First,
review the Information
Cycle Tutorial (http://www.libraries.psu.edu/crsweb/instruction/ip/infocyle.htm).
The key to successful information retrieval is centered in a careful analysis
of the four phases of the information process – how information is produced,
communicated, stored, and retrieved. Understanding of this ‘information
cycle’ process allows the researcher to follow the information ‘trail’ appropriate
to the research question. Consider the range and value of information
that is produced by the academic community, government agencies, consumer
and community groups, professional associations, policymakers, special interest
groups, and the media and popular press, to your research question.
Each of these information ‘producers’ generates, communicates and disseminates
information in a specialized way, and each has different strengths and advantages
to inform the research process. Some researchers characterize these
information paths as patterns of discourse, or conversations within communities,
to reflect and emphasize important differences in the nature and dissemination
of information. This notion of discourse patterns is a useful way to
illustrate and remain mindful of the varieties of information types, and the
relative value of information produced and disseminated both within and outside
of the academic community.
Information
Production / Dissemination
Academic
/ Research / Professional Sources
A primary
responsibility of the academic community is to conduct original research or
to extend existing research to advance knowledge in the field. This information
is communicated through the scholarly communication process, primarily through
academic journals. Published by professional associations, university
presses, or traditional academic publishers, a prime criteria of scholarly journals is the peer review process,
the most rigorous of which is blind review, where experts in the field provide
anonymous feedback on accuracy, conclusions, findings, methodology, and effectiveness
of communication. Neither the author nor reviewer is known to each other.
Less rigorous within the review process is the editorial review, which relies
on members of the editorial board for manuscript review.All
professional communities have professional literature that is primarily concerned
with issues of practice, member benefits, continuing educational opportunities,
political issues that impact the profession, and more. These professional
and ‘trade’ publications are of keen interest to the profession, but are not
usually subject to the same rigorous review process as are research publications.
Dissertations
Dissertations
represent research completed in satisfaction of advanced degree requirements,
and are rarely published by the commercial press in their
original version. Dissertations are most readily available from
Dissertation Abstracts International, a cooperative program that gathers,
abstracts, sells, and offers many titles through a digital dissertations project.
Dissertations are a very valuable resource category because they represent
current interests, thinking, and methodologies being employed by a new generation
of researchers, and can help identify potential colleagues for future research.
They can also identify the institutions where a concentration of research
efforts may match an individual’s interests so that future employment or opportunities
may be explored.
The Invisible
College
An informal
but critical element of the scholarly communication process is sometimes called
the ‘invisible college’. This refers to personal networks and communities
of researchers interested in common questions, issues and methodologies.
Whereas this level of communication had historically remained within the closed
ranks of professional colleagues and academic mentors, the electronic environment
of listservs, discussion groups, and email has expanded
this network to a potentially global scale. Researchers can easily establish
contact with others with common interests, permitting more extensive communication
and collaboration to continue in more traditional, non-public forums.
Government
Sources
The United
States federal government is the largest
publisher in the world. State and local of government also publish extensively
for all areas within their jurisdiction and authority. Responsibility
to make information publicly available from executive agencies is assigned
to the U.S. Government Printing Office. Researchers should be aware
that the shift to electronic dissemination of information has not provided
for complete archiving of documents as was the case for printed versions.
This resulting gap in the ‘public record’ may prove to be a serious obstacle
to serious investigation of many areas. Government documents relevant
to study in the fields within education can be found in categories such as
testimony, legislation, statistics, agency reports, and special studies.
Many aspects of education policy, and workforce education
in particular, have been the focus of intense federal and state attention,
and a significant amount of the pertinent literature is found in government
publications. Central to successful retrieval of government information is
an underlying understanding of the structure of government agencies and the
legislative process.
Media and
Popular Press
The media
and popular press are responsible for investigating current events, and for
reporting and interpreting findings of the research community to the general
lay population. The news information provided through print, digital,
networked and broadcast outlets often represent sources of primary data. Authority
and reliability of the media is based on reputation. These publications
usually carry few of the traditional hallmarks of scholarly publication, such
as being written by experts in the field, a statement of author’s credentials,
bibliographies, and abstracts, but they are valuable as the record of how
important issues impact the general population, and how research findings
and issues are presented to the public at large.
The Internet
The Internet
provides the opportunity for anyone to post any information in any format
they choose. It has the potential to circumvent the established order
and authority of scholarly communication patterns provided by commercial and
academic publishers, and makes more difficult the process of critical evaluation
of information for novices or casual searchers. Internet sites can provide
an additional dimension to a literature search, but ought not
be relied upon exclusively. Critical evaluation criteria must be stringently
applied to information found on the web.
Information
Storage and Retrieval
Information
must be organized in a systematic fashion so that it can be efficiently retrieved.
If this is not accomplished, the information is lost to any future access.
Journal literature is indexed and abstracted by several groups: professional
organizations, commercial vendors, or, as in the case of education and medical
literature, the U.S.
government. While some databases rely exclusively on keyword access
[newspapers, for example], databases usually provide precise access through
‘controlled vocabulary’ or ‘thesauri’, whereby articles are assigned several
subject headings or ‘descriptors’, so that common topics are retrievable.
The degree of precision in the structure of the controlled vocabulary and
the consistency in application of subject terms varied significantly.
These differences in vocabulary across databases are a critical variable that
researchers must be vigilant to incorporate into an effective and successful
search strategy.Increasingly,
digital access to retrieval tools and to full text resources has fundamentally
altered habits and expectations surrounding the research process. Journals
published in print versions are now frequently offered in digital versions
for an additional cost. A small but increasing number of journals are
available exclusively in digital format as peer review processes become more
integrated and widely accepted in that environment. Total reliance
on electronic access is not a viable choice for most researchers since coverage
is unevenly distributed among subject disciplines, and because electronic
access has inherent time frame limitations relative to the entire body of
literature. A comprehensive literature search will often require use
of print indexes and abstracts, journals, reference resources, statistics,
and more, described in detail later in this chapter. The temptation
to limit research to the use of electronic resources can be strong, especially
by distant learners who have significant logistical constraints. But careful
researchers will not allow the availability and ease of electronic access
to be the primary criteria to determine the nature and direction of their
work.
Primary
vs. Secondary resources
Primary
sources are defined as un-interpreted sources of information, and can be a
very important part of a literature search. Primary sources allow you to examine
evidence firsthand without being affected by other opinions. Then, you are
able to draw comparisons between your assessments and the conclusions of others.Often,
'primary' resources are described by their formats - letters and diaries as
opposed to books, for example. However, it is more useful and accurate to
consider records in relation to the original event, as described below in
the Records Along the Time Line Chart (Stout,
1991).
