How to do a Literature Search

Doing a Literature Review

  • Potential (good) sources for an academic paper:

    • EBSCO

    • ScienceDirect

    • JStor

Tips on Searching

  1. Define topic(s)

  2. Determine which search tools are the best

  3. Keep notes of search terms (keywords)

  4. Look over abstracts (summary)

  5. If no luck, change the keywords

Fixes

  • Not enough hits?

    • Check spelling and punctuation of search terms

    • use “wildcard” (usually an ‘*’) at the end of keywords that can have multiple endings

    • use synonyms

    • use “OR” search (adolescent* OR teen*)

    • Check the full useful hits for other references

  • Too many hits?

    • Use synonyms

    • Do “AND” or “NOT”

    • Limit search to abstract, perhaps the title

Reminder

  • ALL searches:

    • use ‘false’ or ‘controversy’ as keywords as well

      • avoids seeing only one side of issues