Business Research Tool KitCREATING EFFECTIVE SEARCH STRATEGIESEVALUATING SOURCES & WRITING LITERATURE REVIEWS

SUZANNE VAN DEN HOOGEN, MLISMARCH 21, 2014

Creating Effective Search StrategiesDEVELOPING AN EFFECTIVE SEARCH STRATEGY WILL HELP YOU TO QUICKLY AND ACCURATELY LOCATE RELEVANT INFORMATION ON YOUR TOPIC.

Search Strategies• Read about your topic

What do you know about your topic?

• Develop questions you would like to answer during your research

Transform your topic into a question

• Keywords can have a profound impact on the results of your research

Use key words and key concepts

• Use a thesaurus

Identify synonyms and related terms

• Boolean Operators• Phrase Searching• Vocabulary

Tips & Tricks

Search StrategiesResearch: A Step-by-Step

Guide

Search StrategiesBusiness Source

Complete

Evaluating ResourcesDEVELOPING AN EFFECTIVE SEARCH STRATEGY WILL HELP YOU TO QUICKLY AND ACCURATELY LOCATE RELEVANT INFORMATION ON YOUR TOPIC.

You must demonstrate that you are willing to examine popular beliefs, assumptions and opinions and weigh them against facts. Support your thesis statement with research.

Analyse your assignment questions:

What does this question mean?How much detail does your professor

require?

Where do I begin?• Read about your topic – know your

subject matter.• Brainstorm ideas

• Think about Key Words & Key Concepts• Write your thesis statement

Critical Thinking

Question! Question! Question! Is this source reliable? Is this source current? Have opinions changed? What are the current trends in this research area? Are there any gaps in the research? Is something missing? Who is the author? Are they an expert in this field? Do they represent multiple points of view or do they

express bias for their own point of view?

How do I remember what questions to ask?

Currency How recent is the information? Can you locate a date when the resource was written/created/updated? Based on your topic, is this current enough? Why might the date matter for your topic?

Reliability What kind of information is included in the resource? Is the content primarily opinion? Is the information balanced or biased? Does the author provide citations & references for data?

Authority Can you determine who the author/creator is? What are their credentials (education, affiliation, experience)? Who is the publisher or sponsor of the work/site? Is this publisher/sponsor reputable?

Purpose / Point of View What’s the intent of the article (to persuade you, to sell something)? For Web resources, what is the domain (.edu, .com, etc.)? How might that influence the purpose/point of view? Are there ads on the Web site? How do they relate to the topic? Is the author presenting fact or opinion?

C

AR

P

Peer ReviewedPeer Reviewed / Scholarly / Academic Journals

• Written by experts in the field• Evaluated by peers prior to

publication• Include author name, usually

credentials• Abstract• Bibliography / reference list• Specialized vocabulary

Not peer reviewed

–Popular Magazines–Trade Journals: Business, Finance, Industry (may be written by experts, but may not be peer reviewed)–Newspapers

EXERCISE: Evaluate these websites

• http://www.timhortons.com/

• http://carca.ca/

Suzanne van den Hoogen, MLIS

Literature ReviewsDEVELOPING AN EFFECTIVE SEARCH STRATEGY WILL HELP YOU TO QUICKLY AND ACCURATELY LOCATE RELEVANT INFORMATION ON YOUR TOPIC.

What is a Literature Review?A literature review is an account of what has been published on a topic by accredited scholars and researchers.

Your purpose is to convey to your reader what knowledge and ideas have been established on a topic, and what their strengths and weaknesses are.

As a piece of writing, the literature review must be defined by a guiding concept (e.g., your research objective, the problem or issue you are discussing, or your argumentative thesis).

It is not just a descriptive list of the material available, or a set of summaries.

Taylor, Dena. n.d. The Literature Review: A Few Tips on Conducting It. University of Toronto. http://www.writing.utoronto.ca/advice/specific-types-of-writing/literature-review,accessed January 15, 2014.

What a Literature Review is NOT:NOT a collection of summaries or abstracts

NOT a copy of article abstracts

NOT a research essay

You are responsible for synthesizing and critically examining the literature!

What is the Purpose of a Literature Review?

To provide an overview of what scholars have written about on a specific topic;

To describe the conceptual or theoretical frameworks used to analyse that topic;

To explain the strengths and weaknesses of this knowledge and these theoretical/conceptual frameworks by comparing and contrasting the work of various authors.

Literature Review: Example

Literature Reviews: Worksheets