7.4: Finding Sources
Learning Objectives
- Identify the steps to find scholarly articles
- Determine when to use other source types
How Do You Find Scholarly Articles?
Once you have a clear idea of the focus of your research and the type of information you need, you will have to locate relevant and reliable sources. Most scholarly articles are housed in specialized databases. Libraries (public, school, or company) often provide access to scholarly databases by paying a subscription fee for patrons. For instance, Centennial College’s library provides access to several databases available free of charge to people affiliated with the College. You can search for a journal title or view a list of databases by subject in these databases.
Databases that aren’t subject-specific are called general databases. Google Scholar is an example of a free general scholarly database available to all who have access to the Internet.
Searching Databases
To find relevant sources when searching Centennial College’s library, you will find it helpful to follow these steps:
- Identify the main concepts in your research question to identify relevant keywords. Stick to nouns. For example, if your research question is, “What are the security issues with adhoc mobile networks?” your keywords could be “security issues” and “mobile” and “networks.”
- Find related keywords. You might choose to use a thesaurus (try thesaurus.com) for this so that you can find relevant alternative keywords.
- Try using subject headings instead of keywords. When you visit the Centennial College library, you will see subject guides for different topics. You can also search for subject headings within databases.
- When searching in databases use quotation marks around phrases to make your search more specific. For example, if you were searching for articles about green technology, but you kept finding articles on technology in general, you would need to search for “green technology” not “technology.”
- Use phrases like “and” and “not” to make your search more specific. If you are looking for recent Canadian research on antibiotic resistance in bacteria, you would use “antibiotic resistance” AND “bacteria” AND “Canada.”
When Should You Use News Articles?
News sources can provide insights that scholarly sources may not or that will take a long time to get into scholarly sources. For instance, news sources are excellent for finding out people’s reactions, opinions, and prevailing attitudes around the time of an event. News articles are typically written by journalists who are experts in investigating and get paid for their work. Usually, journalists work with an editor to make sure that their work is accurate and fair. For example, you may find news articles helpful if you want to read up-to-date information on a rapidly changing topic in your field. However, news articles would not be useful when you need detailed analysis by experts or sources that must be scholarly.
When Should You Use Other Types of Sources?
Depending on your topic, it might be appropriate to seek information from other source types. Social media posts, blog posts, videos, and course materials can be helpful, but it’s important to remember they have not, typically, been through a peer or editorial review process.
Social media posts: Sometimes, experts in a subject engage in public scholarship over Twitter or other social media platforms. For example, scientists may share information with the public on Twitter. The benefit of this type of scholarship is that it can be very current, and you can often see different scholars interact with one another. The downside is, however, that this information hasn’t been vetted by anyone. You may be witnessing an expert’s “rough draft” thoughts, and experts sometimes change their mind based on new information or the peer review process. To know if you should trust social media posts, you would also have to know a lot about their authors (e.g., their credentials, credibility, and purpose of publishing the information).
Blog posts: Though blogging is less popular now than it once was, blogs are still a great way to find out current information about a topic in a format that is more detailed than social media. For example, cybersecurity experts might tweet about a new threat, but also write blog posts that outline their concerns more explicitly and provide extensive proof. However, you should remember that blogs are not vetted by an editor, and that bloggers may have a motivation to sell products or services.
Videos: There are a number of platforms that offer video content. Some videos are from credible sources and can be useful sources for technical reports; however, since there are no restrictions or review processes for videos on platforms such as YouTube, you should carefully assess the publisher and author of the video to ensure it can be used for academic or workplace research.
Course Manuals, Presentation Slides, Lecture Notes: For your ENGL 250 reports, it may be relevant to use course manuals, presentation slides from an instructor’s lectures, and/or other lecture notes from your Centennial College courses. Since these sources are specific to your program of study and have been reviewed and/or prepared by experts in the field (i.e., your instructor), they may be considered credible sources. However, if accessing these types of sources on the internet, be cautious about using them and be sure to carefully assess their credibility.
Should You Create a Plan for Your Sources?
If you are an inexperienced researcher, making a source plan may help you ensure that you have covered all your information needs in your search.
You may use some popular sources, some professional sources, and some academic sources for your research. Sources in the first category might be the easiest to access but might not provide credible information. Professional sources might be freely accessible on the internet, accessible at a fee, or through a database. Academic sources are usually accessible free of charge only through institutional databases (Centennial College’s library, for instance, pays subscriptions to a variety of academic journals; you can download articles free of charge with your authenticated college password, but the college does pay for your access).
Before you start looking for sources, consider using a plan to help you think through what sources you’ll need for specific aspects/sections of your research project. You can download this table (in MS Word) and fill it out. Using this table doesn’t mean you can’t change your mind if you later find another kind of resource that looks promising, but it might help you avoid making poor choices as you start your selection of sources for your research.
TRY IT
Exercise 7.4.A: Find Scholarly Articles
Using the research questions and keywords identified in Exercise 7.2.A, search Centennial College’s library database to find five or more relevant scholarly sources from 2021 or later. Filter the sources for “Full Text Online” and “Scholarly and Peer-Reviewed.”
References & Attributions
Attributions
Content on this page is adapted from Advanced Professional Communication by Melissa Ashman; Arley Cruthers; eCampusOntario; Ontario Business Faculty; and University of Minnesota, which is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-ShareAlike 4.0 International License, except where otherwise noted.
