1. Research can be time consuming so take a few minutes to get organized and think about what you are looking for. Do you need current or historical information, statistical data or facts?
2. Break your topic down into keywords or concepts. Think about possible synonyms for those words and phrases. Many searches may work with a single key concept, but you will often have two or more
3. Start broadly and narrow down as you go. Your first searches will give you a feel for what kind of information is available.
4. Once you've done a search scan the results to see what kind of articles you retrieved. If you see a good article look for additional keywords or even subject headings which have been attached to the article and try those in your search.
5. Be flexible -- you may need to broaden or narrow your search depending on the amount and kind of information you find.
Keep track of your search and your results. Remember research is a process and you may try many things before you find what works best for your topic.
Keep track of your search terms and jot down other words you find while perusing the articles that result from your searches.
The "search history" option under the search box can also help you keep track of your searches.
Put interesting articles into a "folder" so that you can return to them later to decide if you want to look at the entire article. Every record in a search results list will give you the option of adding that article to a folder. Remember that folder stays with you only during the current search session so be sure to check it and email or print anything from the folder that you want to keep before logging off.
Create an account in EBSCOhost (My EBSCOhost) or ProQuest (My Research) databases so you can save your searches & search results and return to them whenever you need to.
