English Research Process: Topics/Keywords

Defining a topic

Before you start to search for any information spend some time thinking about your search terms and your topic.  

There are a couple of tips to make your life easier:

  • state your topic as a question: What are the effects of raising the minimum wage on the economy? OR By what amount should the minimum wage be raised?
  • identify the main concepts (aka keywords): What are the effects of raising the minimum wage on the economy? OR By what amount should the minimum wage be raised
  • brainstorm for synonyms for the concepts
  • right-size your topic

Right-sizing Your Topic

When picking a subject to research, it's important to make sure you choose a topic that's the right size.  One of my tricks for finding a specific research project in a large subject area is to ask myself "what about it interests me?" two or three times.  This generally leaves me with a research topic on which I can write a good 5 - 10 page paper.

For example, if you're interested in Environmental Issues, the pattern might go like this:

What about enviromental issues interests me?    I'm interested in fracking.
What about fracking interests me? I'm interested in how fracking pollutes the water.
What about water pollution from fracking interests me?   I'm interested in how it effects public health.

The final search statement from this series of questions is," How does pollution from fracking affect public health?"  At the same time you've been developing your research questions, you've also created a list of keywords with which to start your research.

For more information on creating search strategies, follow this link: http://info-skills.lib.vt.edu/developing_search/index.html

Selecting Keywords

Selecting Keywords
Think about any time recently where you have searched for information.  You may have been looking for something for school, or you may have been looking up something like movie times at the Lyric.  Where did you go for this information?  I'm betting you went to Google (hey, that's where I usually start when I have a question)!  Next, think about what you typed in as you searched for your information.  Perhaps it was something like "show times at the Lyric in Blacksburg, VA."  While typing in a whole sentence or statement like this works in Google, this strategy doesn't work as well in library databases.  

Library databases work best when you choose a few words that represent or describe the information that you're looking for.  That way, the databases can try to find articles that match up with the words that you've entered into the database.  

But, how do you know which words to choose, and how many you should use to search with?  

 

 

 

Brainstorming