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Advanced Research

Course Number: MU701

Library
Models of Research

Kovaleski, M. K. (2021). The feasibility of a music listening intervention on the incidence, severity, and duration of delirium in the older acute care patient: A feasibility trial (Publication No. 28414859) [Doctoral dissertation, Duquesne University]. ProQuest Dissertations and Theses Global. 

  • See pg. 6 for literature search
  • see page 23 for search strategies

Lee, J. (2015). The effects of music on pain: A review of systematic reviews and meta-analysis (Publication No. 3703017) [Doctoral dissertation, Temple University]. ProQuest Dissertations and Theses Global. 

  • see page 61 for literature search
  • see page 302 for search strategies
Database searching tips
  1. Tutorial: Developing a research question: for graduate students
  2. Consider word variations and synonyms
    • think about how others might refer to your ideas
    • e.g., child death, perinatal death, neonatal death, stillbirth, sudden infant death, etc.
  3. Consider search tactics

 

What is the tactic?

What does the tactic do?

Examples

Boolean AND

Use AND to ensure that all terms appear in every search result.

depression AND home care

Boolean OR

Use OR to ensure that at least one term appears in every search result.

auditory OR acoustic OR sound

Phrase searching

Use quotation marks to find more than one term in a row.

vibroacoustic therapy

Truncation

Use an asterisk* at the end of a term to include multiple endings. (sometimes $)

trauma*

trauma, traumatic, traumatically, traumatize, traumatized, traumatizing

Wildcard

Use a question mark ? within a term to search for variations of a single character.

decoloni?e

decolonize, decolonise

Proximity

Use NEAR/n to search for terms within n words of each other (sometimes ADJ/n)

"music therapy" NEAR/5 child* OR adolescent*

Tutorial: Better searching using AND, OR, NOT 

  1. Employ search limiters (available limiters depend on the database)
    • peer reviewed, article type, date
    • e.g, in PsycInfo, can include: age group, population group, methodology
  2. Identify key publications and authors
    • note citations, and cited references, repeated author names
  3. Document and track everything you do in the steps above
Articles

Tutorial: Finding scholarly articles on a topic

Search in Omni

  • limit to "Articles" and "Peer-reviewed journals"
  • article content in Omni is not chosen or curated, but dumped in, i.e, it may not have everything on a particular topic.

Researchers rely on curated collections of content according to discipline

Other interdisciplinary subject databases that may be helpful depending on your topic

Other considerations

Books and ebooks

Tutorial: Finding books in Omni
Tutorial: Requesting books from other libraries in Omni

Predatory journals

Google and Google Scholar index anything, including predatory journals

Predatory journals are a global threat. They accept articles for publication — along with authors’ fees — without performing promised quality checks for issues such as plagiarism or ethical approval. (Grudniewicz, A., Moher, D., Cobey, K. D., Bryson, G. L., Cukier, S., Allen, K., & Ardern, C. (2019). Predatory journals: no definition, no defence. Nature, 576(7786), 210+)

If in doubt, confirm if a resource is indexed in a reputable database like Omni or subject-specific database, e.g., RILM.

Research methodologies

Grant, M., & Booth, A. (2009). A typology of reviews: an analysis of 14 review types and associated methodologies. Health Information and Libraries Journal, 26(2), 91–108. https://doi.org/10.1111/j.1471-1842.2009.00848.x

Dissertations and Theses 

Dissertations and theses may be considered scholarly sources since they are closely supervised by a dissertation committee made up of scholars, are directed at an academic audience, are extensively researched, follow research methodology, and are cited in other scholarly work.

However, dissertations are still considered student work and are not peer-reviewed. Always clarify with your instructor as to whether you can include and cite dissertations and theses in your research.

Managing your citations

Page Owner: Greg Sennema

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