Before you begin, read your research question/assignment. If you have any questions, be sure to ask your instructor or TA before you begin your research.
EXAMPLE RESEARCH QUESTION: Assess the impact that social media has had on recent outbreaks of civil unrest. Find peer-reviewed journal articles published in the last 5 years.
STEP | Why? | How? | Example |
Step 1: Identify key concepts | Key concepts from your research question are the most effective search terms to quickly locate relevant sources. | Underline key nouns from your research question (for example, people, places, time periods, issues). | Assess the impact social media has had on recent outbreaks of civil unrest. |
Step 2: Identify alternative search terms | To find everything relevant to your topic in a database. |
Brainstorm alternatives (like synonyms, related terms, or alternative spellings) for your key concepts. These will be used as search terms. |
Key concept 1: Social media
Key concept 2: Civil unrest
|
Step 3: Consider using limiters (available in a library database) | In order to focus on articles that are appropriate for your assignment. | Choose limiters in a library database that are relevant to your research needs. |
|
Step 4: Combine your search terms | In order to get more focused results, use Boolean operators (and, or) as well as the wildcard* to combine key concepts. |
And: Combines key concepts together to find articles that contain both concepts. Or: Combine alternative search terms for the same concept to find articles that contain either term. Wildcard*: Finds variations in spelling, prefixes, and suffixes (riot* will find riot, riots, rioting) Phrase search " ": enter search terms made up of multiple words in quotation marks to preserve word order ("social media" will look for these two words side by side) |
("social media" OR "social network*" OR twitter OR facebook) AND ("civil unrest" OR conflict OR revolution OR riot*) |
Step 5: Review your search results | Check if articles are appropriate for your assignment to ensure you find the right information to write a high quality paper. |
Check if you articles are:
|
|
Step 6: Adjust your strategy | If you don't find relevant articles, change your search strategy. |
Too few articles? Try...
Too many articles? Try...
|
Too few articles?
Too many articles?
|
Adapted from The University of Manchester Library: Making Your Search Work (Cheat sheet)
https://www.escholar.manchester.ac.uk/learning-objects/mle/planning-search/story_content/external_files/cheat-sheet.pdf
University of Toronto Libraries
130 St. George St.,Toronto, ON, M5S 1A5
libraryhelp@utoronto.ca
416-978-8450
Map
About web accessibility. Tell us about a web accessibility problem.
About online privacy and data collection.
© University of Toronto. All rights reserved. Terms and conditions.