"To what extent has 'your' specific topic been researched already?
Are you sure you have acquired the pertinent, related literature?
Do you have strategies in place to keep abreast of the ever growing literature related to your topic?" 1
The library has created this checklist so that you can assess your understanding of the range of information resources and search techniques available to support your research endeavours.
For further guidance on any of these issues and on discipline specific research, please contact your liaison librarian.
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In most areas of the social sciences and humanities, books are still the primary source of information. How do you efficiently locate books that are relevant to your research topic? Which catalogues will be useful for your research? And how do you search them effectively? See the UQ Library How-To Guide on Searching Library Catalogues. |
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Book reviews can be an important resource in the social sciences and humanities. They keep you up to date with new publications and new critical approaches in your discipline. See the UQ Library How-To Guide on Finding Book Reviews. |
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This sounds like an unsophisticated way of finding information, but in fact it is still widely used by experienced researchers. Whenever you go to the shelves to borrow a book, scan the adjacent books as well. Can you quickly assess the usefulness of a book from the contents list, the index and the bibliography? |
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Chaining (the "Snowball" Method) Even with all the sophisticated information resources available today, the most widely used technique is still the traditional process of finding one important reference on the topic, reading that, and following up the references that it cites. And those references will cite other references for you to investigate, and so it goes on. This is an excellent way of familiarising yourself with the literature on the topic. It has one obvious disadvantage: it can only take you backwards to older publications on the topic. It cannot help you discover the new literature and the latest research. |
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Another way of improving your results is to search by cited references. The principle is simple: if there is a book or article which is fundamental to your research topic, it may be helpful to find later publications which cite that book or article. See the UQ Library How-To Guide on Cited Reference Searching. |
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To search databases effectively, it is important to understand the concept of controlled vocabulary. Many databases use a system of standardised subject terms (sometimes called descriptors or subject headings). Using these terms may help you to find information that you would otherwise have missed. So when you find a useful reference on a database, look at the full database record for that reference to see if there are any descriptors or subject headings in the record. Searching by those terms may yield useful results. |
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The Library subscribes to over 900 databases, the majority of which provide access to journal articles, either abstract only or full text. There are also many specialised databases with content ranging from newspaper articles to unpublished primary sources. To find databases relevant to your research discipline go to our Databases page and use the menu under Browse by subject. Databases provide a wealth of articles, but how do you search them effectively? Most do not work like Google. To find what's really in the databases, and avoid irrelevant results, see the UQ Library How-To Guide on Database Searching. |
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Inevitably you will identify books and journals that you need which are not available in the UQ Library. Our document delivery service will try to obtain these for you. |
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Government documents can be a major source of information and data. These documents include Hansard (Parliamentary debates), parliamentary papers, green papers and a wealth of government department reports. Government information and publications are becoming increasingly available via the web. However, for older material, you may need to search library catalogues or consult printed indexes. |
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Journal articles are an essential source of information in the social sciences and humanities. The UQ Library subscribes to over 50,000 journals, most in electronic form. Subject databases are your gateway to the journal articles published in your field of research. To find databases relevant to your research discipline go to our Databases page and use the menu under Browse by subject. To do a fulltext search for academic journal articles across many subject areas, try Google Scholar. |
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Many databases now offer an alerting service which will allow you to keep up to date with new research in a particular field of study. When you register for such a service, you will receive the alerts via email straight to your inbox or via an RSS feed. Many publishers are using RSS feeds to provide an alerting service to advise on new information as it becomes available. Three types of journal alerts are available: table of contents to alert you to forthcoming issues, keyword search alerts to notify you of new articles matching your search, and citation alerts to notify you when a particular article is cited. You can also set up alerts from the UQ Library catalogue and many news and blog websites. See the UQ Library How-To Guide on Alerting Services, RSS Feeds & Email. |
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Your research may call for you to consult and refer to bills or legislation, either at the State or Federal level, or even at the international level. To trace the process and changes leading up to the new law being introduced you will need to consult readings and speeches made in Parliament (Hansard). State, Commonwealth and international laws as well as treaties are available online and via databases. See the UQ Library Legal Research Guide. |
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The UQ Library catalogue provides access to millions of resources, from books to DVDs to electronic journal articles. It's an important place to start. But no library can own everything. Why not look further afield? If you are aware of a university where some valuable work has been done in your research area, why not search their library's catalogue? Or try a combined catalogue – with one search of Libraries Australia, you can search across all the major libraries in Australia. A single search of WorldCat searches the holdings of thousands of overseas libraries. Which catalogues will be useful for your research? And how do you search them effectively? See the UQ Library How-To Guide on Searching Library Catalogues. |
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Information can be sourced in many formats. The library subscribes to Informit TVNews, a database, which can be used to search for TV news stories, current affairs and documentary series broadcast on Australian television. Information can be sourced in many formats. Are you familiar with YouTube, a popular search tool for videos and film clips? |
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Researchers used to spend years of their lives laboriously scanning through newspapers in their microfilm or print formats. In some cases, this is still the only option. Fortunately, most recently published newspaper articles can be searched via the web, although not always for free. Increasingly, older newspapers are also being digitised and turned into searchable databases, some of which are subscription-only resources, while others are available free online. See the UQ Library How-To guide on News and Newspapers. |
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The reports produced by non-government, educational and private organisations (for example, the World Bank or World Health Organisation, or a university) are excellent resources for research. They are topical and academic in nature, often contain detailed statistical data, and are usually very up-to-date, often annually rewritten. Often the best place to obtain reports of this nature is from the organisation's website: see web resources below. If the report is not available electronically, you may request it through our document delivery service or your liaison librarian may be able to order a copy to add to the library's collection. |
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Open-access (OA) literature is online, free of charge, and free of most copyright and licensing restrictions, and it is growing. The idea of open access is based on the view that research findings should be freely and immediately available to the world-wide community. This also involves the placement of publications on the web usually through a university site. To enable your publications to be made publicly available you are able to add them to UQ eSpace (The University of Queensland's institutional digital repository for publications, research, and teaching materials). UQ eSpace provides free, searchable access to openly available UQ research, publications and teaching materials and manages their long-term archiving. |
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When you have identified useful references, how will you store and organise them? The University provides you with access to EndNote, a software package that allows you to create a personal database of references. It includes facilities to store electronic copies of your references and to store your working notes on the references. EndNote can also work with Microsoft Word to generate bibliographies in your thesis or other publications. |
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People are important sources of information. Your supervisor, your liaison librarian and your fellow students will all be able to provide assistance in different ways. What is going on may not yet be reflected in any published form so it is often helpful to make contact with researchers at other institutions who are working in the same area. The contemporary web and mobile technologies have made it easier to develop these contacts through blogs, discussion lists (listservs), elearning tools and attendance at conferences. |
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When you have spent some time locating relevant books, you will probably find that a high proportion of those books are published by a small number of key publishers in your area. Most of those publishers will have a website. Check these websites to find out about other books that the publisher has produced. Many of these websites will allow you to set up alerts so that you can be notified by email when new books are published. |
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Statistical datasets are available from a number of organisations, both government and non-government, and cover a range of topics. Supporting your argument with statistics can be a powerful tool for any researcher. You will need to work out which site or resource provides access to the data you require. See the UQ Library Subject Guide on Statistics (International). Read the Help files for the resource you select for assistance with building your statistical query and manipulating and downloading your dataset. |
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Prior to commencing your research it's a good idea to check theses databases to see what research has been done on your topic. Theses are also a useful source of information that has not been published elsewhere. High quality theses are often further developed for publication as books or journal articles. See the UQ Library How-To Guide on Finding Theses. |
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Unpublished Material (Grey Literature) Unpublished source material is an essential resource for some research projects. It is becoming increasingly available on the web, however, much of it can still be difficult to locate and access. For a general introduction to this very complex topic, see the UQ Library How-To Guide on Manuscripts and Archives. |
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There is no easy way of navigating the wealth of resources now available on the web. Subject gateways like Intute can help to locate quality resources. There are smarter ways of searching Google, by limiting your search to specific domains such as .edu or .gov.au. See the UQ Library How-To Guide on Internet (Web) Searching. You should be aware of how to access Google Scholar via the UQ Library's proxy server, so that you can access subscription-only resources more easily when using Google Scholar. If you are off campus, always access Google Scholar via this link. |
1 Macauley, P 2006, 'The librarian – the candidate's forgotten friend', in D Carey and T Evans (eds.), Doctorates downunder: keys to successful doctoral study in Australia and New Zealand, ACER Press, Camberwell, Vic.
