WRT106, 107 (also ACF, ESL) Information Literacy 2016 (Total time: 1 Hour)

Instructor: Associate Prof. Mark Jackson, Reference and Online Resources Librarian OR Assist. Prof. John Hinchcliffe, Reference and Systems Librarian


Learning Outcomes:
  • You will be able to use Google Scholar to find academic scholarly articles
  • You will be able to use databases to find academic scholarly articles

Google Scholar Books and the Internet are only one part of your research project. Often you will need to find a scholarly article, an article written by a scholar or professional addressing a specific topic, usually written for other scholars (or potential scholars), professionals and Higher Education students. Because of economic and copyright considerations you usually will NOT find these types of articles on the Web. You will need to use a database to find the article. Journals contain research articles or literary criticism that is usually more up-to-date than books.

Let's suppose our topic is media (including television, games, movies, etc.) violence and behavior of adolescents. For example, is there any correlation between media violence and adolescent behavior? What research has been conducted on this topic? We can use Google Scholar to search across hundreds of academic, scholarly publications!

  • General scholar searching (type words into the box) (media violence adolescent behavior: 238,000 results)
  • Searching for a phrase or a name (using quotes) ("media violence" adolescent behavior: 8,600 results)
  • Limiting date ranges (since 2009: 3,940 results)
  • Searching specific journals (adolescent: 39 results) OR (adolescence: 68 results)
  • Full text availability (look for the PDF or HTML document to the right of the results, note that it may not be full text)
  • Always click the Cited By link for additional relevant results
  • Always click the Related Articles link for additional relevant results
  • Always click on an Author Link for additional results

Databases Some databases are very specialized. For example PsycARTICLES is a database specifically for the discipline of psychology. CINAHL is a specialized database for nursing and allied health. The Literature Resource Center is a database for literature. Other databases, such as ProQuest and Academic Search are general multidisciplinary databases.

  • Searching by topic (subject term search)
  • Advanced searching
  • and / or operators in advanced search
  • Using database fields for your search (search in abstract, title, etc.)
  • Finding a specific article in the database using advanced search and fields (author and title) 
1. Does early childhood education affect learning outcomes?
2. Does the use of technology decrease medication errors?
3. Does television use affect the reading skills of children?
4. Does sleep deprivation affect academic performance?
5. Does multitasking affect learning outcomes?
6. Does texting affect accident rates and driving performance?
7. Does watching football affect family violence and aggressive behavior?
8. Does alcohol advertising promote adolescent drinking?
9. Does watching Internet porn affect dating behavior?
10. Do vaccines cause autism?
11. Does media-induced task-switching while studying affect learning?
12. Are violence and sex as advertising strategies effective?
13. How does media portrayal of african americans affect perceptions?
14. Is there a correlation between alcohol use by college students and the occurrence of date or acquaintance rape?
15. Does the number of hours worked by college students affect academic achievement?
16. Does portrayal of alcohol and drug use in the media affect adolescent behavior?
17. Does media influence eating disorders?
18. Is broken windows policing effective?
19. Does effective time management by college students lead to better academic performance?
20. How does gender (race, age, etc.) bias affect student evaluations of teaching?

If you have any questions or concerns, please feel free to contact Librarians mark_jackson@bloomfield.edu OR john_hinchcliffe@bloomfield.edu