Searching for Literature on My Topic

There are a couple of steps in the Searching Process:

• Start by doing some exploratory searching for background reading that introduces the topic and gives you an overview of the key issues & ideas. As you explore and read about the topic, take notes on ideas / issues you're interested in exploring more in-depth. 

• Once you've decided on your area of interest, start mapping the main ideas you want to focus on and draw up a rough plan for tackling the researching of these ideas. 

Exploring what's out there on my topic

A really good place to get general & background information on your topic is to have a look at some introductory textbooks.

Use the Library search engine MegaSearch to find textbooks. Learn how to find books in the UTAS Library using

*Try typing the key word  introduction  together with a keyword describing your topic into the MegaSearch search box.

There is a module in  MyLO: LIST

which takes you through this process.

The guide on

will help you to find, search, and download electronic books for use in your studies. It will also direct you to information about eReader software and how to upload eBooks to eReaders.

Can't I just Google?

Alright, we get it - everybody loves Google (even librarians).  It's easy, fast, convenient, and usually a pretty good place to start looking for information.  But if you only use Google to do university level research, you will not find the best information for your studies.

Here are some good reasons why you should also use the library:

Paywalls

• ​Have you ever found a great article online and then discovered that you have to pay to view it?  This happens because online does not always mean free, and most of the best scholarly research is only available if you subscribe to the right academic journals.
• The good news is that the Library subscribes to thousands of these journals for you (using your tuition fees).  When you use the library databases and authenticate with your UTAS username and password, they are all yours.

The Invisible Web

• Contrary to popular belief, web search engines do not cover everything on the web.  In fact, some estimates of search engine coverage put the figure between 10% and 30% of web content (Devine & Egger-Sider, 2014).  The rest is hidden behind paywalls, passwords, or in files and formats that general purpose search engines can't reach.
• Most library databases are part of the invisible web, so you can't access their content using Google.

Credibility

• How do you decide if a webpage is credible or not?  You may be able to figure it out, but wouldn't it be nice if you could choose from a range of the best and most scholarly resources for your subject?  This is exactly what the library databases provide.

Devine, J. & Egger-Sider, F., (2014). Going beyond Google again: strategies for using and teaching the invisible web. London: Facet Publishing.

What about Google Scholar?

Google Scholar can be more useful for university research than Google, because it focuses on scholarly publications and you can configure it to link to UTAS Library resources (using the Library links setting).

However: 

• Google's web spiders have a pretty broad definition of what is 'scholarly'
• It's hard to say exactly what is or is not indexed by Google Scholar, but it seems to have better coverage in science and medicine than in the humanities and social sciences.
• Google Scholar still won't give you everything you need.  No single search engine or database will, so don't get stuck in the habit of using the same search tool for everything.  It pays to consider all your options.