MATERIALS

You've chosen a topic. NO? Go back to Choosing Your Topic.

After the topic, your next decision is about sources of information. Do you want books, or articles? Essays or encyclopedias? Does your topic have a historical bent, so that older material would work, or do you need the most current information to do your topic justice? Can you use materials you find on the Internet? How will you determine if the information is accurate?

The research you need depends on your topic and the nature of your paper. A freshman English class may not expect the same level of research that is demanded of a graduate level architecture student. Most assignments ask for a combination of sources. If you do not understand what is meant by primary and secondary sources, these sites will help clear it up for you:

Primary vs. Secondary Sources from Bowling Green State University

Library Research Using Primary Sources from UC Berkeley Library

Online databases often cause confusion for students. These are collections of journal articles to which a library may subscribe. Using one of these databases is NOT the same as using a search engine and finding any Web page on the Internet. The journal publisher contracts with the database vendor to provide copies of articles to the database as the article is published. Getting an article through a database is the same as having the journal in your hand and finding an article that way. Instead of subscribing to hundreds of titles, the Library can subscribe to a database provided by a vendor which has the titles available online.

The Internet has its own set of issues, and separating the good from the bad on the Web isn't always easy. Here are some sites that can help:

Evaluating Quality on the Net by Hope N. Tillman,Director of Libraries, Babson College

Evaluating Web Pages from University of California at Berkeley

Another issue to keep in mind is copyright. In most cases, if properly cited, you can use material for educational purposes. If you want to quote material or print an image for use in a paper, with proper citations, you may do so; you may not take a quote you like and put it on T-shirts to sell. For more information on copyright, see:

The UT System Crash Course in Copyright

US Copyright Office, Copyright Basics

A word about plagiarism. Many of you understand that you cannot copy a chapter out of a book or a paragraph out of an article without citing it. This holds true for material found on the World Wide Web as well. If you have questions about plagiarism, or just need a refresher, see:

What is Plagiarism?

Plagiarism Tutorial

For information on ethical practices in particular professions, see:

AIA Code of Ethics and Professional Conduct

ASLA Code of Professional Ethics

Ethics for the Certified Planner

Now you are ready to go to Where Do I Look? and learn about where to find the tools you'll need. Of course, you can always go back to Choosing Your Topic, if you need to do so.

Research Methods