I. Select your search terms

• State your research topic as a thesis statement or a question:
  the effects of drug use on adolescents
• Identify the separate concepts (independent and dependent variables, population, etc.) that make up your topic:
  drug use; adolescents
• Make a list of search terms for each concept.  Be sure to include synonyms, related terms, and terms that may be broader or narrower:
  drug use: drug abuse, illegal drugs, addiction, marijuana, cocaine
  adolescents: teens, teenagers, youth, high school students
  The Contempory Thesaurus of Search Terms and Synonyms - ask at Reference Desk
• Use the following thesauri to identify appropriate controlled vocabulary (official subject headings) for each concept:
  Thesaurus of Sociological Indexing Terms - Ask at Reference Desk
  Thesaurus of Psychological Index Terms - Ask at Reference Desk
  Thesaurus of ERIC Descriptors [Education] - Ask at Reference Desk
  Library of Congress Subject Headings - Ask at Reference Desk

II. Devise your search strategy

Based on your list(s) of search terms, devise your search strategy:

• use quotation marks to group two or more words into phrases:
  "drug use", "drug abuse", "illegal drugs"
• use boolean operator OR; this tells the computer to search for all the terms at the same time:
  "drug use" or "drug abuse"; adolescents or teenagers
• use boolean operator AND; this tells the computer to restrict retrieval to both concepts:
  "drug use" and adolescents
• use truncation (*) to broaden your search to include variants of a term:
  adolescen*: adolescent, adolescents, adolescence
  teen*: teen, teens, teenage, teenagers
  
• use parentheses to group terms combined using OR :
  ("drug use" or "drug abuse" or "illegal drugs") and (adolescen* or teen* or youth*)

III. Conduct a search in an article database

An article database is a searchable database of citations to articles from magazines, newspapers and scholarly journals. Many article databases include abstracts and some also include the full-text of the article.

For the Social Sciences, a great place to start is Academic Search Premier. It contains thousands of full-text articles from hundreds of magazines, newspapers, and scholarly journals, including many in the social sciences. To limit your search to mostly scholary journal articles in Academic Search Premier, click on the box next to Scholarly (Peer-Reviewed) Journals. You may also limit your search to articles available in full-text on the computer by clicking on the box next to Full Text.

The library also has access to many subject-specific Social & Behavioral Sciences databases. Unfortunately, only some of these provide access to the full-text of the article. But it is important not to ignore them.

Finally, the library has access to many newspaper article databases, including Newspaper Source and Proquest Newspapers.

IV. Locate the articles

If the article is available as PDF Full Text in the article database you are using, download, email or print the article.

If the article is not available as PDF Full Text, click on the Linked Full Text or Find Full Text buttons to see if we have it in full-text in another database.

If there are no Linked Full Text or Find Full Text buttons, or if it says that no full-text is available when you follow any of the links, check the library's EJournals list to see if full-text for the journal containing the article is available in another article database. This list will also tell you if we subscribe to the journal in print format.

If the article is only available in print, do a Journal Alphabetical search in our Online Catalog to identify the call number for the print journal. Recent issues of print journals are shelved by call number in the Current Periodicals area on the Middle Level of the library at the south end. Earlier issues are shelved by call number in bound volumes on the Top Level of the library.

If the article is not available either online or in print, use ILLiad (our online Interlibrary Loan system) to request a copy of the article from another library. This usually takes 2 to 4 days.

V. Determine if the article is popular or scholarly

Use the following criteria to determine if the article represents scholarly research:

• Does it include a Methods section that describes such things as the independent and dependent variables; the population studied; and the methods used?
• Does it include a Literature Review that discussed previous research on the topic?
• Does it include a Results section that provides detailed information on the results of the research, including tables, charts, etc.?
• Does it include a Discussion section that discusses the results of the research?
• Does it include an extensive Bibliography or list of References Cited?

If you article doesn't fit these criteria, than it is most likely a popular magazine article.

You can also use the criteria found on the library's Scholarly vs. Popular Articles guide to help you determine if the article is popular or scholarly. You should also verify this with your instructor.

Need Help?

• Visit the Reference Desk or call  626-6415 and speak to a reference librarian
• Send an email to Dr. Kotter: wkotter@weber.edu
• Online reference help via email: Ask-A-Librarian Service