A strategy that can be used to tackle a new, unfamilar topic is to gather an overview of your topic and then drill down into the details. Get some basic context and information about your topic, such as a summary of the "5 Ws and One H" (who, what, where, when, why, how). Your first sources will probably not include all of the infomation you need so you can proceed to find other sources that fill in the missing details.
Well, where can you find these?
Knowing the typical patterns of scholarly communication of your discipline can help you find information.
When your professor does a research project, there are typical patterns that are followed.
The table below provides a diagram of the various formats and places where a research project may be shared along with an estimated time frame. Technology and electronic publishing have shortened the time needed to share some of these formats, media, or forums, but some of these sources still take time to produce and distribute.
Table adapted from Wiggins, G. (1991). Chemical information sources. New York: McGraw-Hill.
IDEA |
|
FORMAT, MEDIA, OR FORUM |
GREY LITERATURE? OR PRIMARY LITERATURE? |
research being conducted |
|
seminar within researcher's organization |
||
written progress report to funding agency |
||
|
||
electronic newsgroup |
||
discussion list |
||
conference lecture |
||
laboratory notebook |
||
research completed |
rapid communication journals (short report) |
|
letters journals (short report) |
||
news journals (short report, weekly) |
||
preprint |
||
technical report |
||
personal Web site (if before formal publication) |
||
PRIMARY LITERATURE |
publication process (year) |
article (or series) in conference proceedings [usually book, |
article (or series) in scientific journals |
||
dissertation or thesis (libraries often don't carry, |
||
patent (libraries often don't carry, |
||
final report to funding agency (libraries often don't carry, many indexed in Chem Abstracts or other) |
||
books (some disciplines publish 50/50 in books/journals) |
||
SECONDARY LITERATURE |
0-1 month from primary lit. |
current awareness services (or journals) |
0-9 months from primary lit. |
indexing service or database |
|
standard interest profiles |
||
SDI (selective dissemination of information) |
||
3-9 months from primary lit. |
abstracting service or journal |
|
1-3 years from primary lit. |
review (serial) - summary of topic, less detail, 1-2 years later (Advances in..., Progress in..., Review) within conference proceedings or special of primary journal |
|
2-5 years from primary lit. |
monographs - one author writes chapters on new topics in science, strong editorial control, broader scope than monograph or multigraph, requires knowledge of discipline |
|
treatise - multi volume; logical, classified order; covers entire subject field, requires knowledge of discipline |
||
multigraphs (managed texts, composite works, multi-authored books) - experts write chapters on new topics in science, strong editorial control, requires knowledge of discipline |
||
data compilation - data, numbers, & equations |
||
? |
symposium talk which summarizes a field |
|
SECONDARY? OR TERTIARY? |
2-5 years from primary lit. |
encyclopedia - few references, broad but less detail |
handbook - data, numbers, & equations |
||
dictionary |
||
textbook |
||
? |
bibliographies |
|
citation indexes |
||
atlases, scientific |
||
thesauri |
||
biographical sources |
||
TERTIARY LITERATURE |
7-10 years |
works that are designed to teach you how to use primary and secondary works |
guides to the literature |
||
directories |
||
lists of periodicals |
||
buyers guides |
||
biographical sources |
||
? |
compendia |
|
full-text computer databases |
||
review articles, sometimes |
||
popular literature |
||
library catalogs |
Table adapted from Wiggins, G. (1991). Chemical information sources. New York: McGraw-Hill.
You can use your knowledge about the structure of scholarly communication to help you find information. You can use an encyclopedia or other reference work to get an overview of a topic in a limited number of pages or words. You can use the databases, library catalogs, and other tertiary sources to find secondary sources that comment about and discuss a topic. You may use the databases. Or use the references within the primary sources to find other original primary sources where researchers tell you their own thoughts about their own ideas and how they performed their research projects.
Tertiary Literature > Secondary Literature > Primary Literature
Gray Literature > Primary Literature