Searching and Organizing
Searching for Articles
Unfortunately, there is no “one-size-fits-all” approach to knowing when you have selected enough articles for your research. Some suggestions to make your search productive include:
- Create a plan to dedicate time for reading and stick to that plan.
- Identify practitioners who publish on your research topic and set alerts for those authors and keywords related to their work in order to keep up with their latest work. Do the same with their collaborators or other researchers they frequently cite.
- Do a thorough search in all subject-specific databases you can access. For example, when doing LIS An interdisciplinary field that examines how physical and digital information is organized, accessed, collected, managed, disseminated and used, particularly in library settings. research, you will want to start with databases like Library and Information Science An interdisciplinary field that examines how physical and digital information is organized, accessed, collected, managed, disseminated and used, particularly in library settings. Source, Library Literature and Information Science Abstracts & Full Text, and Scopus. Most of the existing library literature is indexed in these databases. Journals submit their articles to these databases, which increases findability and can help you affirm that you have done a thorough search of available articles.
- Use Google Scholar to search “cited by” literature, i.e., if you have found a relevant article, you can use Google Scholar to see what other articles have used the original article. This technique is called forward reference searching. This type of search focuses on the publications created after an article’s publication.
- Backward reference searching, also known as chain searching, involves identifying and examining the references or works cited in an article. A second-level or second-generation backward reference search is when a researcher examines sources cited by the references used in an initial article. This allows a researcher to identify inconsistencies in the literature.
Organizing and Documenting your Searching
One of the most effective practices you can engage in as you begin your research is to create a document tracker that categorizes and lists your searching techniques. This includes what keywords you used and what databases you searched. One of the most efficient ways to do this is via citation management software. Some free open-source tools include Zotero or Mendeley. As you search, use the reference manager to save full text results The section of a research article where researchers share the results from the research. This section takes the results and directly connects them to the research questions or hypotheses posed at the start of the article. Also can be called “Findings.” . Once you have listed all your keywords and searched through the relevant databases, tag the articles using your reference manager and take notes on what you read using a consistent format. Create a routine of reading and tagging what you’ve found. LibParlor provides a template for you to use as you collect and organize sources for your literature review The process of summarizing, synthesizing and/or critiquing literature around a specific topic/idea. This work can help a researcher understand what has happened before and also how past research intersects and or diverges from other research. A literature review can be a full-length manuscript or a subsection within a larger research article..
Activity
Complete the following activity in your LPOL Workbook. This activity will help you work toward a final curriculum deliverable, and it will help you develop your overall research plan.
Use the 4.2.2: Search Strategy worksheets in your LPOL Workbook to help you navigate the search process. Read 5-10 articles, write down your ideas, and then return to your reading. Literature reviews are meant to be iterative and generative, so the process should help you reflect on how you want to approach your research.
Searching and Organizing
Searching for Articles
Unfortunately, there is no “one-size-fits-all” approach to knowing when you have selected enough articles for your research. Some suggestions to make your search productive include:
Organizing and Documenting your Searching
One of the most effective practices you can engage in as you begin your research is to create a document tracker that categorizes and lists your searching techniques. This includes what keywords you used and what databases you searched. One of the most efficient ways to do this is via citation management software. Some free open-source tools include Zotero or Mendeley. As you search, use the reference manager to save full text resultsResults The section of a research article where researchers share the results from the research. This section takes the results and directly connects them to the research questions or hypotheses posed at the start of the article. Also can be called “Findings.” . Once you have listed all your keywords and searched through the relevant databases, tag the articles using your reference manager and take notes on what you read using a consistent format. Create a routine of reading and tagging what you’ve found. LibParlor provides a template for you to use as you collect and organize sources for your literature reviewLiterature Review The process of summarizing, synthesizing and/or critiquing literature around a specific topic/idea. This work can help a researcher understand what has happened before and also how past research intersects and or diverges from other research. A literature review can be a full-length manuscript or a subsection within a larger research article..
Activity
Complete the following activity in your LPOL Workbook. This activity will help you work toward a final curriculum deliverable, and it will help you develop your overall research plan.
Use the 4.2.2: Search Strategy worksheets in your LPOL Workbook to help you navigate the search process. Read 5-10 articles, write down your ideas, and then return to your reading. Literature reviews are meant to be iterative and generative, so the process should help you reflect on how you want to approach your research.