Transcript Research Topics and Terms - United States University

42. Research topics & Terms
References:
1. Langan, J. (2008). Exploring writing: paragraphs and essays. New York,
NY: McGraw Hill Companies, Inc.
Publication Manual of the American Psychological
2. Oshima, A. & Hogue, A. (2006). Writing Academic English. White Plains,
NY: Pearson Education, Inc
3. Publication Manual of the American Psychological Association. (2010).
Washington, DC: American Psychological Association.
Perhaps you need to know the
importance of the research topic:
1. A research topic is the topic sentence of
the paragraph
2. A topic sentence = states the main idea of
the paragraph (contains a subject & a
verb) + controlling idea (that announces
the specific area to be discussed)
3. The main idea or thesis statement appears
in the introductory paragraph
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Defining the essay and paragraph
Essay definition according to Langan, J.
(2008, p.243):
• An essay, it is a paper of several paragraphs,
• The main idea is called the thesis statement
or thesis sentence
• The thesis statement appears in the
introductory paragraph.
• The thesis statement is developed in the
supporting paragraphs, (see next slides).
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m
Paragraph definition according to Oshima, A. &
Hogue, A. (2006, p.2):
• A paragraph is a group of related sentences that
discuss one main idea. It can be from 1 to 10
sentences, however, the paragraph should be
long enough to develop the main idea clearly.
• The paragraph is mark by indenting the first
word 5 spaces from the left margin
m
According to Oshima, A. & Hogue, A. (2006, p.3) a
paragraph contains :
• A topic sentence states the main idea of the paragraph
(contains a subject & a verb) + controlling idea
(announces the specific area to be discussed)
• A supporting sentence supports the topic sentence by
developing the main idea.
• The concluding sentence ends the paragraph by
rounding up what was said in the paragraph.
Having a clear idea of what do you need
to do ?
• You need to start with a paragraph that
contains a topic sentence (subject + verb) +
controlling idea that announces the specific
area to be discussed
• Your topic has to satisfy the requirements of
your course, but also be an exciting topic to
learn
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Start with some actions:
1. You need to focus on the assignment
2. Think about the point you want to make
3. Write your point in the first sentence, your
topic sentence
4. Lets start searching for terms and sub-terms
or subjects
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For example :
Terms
1.
2.
3.
4.
5.
6.
7.
Fairy tales
Healthcare
Management
Tribes, Reservations
Evolution
Drug abuse
Electronic Resources
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Sub-terms
1.
2.
3.
4.
5.
6.
7.
Snow White, Cinderella,
Hospitals, nursing homes
Hospitals, healthcare
California, Missions
Species, man, mammals
Teens, adolescents
Journals, books, images,
maps
More examples :
1.
2.
3.
4.
5.
6.
7.
8.
Escherichia coli
Hispanics
Endocrine
Nutrition
United States
Mohawk Indian
Policy & politics
Beauty & the beast
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1.
2.
3.
4.
5.
6.
7.
8.
Research
Health care
Disorders
Elderly
Industrial Revolution
Traditions
Healthcare
Beaumont
Electronic sources where you can find
terms, sub-terms, keywords, etc.
1. Books related to the subject
2. Articles from academic databases
3. Google scholar
4. Merriam-Webster dictionary
5. Encyclopedia Britannica
6. Synonyms
Note: Select the above electronic resources
and save the link in “bookmark this page”
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Where to look ?
• Books:
– Go to the last pages, look for the index or glossary, and
search your terms
– Read the introduction, you may find good ideas for your
topic
– Or in Google books look for the book reviews or select Free
books
– From the book: Cultural competence in Health: a guide for
professionals, by Wen-Shing Tseng
• See the Index see example, Page 134:
• Culturally competency, 12, 17, 128
• Cultural empathy, 128
• Culture guidance, 129
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An example from EBSCO
• Articles:
– Read the abstract
– Look the keywords,
subject terms
– Learn the terms
definitions from
internet-look for
academic sources like
Merriam-Webster
Dictionary
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• From: Effect of protein
intake on bone and
muscle mass in elderly:
• Subject terms
• Muscular atrophy
• Prevention
• Bones-metabolism
• Osteoporosis
• Amino acids
• Nutrition- requirements
Databases
• EBSCO is the provider of most of US
UNIVERSITY Online Full text databases
• EBSCO databases have subject terms
indexes
• EBSCO Multidisciplinary “Academic Search
Premier ” is one of the main databases
• Next, we will learn how to access terms and
keywords
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First we need to access the USU DATABASES
1. Go to http://www.usuniversity.edu
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2. Click on Student Services from the USU Home page.
Scroll down
& look for
the database
or source
Click
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By scrolling
down you will
find more
databases &
important
links. Take a
moment to
open all the
links, they
cover local,
regional,
national and
global
information.
Some links will
ask you for ID
& passwords,
others are
open access or
free. Now click
in Academic
Search Premier
Full Text
(EBSCO)
3. For User ID and password, send an email to
Librarian, from your US University e-mail.
[email protected]
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Let’s search for terms in Academic Search Premier
• Click in “subject terms” and start searching
for words- nouns-keywords. For example,
for Electronic Resources (information
resources) use “Electronic information
resource ”,
• Think what term, subject or noun you
would like to search
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The presentation is similar when searching EBSCO databases: Medline,
Eric, PsycArticles, Cochrane, Cinahl, Business Source Elite & Academic
Search Premier
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See where I wrote the term or
subject to be search, please write
your term. Now click the Browse
button and see the results listed
• I clicked in “Electronic information resources
searching”, to see all the sub terms. Then I
clicked in the same term above and retrieved a
list of terms: broader, narrower, related and used
for. Perhaps you will have to go through the list
and select the term or nouns more close to your
research topic
• From the list select more specific terms
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Click in the subject term
of your interest
1.
2. Change OR for AND, then
click Add
If you were interested in
searching, you select as many
terms as you need
Once the terms
appeared, click “search”
For example, I clicked: “Federated
searching”, AND “Search engines”
AND “Electronic information
resources”
From the above list of terms, you can
select your topic of research ;
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Information retrieval
Assisted searching
Boolean searching
Federated searching
Information- seeking strategies
Internet searching
Keyword searching
Search engines
Electronic information resources
Online databases
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Remember, you need to combine terms (the topic of your sentence)
with other terms (controlling idea)
1. Think of the terms from the list as the
“topic of your sentence”
2. And the new terms that announces the
specific area to be discussed as the
“controlling idea”
3. Let’s combine the terms in the next slide
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Terms from previous slide (blue background)
and new terms in white background:
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Information retrieval
Assisted searching
Boolean searching
Federated searching
Information- seeking
strategies
Internet searching
Keyword searching
Search engines
Electronic information
resources
Online databases
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Electronic resources
Academic libraries
Databases
Information retrieval
Internet searching
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Federated searching
Information retrieval
Educational technology
Literacy
User
Terms examples to give you ideas:
1. Electronic
Resources
2. Fairy tales
3. Healthcare
4. Management
5. Informatics
6. Evolution
7. Drug abuse
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1. Information
retrieval
2. Snow White
3. Quality services
4. Human resources
5. Patient records
6. DNA
7. Pregnancy
Are you ready to define your terms or subject
for your research topic?
1. By searching “subject terms” you are
learning the database vocabulary
2. You can also search the database, see
the titles from the result list and click
in the title to read the abstract
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Examples:
• Perhaps you want to learn more about
a specific topic and see the availability
of academic full text literature
• Select as many terms as you need or
select only one, for example “federated
searching” and see the results
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Do you
remember how
to ask for APA ,
MLA citation ?
Read the abstract, it will
help you selecting your
research topic
Let us know if you
need assistance
Catalina Lopez
clopez@usuniversity or
(619) 477 6310 Ext 2017
THANKS
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