Nursing Resources &

Research Tutorial: Distance

Learners

Instruction, Reference & Distance Education

Librarian

Seth M. Porter

Tutorial Outline

Learning Outcomes

Evaluating Information

The Research Process

Searching Tips

Research Resources

Nursing Specific Resources

Organizational Resources & Tools

Contact Information

LEARNING OUTCOMES

Students will be able to explain the difference between scholarly and non-scholarly research resources

Students will be able to demonstrate the use of research resources

Students will be able to list subject specific nursing databases

Students will utilize search strategies and resources discussed to begin article research for their academic needs

Evaluating information• When you pull an article, book or

journal you want to make sure it is

relevant to you and your specific

information needs.

• This could mean a lot of different

things depending on the research

topic.

• Regardless of your research needs an

easy way to make sure your

information quality is appropriate is to

make sure it passes the “CRAAP” Test

• For example if your needs involve a

Peer Reviewed academic article, it

would most likely pass the CRAAP

test without critical investigation. But if

you found a great Health/Nursing

article on the open web or even a

blog, you would want to make sure it

passes as well as doing more due

diligence on the author to check their

creditability

Use this

worksheet

as a way to

test your

information

resources.

Information Gathering: The research

process

1. Identify Information resources to access: E.G, Specific

Databases, Journals and more.

2. Break down research idea or topic into searchable

phrases

3. Identify Keywords to search

4. Use AND to Connect Search Terms for a more specific

retrieval process

5. Use OR with alternative keywords for a larger but less

precise information recall

Search tips Potential

Research idea: How to deal with the

emotionally draining effects of tending for the patients under a nurses care; what are the most effective coping procedures for nurses?

Break down the idea or research topic into keywords, EG:

Emotional effects, coping procedures, nurses, patients

Use synonyms when searching to retrieve better results

Use technical and subject specific professional terms when applicable

Searching Tips

• Have you ever found an article that

was perfect?

• Wish you had more just like it? With a

little research you will.

• Footnote chasing is the act of

finding citations and references in

your current article and using these

articles for your research.

Chase those Footnotes

INFORMATION RESOURCES

Books & Journals:

http://librarycatalog.uah.edu

ILLIAD: http://libguides.uah.edu/ill

Libraryguides:

http://libguides.uah.edu/nursing

OneSearch: http://www.uah.edu/library

Print & General Resources

ONESEARCH WALK THROUGH

When you visit the Library web page one of the first things you will see is the

Big search box called OneSearch

OneSearch is a relatively new feature which searches the majority of our

Databases, journals, and catalog at one time

This is great place to begin your research, but don’t end it here. OneSearch is so

big it will retrieve a lot of information which isn’t pertinent to your research

needs. Begin here with a quick search and see if you can find anything relevant and

then move onto a subject specific database

The next few slides will be a walk through and tutorial of using OneSearch. Most

Databases are designed similarly and if you can access information on Onesearch

you can access it anywhere.

Simply enter your research topic into the search

interface. Use Keywords for a better result.

If the article has a blue “Find it at UAH” we have

access to the article, often in full-text which is

accessible from your computer

On the left

side you can

limit your

search to

full text (which

means it will

only Retrieve

articles

accessible

fully online),

Peer reviewed,

date and more.

This is a great

way to narrow

your search

and make it

more relevant.

The article in its full form is available as a PDF.

The abstract is an overview of

the article. Always read the

abstract first to see if the article

is relevant to your needs.

Full text version

of the article will

be placed here.

This is the tools bar which lets you

create a folder for your articles, print,

email, save, cite and more with your

information. Most databases have this

feature. Keep an eye out because they

are valuable tools.

General Databases

• Academic Search Complete

• Wiley Online Library

• Opposing viewpoints

• JSTOR

• Google Scholar

Remember you can access this information remotely!

General Databases cont.

• Academic Search Complete

• Academic Search Complete is a valuable and comprehensive scholarly, multi-disciplinary

full-text database. The best database for general or multi-disciplinary research

• Opposing Viewpoints

• One-stop source for information on social issues. Access viewpoint articles, topic

overviews, statistics, primary documents, links to websites, and full-text magazine and

newspaper articles

• JSTOR• JSTOR provides page images of back issues of the core scholarly

journals in the humanities and social sciences from the earliest issues

to within a few years of current publication. This is great for general

research

Specific Nursing Databases

• CINAHL (Cumulative Index to Nursing &

Allied Health Literature)

• PubMed

• Alt Health Watch Health Reference Center

Academic

• OVID

• PsycARTICLES

Specific Nursing Databases

cont.• CINAHL (Cumulative Index to Nursing & Allied Health

Literature)

• Is a comprehensive nursing specific database. This will be your go to

research resource as a nursing researcher. It includes searchable

cited references including an advanced searching tool which makes it

possible to pull articles written specifically by nurses.

• PubMed:

• A rich resource for the fields of medicine, nursing, dentistry, veterinary

medicine, health care systems, and preclinical sciences. This is

accessible through AVL and is available after you graduate as an open

source resource.

• PsycARTICLES or PsycInfo

• Both of these databases are multidiscipline with a focus on mental

health.

INFORMATION ORGANIZATION

When doing academic research it is important to cite your sources and manage your citations properly

There are many reference sources to check your citations

There are great tools to manage your information and citations when doing research

Organizational Tools

• UAH Style Guides:

• If you have any citation questions this is an overview of the popular citation

formats and references.

• OWL Purdue:• This is the go to site when you have questions on citation format. When in

doubt go to OWL Purdue!

• Zotero:

• Endnote:

Organizational Tools

Zotero:

• Zotero collects all your research in a single, searchable

interface. You can add PDFs, images, audio and video

files, snapshots of web pages, and really anything else.

Zotero automatically indexes the full-text content of your

library. This is a free open-source citation manager. It is

user intuitive and easy to use, think of like your research i-

Tunes.

Endnote:• A great reference manager, the basic is free the more

advanced is subscription based. Great for building

bibliographies.

Citation

Management

QUESTIONS OR CONCERNS

Contact: Call us: (256)824-6529

Text us: (256) 286-2368

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Seth Porter: Instructional, Reference & Distance Learning Librarian

256.824.6130

smp0024@uah.edu