FYS Academically Speaking: The Why of College

This guide is a great place to start your First-Year seminar research. Use the tabs across the top of the guide to explore article, book and Web resources. Remember that these are only some of the sources that may be useful to you.  Please contact me, Josh Cohen, for help with any of your research, at x1453, cohenjp@etown.edu or e-mail AskUs.

Photo by CDC on Unsplash

Be persistent in your searching.

Try both keyword and subject searching

Narrow a search by using subject headings. Locate subject headings by looking at the descriptors associated with pertinent articles and books.

Try these tips to narrow your search.

Try synonyms (AIDS or Acquired Immune Deficiency Syndrome). Can't think of any synonyms? Try an online thesaurus. Try these tips to expand your search

Try both singular and plural forms of words (use a "+" sign in SocSciAbs to search both singular and plurals e.g. religion+). Use an "*" in Academic Search Premier to get a variety of word endings.

If searching a compound word, try it as one word and as two words (e.g. rain forest or rainforest) to see which retrieves the most useful results.

If searching a term with an internal dash, search the term in each database with and without the internal dash (e.g. x-ray vs. x ray) to see which retrieves the most useful results.