Subscription
databases in the Library
Issues
and Controversies is
a database that focuses on information regarding heavily debated
contemporary political and social issues. Each topic is treated in an
unbiased manner that presents different sides of the issue at hand. Issues
and Controversies is a professional, objective resource that will provide you
with an excellent introduction to your topic. Also recommended is
CQ
Researcher , also
is a highly-respected, very useful current-events resource that contains
information on topics ranging from social issues to politics, education, and the
environment. The coverage is very in-depth and includes a chronology of the
topic and pro and con arguments.
ProQuest
Direct is a database consisting of citations, abstracts and in many
cases full-text articles from over ten thousand publications,
including
magazines, journals and
newspapers.
It is available on all Web-accessible college computers and may be
accessed
from your home computer by acquiring a password from the library. You may save the articles by printing them out, downloading to
diskette, or emailing them to your account. You may search for you topic by using the
Topics list (the default page that you see when you open ProQuest, the Basic search for more
simple searching or and the Advanced Search, which will provide you with more
options for combining different search fields (such as author, publication
title, or geographic location) together. Below is an example of a
search conducted from the Topics option:
Note that you will have a number of options listed. Too see the
articles for each subtopic select "View documents". Listed below are the results
for Political finance AND Bipartisan Campaign Reform Act 2002-US
From this results page you may
mark selected articles for printing or emailing. Simply check the box next to
the article title. By clicking on the "My Research" folder you may email the
articles or format your bibliography.
Please see a librarian if you have questions about using
ProQuest or need the off-campus access codes for the library's databases.
The World Wide Web
The
Internet can be an incredible research tool, if you use it with care. When using
the numerous subject guides and search engines you have at your disposal, it is
important to recognize the qualitative differences between them:
General
subject guides such as those
on portals like Yahoo tend to organize the information into a hierarchical structure, dividing the
information into categories and subcategories. The Web sites that are featured
on these guides run the range from commercial sites, personal Web pages, and
academic pages created by college professors. Yahoo’s index makes no
distinction between them. To make your search results more exact- for example,
if you want to search only for web pages created by academic institution- you
will need to utilize a real search engine like
Google
. Search engines utilize programs called robots or
spiders to create huge indexes consisting of millions of Web pages. On a search
engine you have the capability to restrict your findings by domain name (.edu,
.com, .gov) and exact date of creation. To make things easier you may want to
take advantage of Google's
Uncle
Sam search engine, which will automatically restrict you to governmental web
pages.
There
also exist specialized general subject guides that have been created by
subject experts such as government agency members, researchers and college professors. Utilizing these
specialized guides may in many cases be your best bet for finding quality
information for your research.
Example:
FirstGov: a Web portal that is strictly focuses on government resources. All of the Web
pages you will be linked to from this site have been created by government
officials or agencies. Because your results are restricted to governmental
web pages, you may want to consider using this tool when conducting
political research.
Please see a librarian regarding passwords for the
above-mentioned databases or if you have any questions regarding the information
covered in this research
guide. To learn about how to
properly cite the information found in both print and electronic resources,
please see the MLA
or APA research
guides.
Back
to list of Library Research Guides
