AIS 380

Research Methods and Project Development

Fall 2008
Dr. Lauderdale

1) Where do you always start when you have a research project?

With your instructor! If you have any questions about the assignment, get them cleared up BEFORE you spend time doing the research. Read this.

At the Reference Desk! 2nd Floor North or 460-7025 or http://www.southalabama.edu/univlib/referenc.htm
Let the Reference librarians help you develop an appropriate research strategy for your particular project.

Try this Assignment Calculator from the Univ. of Minnesota for help planning your time and executing the paper writing process.

Record all your research in a systematic way. Research Log form as a pdf.  Research Log form in Word.

2) Start with a good foundation.

Subject encyclopedias and textbooks will give you a broad overview which you can use to orient yourself to the topic.

3) Where do you find Books?

a. SOUTHcat Catalog -what we own; open to anyone on the 'net

b. NetLibrary -8000+ electronic books [subscription]

c. Reference Books Reference Area, 2nd floor North: encyclopedias, etc (in Catalog)

d. Electronic Reference Books --subscription-based and free reference sources

e. WorldCat.org--huge database of books from most U.S. and many world libraries

4) Where do you find Scholarly Journal Articles?

l. Academic Search Premier [Under Ebsco] some full-text, interdisciplinary

m. Academic OneFile [Under Gale/InfoTrac] some full-text, interdisciplinary

n. JSTOR All full-text; all PDF, slightly (3-5 years) older

n2. Project Muse fulltext of 290+ current journals

o. Many, Many Others: See list of databases--alphabetical or by subject.

5) Where do you go to find Newspaper Articles?

q. Mobile Register 1992 - present. [Data from 10/01 to 1/10/03 is currently unavailable] full-text

r. LexisNexis--full-text major newspapers and regional ones

s. Ethnic NewsWatch scroll down page to "E" full text to smaller ethnic newspapers

t. Newspaper Source [Under EBSCO] --full-text

6) Where do you go when you have the information about an article, but need to find the journal issue with the actual fulltext article in it?

Our Journal List: --USA Subscribed, Full-Text, Electronic Journals and Print Holdings

7). What happens if we don't have the book or article you need?

InterLibrary Loan aka ILL. Click on ILL on the Library Homepage. Fill out the appropriate form and the library will find the book or article for you. If it is in a library in Alabama, you will not be charged.

8) Smart "Public" Internet Searching

a. Use well-regarded and recommended Internet sites.

b. Use an "advanced" search engine like Google Advanced Search and limit to "more trustworthy" domains.

c. Evaluate what you find through a search engine extremely carefully. Criteria for Evaluating webpages

d. Website Evaluation Exercise and Answer Form

e. Google Scholar

f. Google Book

9) How do you cite?

Bedford St. Martins: Research and Documentation Online by Diana Hacker http://www.dianahacker.com/resdoc/

Doc Styles website

Easy Bib - Be sure to check the formatting of these carefully!

Landmark's Citation Machine--a free service, so you'd better check the citations created very carefully

8) Academic Integrity

plagiarism for students

SOUTHcat Plus
University Homepage
Click here to make comments--Jan Sauer
 9/5/2008
This page: http://www.usouthal.edu/univlib/sauer/AIS380.html

 

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