Advanced Research Skills : Biodiversity, Conservation & Management Autumn 2012

1. Advanced Research Skills :Biodiversity, Conservation & ManagementAutumn 2012 Sue Bird Bodleian Subject Librarian Geography

2. Elective Essay Assessment • Aims: Does the essay have a clear aim, question or perspective that is relevant to the literature or an issue? • Presentation: You are expected to know how to cite references • Literature: Does the essay address a range of relevant literature, and demonstrate a good level of understanding of the literature on the topic. • You need to conduct initial scoping lit review – key themes, etc. Followed by a more focused & deeper literature review. Peer-reviewed literature acts as a form of substantiation

3. This session • More on Bibliographic Databases • Searching techniques for journal articles, conference papers, book chapters etc • Keeping up to date

4. Subject searching • Better to use specialist indexes covering the world’s literature to find articles • Access via OxLIP+ (http://oxlip-plus.bodleian.ox.ac.uk) • Use inter-library loan for items not held in Oxford and not online

5. E-Journals “I didn't check for the hard copy • so used to getting online access!” “I had just googled the article rather than using SOLO, so that was the issue & why I’d been asked to login, or use Athens”

7. Newspapers Electronic newspapers • Some are freely available. Alphabetic list on OxLIP+ • Best source for the “Text Only” of huge range of newspapers and magazines is Nexis UK. Goes back approximately 10 yrs in most cases and is very current i.e. today’s daily news items

12. Newspapers Electronic newspapers • Factiva - from Dow Jones & Reuters Company • Business news & challenges, market trends & info. • 14,000 + sources inc. local & global newspapers, newswires, trade journals, newsletters, etc. • Archive back to 1969 - 28 languages from 159 countries • Dun & Bradstreet company profiles, Reuters Fundamentals, etc.

15. Newspapers Legal information, cases etc. • Lexis Library • WestLaw – both UK & US editions • But there are a lot more (if necessary ask the Law Library for help)

17. Bodleian Maps

18. Contents are indexed by subject specialists Subject headings Limiting functions e.g. publication types, language Allow you to View Search history Combine searches Mark and sort results Print/save/email/export Save searches Set up alerts Searches done by automated “web crawlers” No thesaurus / subject headings – just free text searching No limiting functions Usually none of these! Databases vs. Search engines

19. Databases (Scopus or Web of Science) enable you to: • Refine results overview to find the main journals, disciplines and authors that publish in your area of interest. • Click on the cited by and reference links to track research trends and make connections. • Find out who is citing you or your supervisor, and how many citations an article or an author has received. • Use Author Identifier to automatically match an author’s published research including the h-index • Use Journal Analyzer to provide quick insight into specific journal performance • Analyze citations for a particular journal issue, volume or year. • Use this information to complete grant or other applications quickly and easily. • Use Alerts, RSS and HTML feeds to help you stay up-to-date • Data export via bibiliographic managers such as RefWorks, EndNote and BibTeX

20. Bibliographic Databases • Abstracting and Indexing Services • Vast range. • SCOPUS (includes GEOBASE) • OVID SP • ProQuest • Web of Knowledge

21. Search Strategies • Boolean logic • Truncation • Wild cards • Synonyms • Which language are you using?

22. Boolean connectors • AND – combines terms to restrict results • OR – useful for covering synonyms • NOT – excludes unwanted areas of research

23. OR, AND, NOT

24. THE bibliographic database for the Earth, Geographical and Environmental Sciences Scopus -- Abstract and citation database containing both peer-reviewed research literature and quality web sources. With over 19,500 titles from more than 5,000 international publishers, including 325 book series. 47 million records: 26 million records with references back to 1996 (of which 78% include references). 21 million records pre-1996 which go back as far as 1823. 4.9 million conference papers from proceedings and journals. SCOPUS

37. eReader Formats The eReader Formats application allows users to convert ScienceDirect articles as seen in the browser into ePUB or Mobipocket format, whichever is appropriate for the user's electronic reader device. Interactive Map Viewer Interactive Map Viewer displays supplementary geospatial data from Elsevier online articles as an interactive map. Methods Search Methods Search application helps you find the methods you need for your research.

41. Bibliographic Searching Search Tip : 1 • Important to remember that although each database covers thousands of journal titles no single database is ever comprehensive. • If you are having difficulty finding material on a topic use the keywords you find in any relevant reference and search again.

42. Bibliographic Databases ProQuest • Biological Sciences • Environmental Sciences & Pollution Management • Ecology Abstracts (under Biological Sciences) • COS Conference Papers (under Biological Sciences) • IBSS: International Bibliography of the Social Sciences • Sustainability Science Abstracts (under ESPM) • EconLit • Worldwide Political Science Abstracts

48. Bibliographic Databases OVIDSP • CAB Abstracts – biogeography • Forest Science - biogeography • GeoRef – physical geography & geology • Zoological Abstracts (1864-2009 only)