Isn’t research supposed to be EASIER with the advent of the Internet? Then why is it so hard to find that perfect piece of information for your journal article or textbook?
It’s hard because there are a couple of tricks you may not know..…yet. Those tricks (let’s call them “hints”) can help prevent junk information overload – and instead hone in on what you really need.
Anyone associated with higher education will acknowledge that tenure track faculty have to perform a fantastic balancing act. Compared to an administrative or line role in an organization, higher education faculty have tremendous autonomy and freedom. However, they face competing demands of many different (and good) opportunities, and for them the stakes are always high. Help is here! This article introduces a powerful strategy for staying on track in the research strand of this competitive journey.
Q: “How do you go about researching content for your textbook?”
A: Janet Belsky, author of Experiencing the Lifespan, 2e (2009):
“I go to a library database where I can get every single article on the topic I’m writing about in every journal in my field. If I am updating a book, I will only look for articles that were published from the time of the last edition to the present. This strategy gets me about 100 or 200 new articles for each chapter. I do a cursory look at everything, but I won’t need to read all of those articles.
