The research process involves a number of skills and techniques. Using a combination of the skills and techniques outlined here will help you find information related to your assignments.
Use our Research Checklist to:
Brainstorming at the beginning of your project can make the process easier later on. Write down keywords, places to search (e.g. databases), and other ideas that come to mind about the topic so you can refer to them if you get stuck later on.
Use your assignment description and rubric when brainstorming keywords, you might find some helpful terminology there to include in your searches.
Keywords, also referred to as search terms, are words that represent the main ideas of your topic. These words are considered the most important, (or the key), ideas, concepts, or subjects about which you’re looking for information.
Have a look at the Search Strategies section of this guide for a quick explanation of how to determine keywords for your search and how to combine them for effective searching.
It can be helpful to acquire some basic background knowledge on your topic. Use this information to:
Places to look for background information are:
Google Scholar provides a simple way to broadly search for scholarly literature. From one place, you can search across many disciplines and sources: articles, theses, books, abstracts and court opinions, from academic publishers, professional societies, online repositories, universities and other web sites.
To familiarize yourself with these and other common sources of information, read through the Finding Information page of this guide. This will also help you determine which sources are appropriate for finding information for your assignment.
If you aren’t able to access the full text of an article or source, fill out our Library Materials Request form and we’ll work to bring the item in for you.
Subject headings are controlled language used by databases to organize information into subject areas. Think of it like tagging photos with hashtags (#) to describe what’s in the picture.
Subject headings are unique to each database, so be aware that different terms may be used depending on where you’re searching. Look for linked terminology in the results list or limiter taskbar (often found on the left or right side of the page). You can click those linked terms to search for related results. You can also look for these terms within an article and use them as keywords for your own search.
Databases are a collection of articles and other sources of information on a wide variety of topics. Searching for information in these can return an overwhelming number of results. You can narrow results down to more manageable numbers by using what are called limiters. A selection of limiters are usually found in sidebars beside the list of results. Use these to limit results by publication date, source type (e.g. peer reviewed journals), etc.
Once you find two or three relevant articles take a look at the reference lists from those articles. There you’ll find a list of sources the author(s) used to write their own article – just like what you’ll do for your own paper. These sources should provide further information on the subject discussed in the article.
You can request sources from the article's reference list from the library! Learn how in the Interlibrary Loan section below.
You don’t necessarily have to read an entire article! Instead, look for sections called:
These will help you quickly determine whether or not the article meets your needs and is relevant. At the college level, these sections are really all you need to complete your assignments.
You can search websites and PDFs for specific words by using the search function. To bring up the search box, press the CTRL and f buttons together on your keyboard. A search box will appear, usually in the right-hand corner of the page. Enter your search word or phrase and hit enter to search for it within the source.