog
Search for the book The Cambridge Companion to James Joyce. What HELIN
library holds the 2004 edition of this book in their collection? What LC Subject
link would I use if I want to locate more books providing criticism on works by
Joyce?
Go through the process of requesting the book; however, please do not make the
final submission!
The Internet vs. Library Databases
Some Differences
The Internet
Library Databases
Randomly organized information
Well-organized information
No standardized review process by
editors, publishers, and librarians
Information reviewed by editors and
publishers and selected by librarians
Unsophisticated search and export
features
Sophisticated search and export features
Much credible information requires
payment
Information subscribed to by the library
and made available as part of tuition
payments to the university.
Google
Myth: Google is always bad to go to for information used in class papers and projects.
Truth: Google can be a very useful tool for locating CERTAIN types of information.
Google is very effective for locating the following:
• a stock price
• current news
• the company PR department
• government data
**Cartoon by Mike Lynch taken 7/3/2007 from Mike Lynch Cartoons at
http://mikelynchcartoons.blogspot.com/2006_07_01_archive.html
Searching Google more effectively
Use the Advanced
Search feature!
Searching Google more effectively
Holds together
search phrases
.gov limits to government sites;
.edu limits to educational sites
What’s Google Scholar?? scholar.google.com
Google Scholar is Google’s response to a demand for an easily searchable repository of
scholarly materials.
Content in Google Scholar includes:
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Peer-reviewed papers
Theses
Books
Abstracts and articles
Content is from:
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academic publishers
professional societies
preprint repositories
universities & other scholarly organizations
On-campus users at participating schools will see links in Google Scholar search results which
facilitate access to their library's resources. These links lead to the library's servers which, in
turn, direct patrons to the full-text of a desired article which may be available free via a
database in their library.
(see: Google Scholar Library Links:http://scholar.google.com/intl/en/scholar/librarylinks.html)
How to set your preferences to link to Bryant library holdings
Click on Scholar Preferences
How to set your preferences to link to Bryant library holdings
Type in Bryant
University and click
on Find Library
Exercise #2: Finding a scholarly book or article on
gun control
You have a paper to do for sociology, and you have selected to research and
report on gun control. You know Gregg Carter, a sociology professor at Bryant,
has written extensively on this topic. Using the advanced search features of
Google Scholar, find a book or article written by Professor Carter that will be
useful for writing your paper. Is the book available in Bryant University’s
library?
Evaluating Internet Information
Some criteria to evaluate internet information:
Domain name:
Does the domain indicate a government site (.gov), an educational site (.edu), an organizational site
(.org), a company site (.com) or an individual’s site (look for a personal name following a ~ or %).
Is this an appropriate site to search for the type of information you need?
About Us:
Read the “about us” or “about” or “who we are” tab. Does the group or organization provide their
mission statement? Why does the site exist?
Author Credentials:
Look for the author of the information. Does he/she have credentials posted? Does the author
possess credentials that give him/her authority to speak on the topic?
Site Sponsor:
Look for the sponsor of the site. Does the sponsor have a bias? Are they open about their bias?
Does the site use inflammatory or discriminatory language?
Facts and Additional References:
Are facts and additional references on the topic provided by the author?
Timeliness:
When was the site last updated? When was the document you are using written and/or updated?
Different Publications – Different Purposes
Articles from the library may be available in print or electronically through one of the
library databases. The articles reside in one of the following types of publications:
Trade Journals
Cover particular industries and include industry news, ratings and rankings, interviews of industry
leaders, etc. Trade journals are a good source to use when conducting a company/industry
analysis or looking for an industry forecast.
Peer-Reviewed Scholarly Journals
Publish articles written by scholars and reviewed by a jury of peers. These articles include, but
are not limited to, original research with data. Peer-reviewed scholarly journals are a good source
to use when writing a research paper in the humanities, business, or the social sciences.
Newspapers
Report on the news of the day and also include commentary and editorials.
Newspapers are a good source to use when looking for current political or economic news or
when following the news on a particular company.
News Journals
Published monthly or weekly, report on the news for a particular subject area. For example,
Forbes and Fortune report on business news; the Economist reports on world events and
economics. News Journals are a good source to use when writing a report on science, political
science, economics, or business; any paper where you need to be updated on recent events.
Publication Examples
A Trade Journal:
use when researching
an industry
A Newspaper:
Use to locate
daily news
Peer-reviewed
academic journal:
use to locate
scholarly research
A News Journal:
Use to locate news
occurring within a
particular subject
area
Information content located in library databases
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Articles from scholarly journals
 Located in Proquest databases, EBSCO databases, and subject-based databases
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Articles from trade journals, news journals, and newspapers
located in EBSCO, Proquest, and Lexis/Nexis databases
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Articles focused on particular subject areas (e.g., literature, psychology)
Located in subject specific databases such as : Gale Literature Resource Center,
PsycInfo & PsycArticles, EBSCO Communication & Mass Media Complete,
EconLit, etc.
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Country Information
 Located in ITDN, EIU Country Commerce, Internet Securities Emerging Markets
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Company Data
 Located in Hoovers Academic, Mergent Online, and Mergent Horizon
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Overviews of Contemporary Topics
 Located in CQ Researcher and Opposing Viewpoints
Selected library databases by content type
Articles on General Topics
Academic Search Premier
Proquest Research Library
Articles on Psychology
PscyInfo
PsycArticles
Articles on Communication
Communication & Mass Media
Complete
Proquest Psychology Module
News Articles on Companies
Articles on Literary Works
Proquest
EBSCO Business Source
Premier
Lexis/Nexis
Gale Literature Resource
Center
MLA International
Bibliography
Company Data
Industry Information
Mergent Online
Mergent Horizon
Hoovers Academic
IBISWorld
S&P NetAdvantage
Hoovers Academic
Plunkett Research Online
Articles on “Hot” Topics
Country Information & Data
CQ Reseracher
Opposing Viewpoints
CountryWatch in Ebsco
EIU Country Commerce
ITDN
ISI Emerging Markets
Mergent Country Reports
To locate more library databases by subject area, go to:
The Journals List
Use the Journals list link to locate the full text of a particular journal or newspaper.
The journals list will point you to the database that carries the full text of a
publication.
Exercise #3: locating the full text of a newspaper or journal
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What database(s) carry the full text of the Wall Street Journal Eastern Edition?
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What database (s) carry the full text of College Literature? What dates are
available full text?
How database indexes are arranged
Library databases contain thousands of full text articles students can retrieve using any of the
following search limits: author, title, keyword, subject, company name, etc.
Each article retrieved has a corresponding “record” for it in the database. If you look closely at
some of these records, you will see descriptors (word tabs that describe the article), listed
at the top and side of the screen.
You can use the Advanced Search feature in a particular database to make your searches more
exact by using these descriptors.
Use the Basic Search features to run searches where there is limited information on your topic.
Use the Advanced Search features where there is a wealth of information on your topic and
you want to narrow your search to find exactly what you need.
Basic Search Protocols
Connectors
Use AND to limit your results to documents that include both terms.
Use OR to expand your results to retrieve documents with either term or both terms included in the
document. This is an excellent search to run if there are synonymous terms for your search term.
Examples: AIDS or Acquired immune deficiency syndrome
cars or automobiles
“insurance industry” or “financial services industry”
Use AND NOT to exclude a term from your search.
Example: adults AND NOT (children or adolescents)
Use Truncation to pick up variant endings of a search term. This is most commonly represented by:
* or !
Example: wom* to pick up woman or women; human* to search humans or humanize, etc.
Be careful using subject search!!
Running a subject search is often a very effective way to locate information on a
particular subject. The subject search provides a way to create a search using an
authoritative list of subject terms created by indexers. The subject term
describes the content of the article. Using the subject search feature can ensure
that you locate articles containing synonymous terms for the same concept. If
you choose to run a subject search, be careful to verify your subject to make
sure your term matches the term being used by the indexers.
 Use the browse subjects link to verify your subject term when using Proquest.
 Use the subject terms thesaurus to verify your subjects when using the EBSCO
databases.
Exercise #4: Use the Advanced Search feature in Proquest
Run an advanced search in the Proquest Business Databases to
locate a recent article in the Wall Street Journal that discusses Hasbro’s
attempts to save its rights to the game Scrabble. What popular game
played on Facebook is Hasbro claiming infringed on the company’s
copyright and trademarks?
Look at the “cite this” icon located in the yellow strip at the bottom of
the page. Click on this icon to view how to create the citation to this
article for your paper’s bibliography or works cited page.
Exercise #5: Use the Advanced Search Feature in PsycInfo
Run an Advanced Search in PsycInfo database to locate articles on the subject of
obsessive compulsive disorder. Mark the first 3 articles and then click on the
Folder View and print or email the article citations.
Tools for Managing citations and building a works cited page
For quick formatting of one article, book, or document, go to:
Citation Machine at http://www.citationmachine.net/
For storing citations, inserting in-text citations, and automatically creating a bibliography for
a particular paper, use the References tab located in Microsoft Word 2007.
EndNote is a bibliographic manager that lets you create folders for individual papers and
projects and use these folders to store bibliographic citations. You can export citations
from Proquest and EBSCO databases into EndNote. With EndNote you can also
automatically create in-text citations and bibliographies.
Sign up for a workshop on managing citations using EndNote!
Librarians Have Answers!