Literature Searching

Useful things to make your (academic) life easier

Housekeeping

• How’s it going?

• Any questions so far?

• Can you find your recommended reading?

• Do you know who to contact for help?

• Library Subject Guides?

Getting started

By tableatny (BXP135671) [CC-BY-2.0 (http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/2.0)], via Wikimedia Commons

Access from myUniHub > My Study page > My Library > Library Subject Guides

Hover your mouse over Resources to see pages on specific topics, e.g. Finding Journal Articles

Starting your search

Summon

Searches journals, books and more

Good starting point for a basic search

NOT specific to sport!

Doesn’t do specific or complex searching

Refine, refine, refine

Full text online

Scholarly & peer review

Journal Articles only

Discipline,

e.g. recreation & sports

Date range

What are you looking for?

• Briefly summarise your topic

(doesn’t have to be detailed)

• Can you sum up your topic in only 5 words? 3 words?

Keywords• Brainstorm – it will save you time later!

• Searching one word for your concept will not necessarily bring you all the results! And sometimes none.Not everyone uses the same terminology for one idea

• Can use the worksheet if you like (also helps you organise how to combine the terms with ‘AND’ or ‘OR’)

Planning your search - keywords

1. Pick out your concepts and separate them

–Concentration, performance, tennis etc

2. Think of other words that are different from your key words but represent similar concepts

–Attention control, focus, attentional strategies, racket/racquet sports etc

Planning your search - keywords

3. Be Prepared

Think of narrower words that fit into your topic and wider concepts that your topic fits into.

You will often need to:

A. widen your search by using larger terms or concepts to produce more results

OR

B. narrow your search if you produce too many results, by using more specific terms that fit into your concept

• NOTE: if you narrow or widen ALL your concepts you will make your life too hard – choose one or two

concentration

• Concentrat*

• Attention

• Focus

• “Attention control training”

• “Attentional strategies”

performance

• Ways of measuring performance

• Perform*

tennis• Racket sports

• Type of competition

What research has

been conducted on

improving

concentration and

performance in

tennis players?

Specific egs

• Specific groups of athletes

•Age?

•Gender?

•Level – elite etc?

Back to your topic

• Narrow it down to some key words

• Swap with your neighbour – add some they haven’t thought of

AND / OR.....WHY?

Key databases for Sport

• Sport Discus

• Medline / PubMed

• PsycInfo

• Science Citation Index

• Science Direct

Sport Discus

• After a short demo...

• Try searching for some articles on your topic

• Use the ‘check for full text’ links

...is free and full of stuff!

Personalising Google Scholar• Did you know you can set up Google Scholar to link

to everything you have paid access to through the University?

• Google Scholar > Settings

Personalising Google Scholar…

• Click on Library Links on left hand side

• Search for and select Middlesex University, then Save

Searching Google Scholar

Getting Full text of journal articles

• MyUniHub > My Study > My Library to log you in

• If you’re not lucky… REMEMBER – it won’t always be directly available to you – especially at MSc level

• Double-check (library catalogue)

• Google Scholar

• Authors’ & institutions’ websites

• Researcher networks (e.g. ResearchGate), contacting authors

• Inter-Library Loans

Getting Full text of journal articles

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• Troubleshooting guide can be found here – http://libguides.mdx.ac.uk/accessingelectronicresources

• If you’re not lucky… REMEMBER – it won’t always be directly available to you – especially at MSc level– Double check the library catalogue by copying journal name into the ‘journal

search’. If we have it there’ll be a record and a link with the dates we have access to.

– Go to Google Scholar and look for PDF signs, check ‘all x versions’– Search for Author’s website/institution’s repository, often they have uploaded

a pre-publication version– ResearchGate, Academia.edu…– Emailing authors– Order a copy via the inter-library loan service (you’ll be emailed with a link to

a PDF) (£3.00 added to your library account)http://unihub.mdx.ac.uk/study/library/resources/ill/index.aspx

Citation indexes

• Which articles have cited an earlier article

• Find articles on similar/related subject

• How many times an article has been cited

• Best journals in your field

Google Scholar citations

Science Citation Index

Staying up to date in your area

• Most of the databases have an option to set up an account, so you can save searches and set up alerts or RSS feeds for new articles

Staying up to date – citation alerts• In Science Citation Index

• For articles significant to your work/dissertation – get an alert when it is cited in new research

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Attribution

Referencing tools

• Cite Them Right

• Flow

• Mendeley

Shows you how to reference just about any source using Harvard referencing style

Other referencing styles e.g. APA are available for the main resource types

Access via MyUniHub / Subject guides

Online site to manage references, subscribed to by the University

Access through the Databases list on MyUniHub

Generate your references in many different styles – including journals

Help available on Subject Guides

Freely available software

Online and desktop versions

BOTHStore and annotate PDF files

Available to you after you’ve left MDX

Share references and notes with groups

Need help?

• Librarians in the Study Hub (1st floor of Sheppard Library) during core hours Mon-Fri

• Ask a Librarian http://askalibrarian.mdx.ac.uk/• SES Library Subject Guide – Jo’s contact details and

presentations/helpsheetshttp://libguides.mdx.ac.uk/sport