As part of your course, you will be interviewing an expert in a scientific field. You will be gathering evidence directly form the source, this is known as a primary source. See below for more information on the difference between primary and secondary sources. Your instructor has provided you with the link below to help you give a good interview. Here are some additional guidelines to keep in mind when writing your questions:
When you are affiliated with a higher education institution, you have information privilege. That is, you have access to Library-subscribed scholarly content that is not freely available on the open web. Little known fact: this access usually ends when you graduate.
Led by academic libraries and information activists, the Open Access (OA) movement provides an alternative: a bridge to to open scholarship, no matter your institutional ties. OA expands the content that is available across access barriers, and is gaining ground in the scholarly community.
OA resources will be available to you after you leave IUPUI. For more information on open access at IUPUI see the Center for Digital Scholarship website.
As you engage in your research, explore the following OA repositories:
BASE is a vast cross-disciplinary international metasearch for OA content.
The Directory of Open Access Journals covers free, full text, quality controlled scientific and scholarly journals and aims to cover all subjects and all languages.
OpenDoar is an authoritative directory of academic open access repositories. From University of Nottingham, UK.
ROAR provides up-to-date visual access to a huge database of open access repositories.
Before diving right into a search, stop and take a moment to consider what type of resource you want to find. Do you need a book? A scholarly article? Do you need a blog written by or YouTube interview of an expert? Do you need raw data? Next, think about where that type of information might be found. Will a simple internet search locate what you need, or do you need another tool? Use the chart below to think about where you might find the information you need. If you're not sure where to start, this would be a great moment for you to contact me!
Description of, "Type of Sources"
Additionally, you may need to think in terms of primary and secondary sources. For more on that, see the information below on interviews and the infographic.
Next, I'll give you some of the most common search tools below and some tips, but keep in mind that these are not one-stop shopping, nor are they one-size-fits-all.
Before you start entering any search terms, spend a few minutes trying to think of as many relevant terms and combinations of terms as you can. This will help you to avoid getting stuck in a rut with the first terms that come to mind.
If you need help in coming up with terms, you may want to try the "Thesaurus" or "Subject Headings" features in the database you've chosen.
Check out the "Help" or "Search Tips" to learn some of the search features specific to that database. Most databases provide similar features, but the methods may vary. Some common tricks:
Try the databases' Advanced Search feature, which usually gives you the ability to search multiple fields (author, title, keyword, subject, etc) with one search and may offer additional ways to expand or limit your search.
If your first search strategy does not work, try another approach. Remember that you can also get help from the library. Check out the links below.
The list of resources below is not comprehensive, nor is it in order of "best" or "recommended." It's up to you as a researcher to evaluate each tool and choose the best one. Your instructor or librarian can provide guidance, but you should feel free to explore on your own as well. Click the "i" for more information about each resource, but don't stop there: Google them and see what else you can find out!
News databases -
A final note, if you want to search the subject guides for something specific you'll have to use the site search feature at the top right of the page. They are built more for browsing than searching.
