Research Skills for a Literature Review
Richard Holmes, Durham University Library
Aims
• To bring everybody up to speed• Dispel common misapprehensions• Explain the tools available• Provide time for hands-on and for Q&A
Format
• Where to search Introduction to the tools• Hands on• Comfort break• How to search: strategies and techniques• Hands on• Q&A
Use the Right Tool
• Google isn’t great for academic research• Alternatives are more efficient…• Save you time• Improve your results
What’s wrong with using Google then?
Problems with Google
• Too many search results• Not targeted at academics• Indiscriminate harvesting of information• Search results are manipulated (personalised)
and sorted by popularity; not quality• Google has no awareness of Durham holdings or
subscriptions
But, good for finding ‘grey’ literature
Go Scholar?
• Filters out web sites and other ‘lay’ material
• Searches mainly academic domains
• Some awareness of Durham collections
• Broader search than some alternative
• Indexing is still automated• Hazy definition of
‘scholarly’• Depth of coverage (misses
key resources)• Limited filter/refine options• Less structured/consistent
records than alternatives
Tip: Set up library links
Library Catalogue, then?
Benefits:• Degree of quality assurance• Check local availability of
specific content• Find monographs on your
subject• Access to everything it finds
No good for finding:• Chapters (in textbooks)• Articles• Conference papers• Newspaper reports• Theses• Technical notes• Images
An extremely superficial search tool
Discover?
• Deeper searching• Identifies a range of content types (including articles,
chapters, images, primary material)• Options to limit or filter results• Searches just owned/subscribed content but can also
search more broadly
But…• No citation data to assess popularity or impact• Fewer advanced search options offered by niche databases
Commercial Databases
Two distinct types:
Full Text
VS
Bibliographic
Commercial Databases
1 - Full text collections– JSTOR– ScienceDirect
• Search every word in every paper (deep searching)• View the full PDFs immediately (where entitled)
But…
• Narrow breadth (limited or individual publishers)• Multiple search interfaces to learn
Commercial Databases
2 - Indexes of bibliographic information– Web of Science– Medline/PubMed– SciFinder Scholar
Search multiple publishers at onceMainly peer reviewed materials
But…
No knowledge of your access entitlementsUse ConneXions to check Local availability
Demo
Catalogue
Discover
ScienceDirect
Web of Science
No one resource covers everything! Use a range of options.
Have a go!
Comfort Break
What to search
Entering correct syntax
The Research Cycle1.
Decide where to
search
2.Choose
your search terms
3.Perform
the search
4.Review results
Choosing Search TermsIdentify the key words/concepts from your topic
“Treatment and prevention of Ebola Virus in Women and Children”
Choosing Search TermsIdentify the key words/concepts from your topic:
“Treatment and prevention of Ebola Virus in Women and Children”
Choosing Search TermsIdentify keywords from your topic:
“Treatment and prevention of Ebola Virus in Women and Children”
Identify Synonyms:• Treatment| intervention| management | cure• Prevention |prophylaxis• Women| females• Children| Infants | minors | neonates
Tip: Use a thesaurus such as ‘VisuWords’ to identify synonyms and related concepts
Tips to broaden or narrow your search
“Treatment and prevention of Ebola Virus in Women and Children”
• Identify Synonyms: prevention OR prophylaxis | treatment OR intervention | children OR Infants OR Minors
• Truncation: prevent* = prevent, prevents, prevention, prevented, preventing
• Wildcards: wom?n to locate woman or women• Phrases: “prevention of Ebola”• Joining Words: AND, OR, NOT
Have a go!
Evaluate your resources
Consider:• Who wrote it• What are their credentials?• Who did they write it for?• Why did they write it?• When did they write it?
Further guidance at• http://prezi.com/q5jglgamre6c/evaluating-information/ • https://www.dur.ac.uk/library/using/finding/evalinfo/
Keep a note of all references used
Catalogue and databases all offer the option to save/export recordsDo it! It will save time when writing up and referencing
Bookable Endnote sessions:• 18th November• 8th December
Zotero equivalent on:• 25th November
Apply via the University’s course booking system https://www.dur.ac.uk/training.course/
Top Related