COMM 2: Media in a Global World (Chopra): Sample Search

• Library Home Page

  Databases, catalog, interlibrary loan, LINK+...
• OSCAR - Library Catalog

  Find books, videos, journals/magazines, etc.
• A-Z Databases

  You can also browse the list by subject, type, or vendor.
• Ask a Librarian

  Get help from a librarian by texting, IM, email, or make an appointment.
• Camino

  Link back to your course syllabus, readings, etc.
• Citation Guides

  How to cite your sources in APA, MLA, Chicago styles, etc.
• Google Scholar

  Link to article's available through the SCU library and other sources.

Searching databases for journal articles is a bit more challenging than using tools such as Google. The good news is that you have a lot more control over how you design the search. This also means you should get better, more targeted results.

• Before you start your research, try focusing your topic by writing a one sentence research question. For example: Do communication styles by college students differ by gender?

• Identify the main ideas in your research question.
  • communication styles
  • college students
  • gender

• Boil the statement down to keywords, or the most important elements of your issue. EX: communication, gender, sex, college students, young adults

• Use an asterisk to find variations of a word. EX: communicat* will find communicate, communication

• Then, separate the keywords with the "and" and "or" connectors EX: communicat* and (gender or sex) and (college student* or young adult*)

The above search strategy in the Communication Source database will look like this. Note that I changed "Select a Field" to "SU Subject Terms" for the first two boxes so only the index terms will be searched. The last line searches the full record.

This search retrieved 174 peer-reviewed citations.

Page created by Sophia Neuhaus on July 1, 2018