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1. Know where and how to search efficiently to find the best information for your purposes
2. Make good decisions regarding the quality and appropriateness of your information sources, including assessing whether a resource is worthy of trust and up-to-date
3. Know who has rights to the work you use
4. Know how to properly give others credit for their ideas
5. Know the extent to which you can ethically remix or synthesize ideas and information in your own work

This is where [research skills|http://www.library.cornell.edu/resrch/intro] <link ?> (TC) and knowledge of Cornell's [academic integrity guidelines|http://cuinfo.cornell.edu/Academic/AIC.html] <link ?> (TC) are key.

Your approach to information research, like your needs and requirements regarding sources of information, will vary depending on what you research. For example, you may be researching scholarly articles for a paper, popular news and opinion for a speech, images and video for a multimedia project, or blog posts and Wikipedia articles for the latest movie news. A quick Google or Wikipedia search may suit your purposes in some scenarios, but, for academic research, that's just the first step.

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• Discuss your ideas with your course instructor, TA, or a librarian*.* (TC)
• Look at popular news articles and blog posts to see what's currently in the news about your topic*.* (TC)
• Perform a search using Google. This is a very popular approach, and it can be a good one, but it is not the only option available to you. Explore this resource for additional ideas.
• Use an encyclopedia for your (TC) subject or discipline; the index or list of topics can give you additional ideas. Wikipedia isn't the only online encyclopedia available! (Read our caveats regarding the use of Wikipedia in the section called Using Wikipedia.) Online reference works (TC) available through your library can give you a quick and authoritative starting point, especially for more specialized subjects.
• Check your library catalog (TC) for books on the topic*.  We could like to WCL if we want to change the text too.* (TC)

Use sources like these to understand the broader context of your topic. They can tell you in general terms what is known about it, including what kind of information is out there and what interesting questions are still unanswered.

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First, state your topic idea as a question or a sentence. For example, you might be interested in finding out, "How did Title IX impact women athletes in college athletic programs?" Before you commit to this or any specific topic for your research, use the [library databases|http://wfxsearch.webfeat.org/clients/wfxcornell/wf3_cornell.asp?cid=12378] (TC)  to test it.

While you can usually just search for some words or a phrase in an online search engine, library databases require you to search in particular ways, if they are going to recognize your search. Depending on the resource you are using, the exact methods you'll use to search will vary, but most library databases use similar methods, called Boolean searching.  This isn't necessarily true. Many databases have a basic search that does not require very much of the patron. (TC)

The more specific you can be about what you are looking for, the more effective your search will be. To define your potential search terms, identify the main concepts or keywords in your question. In this case, they are "Title IX," "women," "athletes," and "college athletic programs."

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• Too large. Are there far too many search results? Maybe you can focus or narrow the topic a little more.
• Covered comprehensively in another paperelsewhere (CA). Did a number of people already fully explore this topic? Check with your TA and professor if you are unsure about the answer to this question. They may be able to suggest a new perspective on what seems like an old or overdone topic, or they may suggest that you choose an alternative topic instead.
• Too specific or too new. You may find there just isn't enough information available to complete the project. This can be particularly important if you are planning on using data in your research. You may need to broaden your topic by using a more general term or terms in your search.

It's helpful to create and refine your search multiple times as you hone your ideas, find new pathways, change your ideas, and learn more about the subject area. For more information on choosing and developing your topic and testing your search, see [Choosing and Developing Your Topic|http://www.library.cornell.edu/resrch/intro#1Choosinganddevelopingaresearchtopic-1Ch] in the Cornell University Library's Introduction to Research tutorial. (CA)

If you complete your test, and you are If you complete your test, and you are still in doubt, ask your professor.

Narrowing and Broadening a Search

Let's look at some techniques for narrowing your search. One option is to add more words or specialized terms that describe your topic, putting "AND" between each word. For example, search "women AND athletes AND college AND athletics." By using "AND" in capital letters between each term, you indicate that you aren't looking for the word "and," but that instead you are specifying a Boolean operation requiring the inclusion of all terms in the search.

If you're getting a lot of articles or books that mention your topic, but which haven't been written directly about it, you can narrow your search of library catalogs and article databases by using subject headings. Subject headings (sometimes called "descriptors" or "suggested topics") are words the databases use to tag everything about the topic. For example, you might search for "women athletes," but find that useful subject headings (usually found in the complete record for an item that fits your criteria) are "women athletes United States" or "sports for women." Once you have discovered these, you can search by subject instead of by keyword or by terms, to locate additional information that's pertinent your topic.

Also, you can exclude words by using "NOT" (for example, "women athletes NOT basketball," if you want to exclude anything that mentions that sport). But be careful! Doing so will exclude anything that mentions the negated term, even once.

You can also narrow your search by publication dates, language, type of document, and other criteria. Doing so will enable you to find what you want with just a few clicks without having to troll through thousands of results.

Now let's consider ways of broadening your search. You can do this by using a more general term or terms or by thinking of synonyms or related terms. For example, you can search "women OR female OR gender OR woman." By using the word "OR" in capital letters between each term, you indicate that you aren't looking for the word "or," but rather that you're looking for any of those variations on "woman."

Most databases also let you search for variations of words using a process called truncation. For example, "athlet*" can be used to find "athlete," "athletes," "athletics"---anything that begins with those letters, no matter what its final letters are.

Note: These techniques usually appear in most databases and library resources, though the way they appear will vary. Always check the search tips or Help to find out how they work in a particular database or Ask a Librarian. (TC) All search engines may not have the same features.

Text modified from Cornell University Library. (2009). Introduction to Research. Retrieved May 14, 2009, from http://www.library.cornell.edu/resrch/intro

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If you find one good source, the bibliography at the end of it will point to research that its author used. In addition, you can often find a type of scholarly articles--called "a review of the literature"- written expressly to provide an overview of research in spefic specific fields. The sources cited in such an article review articles -literature review (TC) or in any relevant bibliography are good starting points for further inquiry.

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Effective use of the Web in information research means more than just throwing a couple of keywords into a search engine and seeing what the first few results are. Here are The section "Using Google" offers (TC) some tips for performing a targeted search using Google, as well as some tips for using other available sources of information.

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For scholarly research, you also can use Google Scholar. Google Scholar searches a more academic subset of the Web. Although what Google considers scholarly will sometimes differ from what your professors and librarians consider scholarly, in general, Google Scholar will return a more relevant set of results than a regular Google Search will.

Additional Resources

• Google Book Search (search tips)

TIP: You can use Google Scholar to get to some (though certainly not all) of the resources the library has licensed from off-campus (it's automatic if you are on campus). Set your [Google Scholar Preferences|http://scholar.google.com/scholar_preferences?hl=en] so that Google recognizes you as a Cornell person, knows what you have access to, and will let you keep your references in a citation management program. 

• In Google Scholar, go to [Scholar Preferences{*}|http://scholar.google.com/scholar_preferences?hl=en]*
  * Under Library Links settings, set to Cornell and under Bibliography Manager, choose RefWorks
• Now, Get it! Cornell appears in your search results, when that item is available as well as links to Export to RefWorks or other citation management software. (CA)
  

Additional Resources

• Google Book Search (search tips)

Also check out the Cornell volumes in the Million Book Also check out the Cornell volumes in the Million Book Project by the Internet Archive, and the digital collections available from Cornell at http://bookstore.library.cornell.edu (the latter often enabling you to buy print copies of digitized sources through Amazon.com's print-on-demand service).

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Google does not cover everything! (No single Web site or search engine can.) Cornell University Librarysubscribes Library subscribes to thousands of scholarly databases and journals journals (CA) that are available from your desktop and you can find millions of books(CA) in its stacks and online, many of which are not freely accessible on the Internet. Even if the item you're looking for is available somewhere online, it may not be possible to find it using search engines, and it may not be available for free. Furthermore, the fact that one search engine can find it doesn't guarantee that another one will be able to! Every search engine finds different things. So you need to have more tools than just Google at your disposal. The following are a few other sources of information on the Internet:

• Information portals. Sometimes universities, organizations, and other groups will put together portals of information on a subject. Sites like the Librarians' Index to the Internet or subject-specific portals like Voice of the Shuttle, Intute, BUBL, and others can give you pointers to lots of information in your area.The [Cornell University Library website|http://www.library.cornell.edu/]. The librarians have created [guides|http://www.library.cornell.edu/resrch/libguides]to some of the best resources on the Web and in print that can help you complete your project efficiently and effectively with authoritative information. Many of these in-depth authoritative resources are only available through the library. These guides will give you the best starting points (whether they be reference works, databases, journals, websites and other resources) for your subject. There's also information about [library services|http://www.library.cornell.edu/svcs]that can help you do your research and ways to [Ask a Librarian|http://www.library.cornell.edu/ask] for help (CA)
• The deep Web. A great deal of scholarly information is either contained in databases that aren't indexed by search engines, or is put together on the fly by databases and, as such, doesn't show up among search - engine results. This body of effectively invisible information is called the "deep Web" or the "invisible Web." To mine the deep Web, you'll need to go to individual databasesinformation is called the "deep Web" or the "invisible Web." To mine the deep Web, you'll need to go to individual databases.
• Information portals. Sometimes universities, organizations, and other groups will put together portals of information on a subject. Sites like the Librarians' Index to the Internet or subject-specific portals like Voice of the Shuttle, Intute, BUBL, and others can give you pointers to lots of information in your area.

Additional Resources

• Librarians' Index to the Internet
• Voice of the Shuttle
• Invisible or Deep Web: What it is, How to find it, and Its inherent ambiguity

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Finding books and articles for your topic is just the first step. Getting the whole book or the full-text version of an article if the full text is not online is the next step. To accomplish this, you can:

• Search the library catalog (CA) for the title (or journal title if it's an article)
• Use Get it! Cornell links (which will link to the full-text article, help you search the Cornell University Library catalog for the source, or allow you to request the article through interlibrary loan) (CA)
• Use
• Search the library catalog for the title (or journal title if it's an article)
• Use Get it! Cornell
• Use CUL Passkey (or go through the library Web sitewebsite) to get into licensed materials from off campus (CA)
• Use interlibrary loan and document delivery services for free if full text isn't available through Cornell

Additional Resources

• How to Read Citations (video)
• Finding Books Shelved in Olin Library (video)
  (CA)For more information see Finding books, articles and other material from the library's Introduction to Research tutorial.(CA)

  Additional Resources

• How to Read Citations (video)
• Finding Books Shelved in Olin Library (video)
  

Evaluating Sources

Once you have found information on your topic, analyzing and evaluating the results of your search can be a challenge. How will you know if you have found the most authoritative, accurate, objective, and up-to-date scholarly information available? Use the Source Evaluation Checklist, a guide to thinking critically about what you find.

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For more information on these types of materials, see the Distinguishing scholarly from non-scholarly periodicals Evaluating Resources (TC) section of the library's Introduction to Research tutorial.

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Scholarly articles are judged according to whether or not they are peer-reviewed. Peer-reviewed journals contain articles that have been examined by peers experts (CA) in the field (perhaps on the journal's editorial board) and evaluated on the quality of their research. This is an entirely different thing from the type of peer review you may perform in your classes (since you and your classmates probably are not generally recognized authorities in any field).

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• If it's online, go to the journal home page and check under About This Journal. Often the brief description of the journal you find there will note that it's peer-reviewed or refereed or will list the editors or editorial board.
• In some library databases, there will be a feature that automatically limits your search to scholarly or peer-reviewed articles
• Go to the database Ulrich's (TC) and do a Title (Keyword) search for the journal. If it is peer-reviewed or refereed, the title will have a little umpire-shirt symbol next to it.
• Be careful! A journal can be refereed or peer-reviewed and still have articles in it that are not peer-reviewed. Generally, if the article is an editorial, a brief news item, or a short communication, it will not have been through the full peer-review process. Most Ddatabases like Web of Knowledge will let you restrict your search exclusively to articles (and not editorials, conference proceedings, and so on).

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According to the College of Arts and Sciences' plagiarism tutorial (TC) on "When do I need to document sources?" (2005),

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We especially recommend RefWorks (TC) (Internet-based and free to current Cornell students, staff, and faculty) and Endnote (desktop-based).

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