1. Library Research Workshop
CMPT 105W
Library Research Workshop
Handout: 6 slides with space for notes. Plus: examples of search results + articles.
Holly Hendrigan
Applied Sciences Librarian,
SFU Surrey

2. Researching your topic Evaluating your sources Getting help
The plan
Finding your topic
Researching your topic
Evaluating your sources
Getting help
Questions (at any time)

3. CMPT 105W: Research guide

4. Finding your topic

5. Finding your topic
You will be writing two different papers about the same applied science topic.
An informative paper
A persuasive paper
The topic must have
“a significant social, environmental, or ethical dimension”
“an area of controversy associated with it”

6. Start Literature Search Change Focus Start writing Modify Focus Write
Inspired Idea
Change Focus
More Research
Start writing
Modify Focus
Note that you are first writing the informative paper but you are probably going to run into various positions and arguments on the topic, so save yourself some time and document where you have looked and what you have found.
Write
Bit more research
Hand In

7. Finding your topic Don’t forget that it must have
Would any of these work for both an informative and a persuasive paper on an applied science topic?
3D TVs
Driverless Vehicles
Internet of Things
Facebook and Fake News
Don’t forget that it must have
“a significant social, environmental, or ethical dimension”
“an area of controversy associated with it”

8. First place: News Sources (Google Search)
Search: BBC Russia facebook in Google

9. News Sources (News databases)
News sources: possibly a place for different positions on a topic.

10. Academic Encyclopedias
Informative paper, primarily, but often frames the debate as well

11. Books: Library website
eg internet: middle column will retrieve books

12. Books: Technical e-book collections
Safari Tech Books Online
Springer Lecture Notes in Computer Science (LNCS)

13. Researching your topic
Two keys to finding what you want:
1. Good words to use for your search
2. Good places to search

14. 1. Good words
Smartphones: smart phones, cell phones, telecommunication, computers—social aspects—human-computer interaction

15. 2. Good places
You want to find authoritative sources to support your work.
Wikipedia: big no-no in academic citations. Activity: go back to Hazel’s google search (employee monitoring)

16. Researching your topic
journal articles
books summarize recent research
textbooks, reference books, encyclopedias

17. Researching your topic: journal articles
Sample persuasive topic:
Internet addiction is (or isn’t) a serious problem

18. 1. Library Search
Second column in Library Search searches books

19. 2. Journal Article Databases: CMPT 105 guide

20. Suggested source: Academic Search Complete
Social media use leads to depression. Do keyword, subject searches

21. Evaluating your sources
You’ll want to find authoritative sources on your topic.
Are either of the articles on your sheet scholarly articles?
How can you tell?
How can you use one scholarly article to find additional relevant sources?
Handout: fake news

22. Evaluating your sources
Popular
Scholarly
Author
No affiliation provided
Affiliated with an academic / research institution
Abstract No
Yes
Length
Short
Long
Images
For aesthetic appeal
Research findings displayed as graphs, charts, etc.
Language
Easy to understand
Elevated, specialized
Citations
None at all, or very few
Yes, many
Review
Editor
Peer-reviewed
You can also evaluate these elements for websites and other documents.

23. Citing sources What information don’t you need to cite?
What information do you need to cite?
Elicit from students what doesn’t need to be cited (i.e. your own ideas; common knowledge). Everything else needs to be cited for a number of reasons (i.e. to give credit to authors; to show you’ve done research; to show you can paraphrase/quote/etc.; to show you can cite using a specific style).

24. Also on CMPT 105W research guide
Citing your sources
Links to IEEE and APA guides
Presentation resources
Link to SFU Library’s “Business Presentations” page, which includes a variety of excellent resources
Avoiding plagiarism tutorial
Link to SFU Library’s “Understanding and Avoiding Plagiarism” online tutorial

25. Getting help The library provides many ways to get help:
- In-person at the reference desk
- Telephone -
- IM
- Text message
- Student Learning Commons