Now that you have a research topic in mind,
you will need to use the Libraries to find relevant
articles and books to help you explore your
topic and develop your own conclusions.
This short video will explore how to search
for materials from the Purdue Libraries'
general catalog
to help you in your research process.
There are always more details
and functionalities to learn about,
but this video will get you started with simple,
yet effective strategies
that you can use to locate relevant materials
across most databases
you may use during the research process.
Once you've considered the purpose and scope
of you research topic,
you can explore the Purdue Libraries' catalog
for interesting books, articles, data, and more
to incorporate into your research.
The catalog allows you to easily
tailor your searches to location the information
most relevant to your research needs.
You can access the catalog at
www.lib.purdue.edu.
Here you will find a simple search tool.
From the simple search box,
you can begin your background research on,
for example, Frankenstein.
The options from the drop-down menu to the left
of the simple search box
allow you to apply your search terms
to different material types,
such as books and media,
articles, and more.
The default "search all" option will
cast the widest net
to locate nearly all sources related
to your search terms across a variety
materials at Purdue,
including webpages,
research guides, and more.
You may wish to select the "Books and Media"
or "Articles" options to get started searching
for a topic,
so you know which kinds of materials will
be in your list of results.
Unlike Google's simple search interface,
the Libraries' catalog provides additional search
functionality with its advanced search option.
From this screen you can apply multiple
search terms and filters to your queries,
to locate the information you really need.
You can limit your search to all materials
that have been described by the authors
or publishers
to be specifically about Frankenstein
by selecting "Subject" from the drop-down menu.
The catalog's advanced search feature
allows you to apply additional search terms
to your query
such as "science" or "ethics"
to target materials about the original text
and how it raised issues related to
ethics of science that are still relevant today.
You can continue to modify your search
parameters using the facets located
on the left-side menu.
The "articles from Peer-reviewed journals"
option allows you to filter out
all materials that are not journal articles
that have been through a rigorous review
process by experts in a field.
This is a simple strategy to locate materials
that have been deemed credible within an
area of research.
However, it's always important to continue to
think critically about the arguments made and
findings produced in these sources
as you explore them more closely.
For more information about how to evaluate
different kinds of sources,
see Module 2: Evaluating Primary
and Secondary Sources.
Perhaps the scope your research excludes
scholarship from before a certain date.
The publication date facet allows you to limit
your list of results to materials published
between a specific date range.
The Libraries' catalog consolidates commonly
used keywords from the large list of results
and presents them in the Subject section.
Here you can find other potentially relevant
subject terms you may not have know about or
considered applying to your search.
By selecting the checkbox to the left
of the additional subject term and
selecting the "Apply Filters" button,
you can add those subject terms
to your query without typing them manually
into the search fields at the top of the screen.
You can always tell which filters you have
applied to your query
by examining the Active Filters section at the top
of the available facets menu.
To reset your search to the search terms
you started out with, simply click
the "reset filters" button in blue.
Feel free to explore the many other facets
along the left-side menu
that you can apply to your search in the catalog.
Once you have found a source that looks
relevant to your research topic,
you can find out more information about it
by clicking the source's title in blue.
Here you will be brought to an item-level record.
Scrolling down the page
or selecting the "Details" section
from the left-side navigation menu
will display more information,
such as the title, author,
list of subject terms,
publication source,
date information,
a short description of the item, and more.
As you look through these, you can learn more
about the source and consider how it will
enhance your understanding of
your research topic.
You can consider what kind of item it is,
and whether that will help you
gather the information you need
at this stage in your research;
who the author is,
and whether you want to explore more articles
or books the author has written;
what other subject terms are associated with
and whether you want to incorporate
those terms
into an additional search on your topic;
what this source is about
by reading the abstract,
and whether the additional details about the
purpose, analysis, and findings of the source
will help progress your research.
As you apply different kinds of queries
and begin to learn more
about your research topic
from the catalog record for each source,
make sure you record
the details of your searches,
such as the search terms and
the facets you applied,
and how helpful they were.
Documenting your search process
and the usefulness of the results sources
will help you avoid redundant
or less effective searching as you continue
to collection and evaluate information
for your research paper over time.
In this brief video, we explored
different strategies for searching for materials
in the Purdue Libraries' catalog.
We explored the simple and
advanced search options,
as well as the faceted search options,
before examining record level information
for relevant sources.
These strategies can easily be used in
other databases available through the Libraries
to help you locate information
for a research project.
You will learn more about picking and accessing
a subject-specific database in the final
video in Module 1.
For additional help with finding relevant sources
for a research project,
please visit the Purdue Libraries
Ask a Librarian page
at www.lib.purdue.edu/help/askalib.