Library Tutorial 2 covers the academic research process, including how to best search an academic database, and how to read and understand academic articles. The activity for this tutorial is intended to help you conduct academic research to locate relevant articles for your project topic based on what you have learned.
To fully understand the focus of your study, you must read the published research. The steps you take to find the right articles will be the same no matter the subject, but the sources you search will vary based on your field.
Your assignment is to develop a search string to use in a literature search based on the subject of your project topic: Find THREE ARTICLES, one from each of the three sources listed here, and keep track of the article details to enter in the follow-up quiz in Canvas.
Note: As you will need two articles to read and analyze for the project assignment, look for those that will best fit your topic and save them to review for the next two assignments.
What it is: A research database of scholarly and trade articles about chemistry published by the American Chemical Society.
What you'll find: Research and review articles in scholarly journals; news articles and information about the field in Chemical & Engineering News (C&EN).
You may find articles from C&EN easier to read because trade journals are written for a broader audience than scholarly journals, which are meant more for researchers.
What it is: A multidisciplinary scholarly journal published by commercial publisher SpringerNature.
What you'll find: Research articles and review articles written by scholars; news articles written by Nature staff writers.
What it is: A multidisciplinary scholarly journal published by the American Association for the Advancement of Science, a nonprofit professional society.
What you'll find: Research articles and review articles written by scholars; news articles written by Science staff writers.
Literature: The scholarly publications that report original empirical and theoretical work within an academic field. These publications establish what is known on a subject and provide the basis for what is still to be learned.
Search string: A combination of keywords and search strategies that produces more accurate information retrieval in databases, search engines and other sources.
Scholarly research articles are written for and by researchers, who usually work for a college or other institution, and the articles provide information about their experiments and studies for others who do the same research. These articles can be densely written with a lot of technical language, as they are intended to be read by others who will know these terms.
Trade journals are written for people who do a particular job, and are usually written by journalists who also have subject expertise in the job. These journalists write for a broader audience, and while they may use terminology common to the field, some trade journals may also be read by the general public and so the articles are often more broadly understandable.
Popular news sources like newspapers and magazines are written for the general public by journalists who have been trained in journalistic writing methods and ethical practices. These articles include investigations into people or events, features about popular trends, or opinion pieces on current topics.
Look for the major terms and concepts in your research topic or question and start making a list:
EXAMPLE: What have been the effects of microplastics in the ocean?
Keywords:
NOT keywords:
Concepts:
Now identify synonyms or different versions of your words and add them to your list:
Now you have something to work with!
As you search for information on this subject, you'll start to find other terms and ways of describing these concepts that might help you better find what you need. Add those to your list.
