Information Resources and Your Information Needs - Assignment Example

Information Resources and Your Information Needs G1. The most important sources of information imperative to my research work are from the books, journals, thesis papers, conference papers and URL link information among other credible online information. The rationale for the importance of these sources of information is because of the different perspective that they present about the research work. In essence, in order for a research process to be fully complete a researcher has to consider a wide scope of sources which are not limited to books or journals but rather inclusive of all important sources especially with the presence of technological tools such as online databases that provides thousands of information. A research work also requires a literature review which states the relevant details from different authors who have done similar research; this provides the researcher a good platform to commence the research writing in details and also improve on the focus. This is the major rationale for choosing the different information sources that I have stated in this explanation. Search Strategy - Planning G2. The search strategy planning has a number of imperative things to consider when accessing relevant search to the topic of the research process. Some of the fundamental but essential things to remember and consider when planning a search strategy are as follows. 1. Taking time to read and think through the search strategy before beginning the search process is an important starting point. 2. Defining your topic well- this will be important in the selection of keywords to be uses in the search process. The keywords of phrases act as a summary to the information selected. Writing a paragraph of the research topic can be important in selecting the keywords for the research process, as an example of my research process, the paragraph used in the first assignment looks is as follows; ” The underlined words helped in creating keywords or phrases. 3. Defining the scope of the topic by year and language also helps in limiting the number of search; this is usually available in advanced search option. Search Strategy - Execution G3. 1. Begin your search- Most electronic databases allows linking of keywords using AND OR and AND NOT these are normally called Boolean operators. 2. Refining the search- since some databases my provides a large list of the results, it is imperative to refine the search by re-writing the keywords to focus more on the topic or by making the research more specific through the use of NOT operators. When the search finds too few results, it is appropriate to increase the search by increasing the year limit of publications, using truncation symbols like environ* or wildcards like *? And $. 3. Irrelevance- when the search results are irrelevant it is important to consider re-writing the keywords to be more relevant to the computer search operations or alternatively one can look for other online search databases. 4. It is also imperative to consider saving the search strategy you once used in order to save on time while accessing the same database again. Since many electronic databases allow users to save their search strategy, it is an important consideration as a researcher to ensure that the research is saved for future references. Collecting References and Compiling a Bibliography G4. There are a number of factors that are important to consider while collecting references and compiling a bibliography. Some of these considerations are as follows; 1. Creating a list of references and using in-text citation in the research works demonstrates sound academic skills because of the appreciation of the secondary sources and other authors. 2. Choosing the appropriate referencing style is another important factor to be considered before creating a list of bibliography. Some of the common referencing styles includes but not limited to APA, MLA and Harvard. 3. Ensuring that you adhere to the guideline of the chosen referencing style is also critical in ensuring that the compiled bibliography demonstrates sound academic knowledge. As an example, the authors names ought to start with family name followed by initials of the first name, followed by the publication year in an enclosed bracket then a full stop followed by the title of the article or book then the place of publication followed by the publisher in case of a book using Harvard referencing style. 4. It is also important to ensure that the list is alphabetical and also all the references used in the in-text citation. Read More