English 102
The Research Process Part III
Searching the Databases for Magazine, Journal,
and Newspaper Articles
We are now ready to move on to the third phase of the research process - searching the databases subscribed to by the Library for magazine, journal, and newspaper articles.
At present, we can't search on a complete sentence or lengthy phrase. However, we can continue to focus our research topic and be much more specific in our database searching, by combining up to three of our keywords using the Boolean operators "and", "or", "not."
We can narrow the search by stringing together keywords with the word "and." Or, we can expand the search by stacking synonyms or similar words with the word "or." These techniques will allow us to focus the research topic. I'll begin to explore the topic by trying different keyword combinations.
To search the databases, I'll click on Library from the College's main page and then select "Full text Databases and Indexes." This screen shows the various databases that are available along with a description of each.
Ebscsohost would be a good database for this search. Another comprehensive database to search is Infotrac Onefile.
EbscoHost covers many disciplines through a collection of databases. Several of these databases can be searched simultaneously. We'll search on Academic Search Elite and Masterfile Premier.
I'll search 'bully or bullying'. WOW -- so many records are found! - too many! Sscanning down the list I notice that bully pulpits comes up a lot. - not what I wanted.
Time to refine the search by making it more specific. So, I'll add 'and children' to my search. [the search is (bully or bullying) and children].
I still have a lot of citations - over 700. It's still a good idea to scan down the list - at least the first twenty or so citations to see what is being published on this topic. After scanning the list, I decide that I'm interested in the prevention of school bullying. A citation in Education Week "Bullying Prevention Seen Having an Impact [#37] looks interesting.
Clicking on the title opens to the citation screen. I check the subject heading assigned to the article. I could click on bullying in schools but I want to add the word prevention.
I'll refine my search to read "bullying and schools and prevention".
I get 124 articles - a pretty good number. Scanning down this list, I can see that many articles are right on my topic of the prevention of school bullying, I can focus my research with examples of programs, or with information on how research assists in prevention and intervention planning or even with state laws and policies to address bullying in schools. So by scanning down the list of articles, I get ideas on how to really focus my topic.
I'll open up citation #10 "School bullying: Changing the Problem by Changing the School" (#10). I read the abstract and decide that I want this article.
I've opened the HTML file, but depending on what I'd like to print, I can also open the PDF File.
The PDF file will be useful if I decide to quote from the article, because I'll have the actual page numbers the article has in the journal of origin.
To email this article to myself (if I'm conducting my research on campus) I'll need to make sure that I fill in the subject line and click on PDF if this is available.
I could also search InfoTrac Onefile, using my search terms "bullying and schools and prevention."
The result is 74 citations. 74 is a good result - under 100 and probably very much on target.
I'll look for articles indicating "text" which means the article is available in full text. If a citation for which there is only an abstract looks very good, I can check the Library's printed holdings list to see if our library subscribes to the title.
I see that there are several articles in Educational Leadership that look good.
So, I could also check the A to Z Journal Gateway to see if any of the databases we subscribe to would have the article in full text.
I see that articles from this journal are available in full text through several of the databases we subscribe to. So, I can search on these databases for these articles.
We've completed the three essential steps to doing research. We began, in Part I, in the reference section of the Library by finding an overview article in a reference work - in this case a subject encyclopedia. We then located, in Part II, a book using the online catalog. Finally, in this session, we used a couple of the databases subscribed to by the library to find magazine, journal, and newspaper articles.
