‘Introduction to the Library Research Process’

1. ‘Introduction to the Library Research Process’ Gilbert Bede, BA, MLIS Communication Liaison Librarian Okanagan College Library "The Librarian", Giuseppe Arcimboldo, 1556”

2. Today’s Outcomes • Developing, Executing and Evaluating your Research Strategies • Recommended Materials • Library Services • Getting Additional Assistance • Questions

3. BIAS • Bias is an inherent aspect of all information • You need to review all information that you try and understand its bias • Scholarly Communications Does One of the Best Jobs of Minimizing Bias • Remember that you to have your own personal biases • Reviewing, analyzing and citing the information that you discover is important

4. “I’d like some information please.” Your Department of Information has the technology and solution to meet this very need. Suddenly, you’re dropped in the middle of a vast ocean of information, thrashing to keep your head above the waves. Information, information everywhere … but after 3 - hours of searching you discover that it is doesn’t contain the information that you need and you are quickly running out of time to complete your assignment! Adapted from Simplicity: The New Competitive Advantage in a World of More, Better, Faster Bill Jensen 2000, Perseus Books, NY, p.21 Image http://www.raysofhealinglight.com/images/fear.gif Retrieved January 8, 2007

5. Information, Information Everywhere • 2004: It was estimated that 5 million Terabytes of Information Existed • 1 Terabyte = 10¹² • 5,000,000 x10¹² • 170 Terabytes are considered to be indexable • Library of Congress contains about 30 Million Books roughly equal to 30 Terabytes • 2005: The Web was estimated at 11.5 billion pages – 40 terabytes of textual content • 1993 130 Websites • 2005 64,800,000 Websites • Ulrich’s estimates 300,000 periodicals of all types are in print — academic and scholarly journals, Open Access publications, peer-reviewed titles, popular magazines, newspapers, newsletters, etc. • Bowker’s estimates that there are currently 9,000,000 titles in print • 81,000 Publishers • 195,000 New Titles In 2004 • 79% Of All New Books Sold In North America in 2004 Sold Fewer Than 99 Copies, With 16.91% Of All Books Selling Between 100 – 999 Copies • 95.91% Sold Under 1,000 Copies • $40 Billion Worth Of Books were sold in North America in 2004 • Multimedia

6. Developing, Executing and Evaluating your Research Strategies

7. "Knowing the right question to ask is half the answer." ~ Lord Byron

8. Designing Your Search Strategy Time Management

9. Identify Your Research Topic • Understand the requirements of your research assignment • Speak to your instructor • Read your assignment carefully • Create a written research plan • When is your assignment due? • Do not take on more than can be accomplished within your identified research timeframe • Dangers of a Broad Focus • Too Much Information to Process • Pearls of a Narrow Focus • Too little Information to Process • Challenge of emerging issues • The Subject so recent that it is not yet appearing in the literature • Limitations of Local issues • Rare in the literature • Private vs. Public companies

10. What do you already know about this topic Consult your textbook, lecture notes, etc. Speak to your instructor Speak to your liaison librarian Discuss it with your classmates State your topic idea as a question Identify the main concepts , keywords and keyword phrases What format(s) of information are you looking for i.e. Book, Article, Multimedia, etc. Scholarly vs. Non-Scholarly vs. Trade/industry/Professional Establish a coverage timeframe for your research i.e., date of publication Decide on your geographical focus Local Regional National International Combination of some or all of the above Do I want Citations or Full Text OC Library doesn’t have the full text of all journals published Inter Library used to borrow or obtain copies of material not owned by OC Library Typically takes less than a week to get an article that we don’t have What if the material that I want is at another campus Request function in Library Catalogue Typical Research Cycle Test your Research Strategy Refine your Research Strategy Retest your Research Strategy Repeat or Select a new Topic Learn as you Search Things to Do and Think About Before You Start

11. Opportunity is missed by most people because it is dressed in overalls and looks like work.~Thomas Edison

12. How Do I Know When I am Done my Research? • Set a benchmark of how many information sources you want to read based on the time you have available • Your assignment provides guidelines • You have to position yourself somewhere between a minimalist approach of ‘satisficing’and falling into the’ ‘paradox of choice’s’ black hole’ of too much information that results in analysis paralysis • You need to find the balance Image retrieved January 11, 2008 from http://tadd.weather.gov/images/turnDrownWarningSign.jpg

13. My Kingdom for the Correct Keywords • Research is predominately carried out by searching using keywords and keyword phrases • The English language changes overtime, sometimes very quickly • The subject analysis performed by indexers and abstracters doesn’t always keep pace • Controlled vocabularies • Each discipline has its own lexicon

14. Developing a Realistic Search Strategy • State your topic idea as a question: • ‘What is the market for organic products ?’ • Identify the main concepts or keywords • Market • Organic Products

15. Market Marketplace Economy Sector Synonyms

16. Organic Products Organic Food Organic Farming Organic Stores Synonyms

17. Now What? Image retrieved January 11, 2008 from http://www.breakingthetape.com/tri-polar-express/yellow_brick_road-thumb.JPG

18. Where to Start Searching • Identify where to Search • Do I want a • Book? • Encyclopaedia, Handbook, Directory, Almanac etc.? • Periodical • Magazine • Scholarly Journal • Trade Journal / Industry Publication • Media • Video/DVD • Sound Recording • Internet?

19. Scholarly (academic) domain based scale, purpose and ideology specialized press peer reviewed by subject experts structured language citations references bibliography often only available through academic libraries can be an intimidating place to start if you are unfamiliar with the subject area General (trade) profit driven author may not be an acknowledged domain expert focused at a broader general audience widely available written in lay persons language good starting point if you are unfamiliar with the subject area Books

20. Encyclopaedia, Handbook, Directory, Almanac etc.? • Very useful when you don’t have much insight into the subject you are investigating • Historic background, brief articles, concise in depth information, good source for keywords, related topics, etc. • Source for Quick Facts and Statistics • Check the imprint information • Timeliness can be an issue • Wikipedia • Lacks Authority • You will have to verify and validate any information that you use from this source

21. Periodicals • Newspapers, Newsletters, Digest and Magazines • Not Created Equal • Editorial Point of View • Content is there in order to sell advertising • Magazines • Trade • Industry • Professional • Digests • Edited versions of the original article • Often lack citations • The are exceptions i.e., Congressional Record is the Daily Digest • Journals (Print) • Predominately Scholar in Nature • Journals (Electronic aka ‘E-Journals’) • Online, Internet based versions of print journals • E-Journal only publications

22. Scholarly Communications • Scholarly Journals • Books • Annotated Bibliographies • Databases / Web Sites • Data Sets • Conference Proceedings • Symposia • Technical Reports • Presentations

23. Scholarly Literature • Highly structure • Each discipline has its own language • Peer Reviewed • Subject Experts • Editorial Boards • Properly Documented • Publishing it submits to the scholarly community for critical scrutiny • It is collected and access to it is facilitated by libraries

24. Government Publications • Government is major information producer • Over the past 10-years they have shifted the majority of the material to the Internet • Can be time consuming to locate • Good source of statistical information and data • Information on virtually everything

25. Online Databases • Aggregate content from multiple sources into a single searchable database • Thousands of journal titles • Both scholarly and non-scholarly articles • Other types of content, case studies, videos/audio clips, statistical tables and data sets, etc. • Complex but powerful native search engines

26. Media • Video • Audio Recordings • Micro Fiche • The Internet is a growing sources of this material • Citation of such material can be problematic especially if discovered on the Internet • The Library has an growing collection of this type of material

27. Internet • Surface Web vs. Deep Web • Surface Web (search engines) • Deep Web (database driven web sites) • The Deep Web is roughly 600x the size of the Surface Web • User friendly search engine • Quantity vs. Quality • Validation of information • Good for Government Publications • Google's Scholarly Content Search Engine • http://scholar.google.ca/ • Caveat Emptor – Let the buyer beware

28. Library Web Pagehttp://www.okanagan.bc.ca/administration/students/library.html

29. Recommended Staring Points

30. Search Engines & Multitasking • Don't assume you know what you want to find. Look at search results and see what you might use in addition to what you've already identified in your search strategies • Switch from Internet search engines, Online Databases, E-Journals, etc. • Don't bog down in any strategy that doesn't work

31. You Know Little or Nothing About the Research Topic

32. Book Reviews - Book Review Index Plushttp://ezproxy.ouc.bc.ca/login?url=http://infotrac.galegroup.com/itweb/kelo91364?db=BRIP

33. Canadian Encyclopedia http://www.thecanadianencyclopedia.com/

34. Encyclopedia of British Columbiahttp://ezproxy.okanagan.bc.ca/login?url=http://www.knowbc.com/IEBC/IEBCLogin.asp?Action=LogIn&username=okanagan&password=AUWUFCGUD

35. Canada Info Desk http://ezproxy.ouc.bc.ca/login?url=http://circ.greyhouse.ca/search/quicksearch

36. Oxford Reference Onlinehttp://ezproxy.okanagan.bc.ca/login?url=http://www.oxfordreference.com/

37. World Almanac (FirstSearch - OCLC)http://ezproxy.okanagan.bc.ca/login?url=http://firstsearch.oclc.org/autho=100232486;fsip?dbname=worldalmanac

38. Encyclopedia of International Media and Communications http://ezproxy.ouc.bc.ca/login?url=http://www.sciencedirect.com/science/referenceworks/9780123876706

39. Encyclopedia of Information Systemshttp://ezproxy.ouc.bc.ca/login?url=http://www.sciencedirect.com/science/referenceworks/9780122272400

40. Encyclopaedia of Social Measurementhttp://ezproxy.ouc.bc.ca/login?url=http://www.sciencedirect.com/science/referenceworks/9780123693983

41. Librarians’ Index http://www.lii.org/ • Over 16,000 web sites.Compiled by librarians in information supply business. Highest quality sites only. Great, reliable annotations. • Infomine http://infomine.ucr.edu • Over 120,000 web sites.Great, reliable annotations. Cooperatively compiled by university & college-level, academic librarians of the UC campuses

42. OC Library Cataloguehttp://library-1.okanagan.bc.ca/

43. Searching the Catalogue • Basic Search • Search Builder • Truncation ? • Patron Login • Request • Help

44. Subscription Databases

45. Business Source Premierhttp://ezproxy.okanagan.bc.ca/login?url=http://search.ebscohost.com/login.asp?profile=web&defaultdb=buh

46. ABI/INFORMhttp://ezproxy.okanagan.bc.ca/login?url=http://proquest.umi.com/login?COPT=REJTPTE5M0M@ABI/INFORMhttp://ezproxy.okanagan.bc.ca/login?url=http://proquest.umi.com/login?COPT=REJTPTE5M0M@

47. Academic Search Premierhttp://ezproxy.okanagan.bc.ca/login?url=http://search.ebscohost.com/login.asp?profile=web&defaultdb=aph

48. Recommended Databases • Academic Search Premier • http://ezproxy.okanagan.bc.ca/login?url=http://search.ebscohost.com/login.asp?profile=web&defaultdb=aph • CBCA Complete – Canadian Content • http://ezproxy.okanagan.bc.ca/login?url=http://proquest.umi.com/login?COPT=REJTPTM4OTAmSU5UPTAmVkVSPTI=&clientId=7018 • Business Source Premier • http://ezproxy.ouc.bc.ca/login?url=http://search.ebscohost.com/login.asp?profile=web&defaultdb=buh • CPI.Q (Canadian Periodicals Index) • http://ezproxy.okanagan.bc.ca/login?url=http://infotrac.galegroup.com/itweb/kelo91364?db=CPI • Canadian Reference Centre • http://ezproxy.ouc.bc.ca/login?url=http://search.ebscohost.com/login.asp?profile=web&defaultdb=rch • Canadian Social Investment Database • http://ezproxy.ouc.bc.ca/login?url=http://csid.jantziresearch.com/HTML/login.asp • Hoover's Company Capsules & Profiles • http://ezproxy.ouc.bc.ca/login?url=http://proquest.umi.com/login?COPT=SU5UPTAmVkVSPTImREJTPTJEMzI@ • Hospitality & Tourism Complete • http://ezproxy.ouc.bc.ca/login?url=http://search.ebscohost.com/login.aspx?profile=ehost&defaultdb=hjh • Canadian Newstand • http://ezproxy.ouc.bc.ca/login?url=http://proquest.umi.com/login?COPT=U01EPTQmSU5UPTAmREJTPUcyMUQ@ • America: History and Life • http://ezproxy.ouc.bc.ca/login?url=http://search.ebscohost.com/login.asp?profile=web&defaultdb=ahl

49. Where can I get this article?

50. Seamless Connection