| Abstract:
A short summary of the
content of a book, book chapter or journal article. Abstracts may vary
in length and are sometimes written by the author of the article. Search
Tip: Reading the abstract can help you determine the relevance of an
article to your research, and whether you want to locate the full
text.
An abstract can also help you understand the full
text.
Bibliography:
A list of references, sometimes annotated, to research materials on a
particular topic. Academic research always includes a bibliography of work
cited or consulted. Search Tip: The bibliography in a current
book or article will help you locate additional materials on your topic.
Citation: The
complete information needed to find a particular item. For books, it
includes the author, title, publisher and date of publication. For
periodical articles, it includes the author, title, name of the magazine
or journal, volume number, date, and page numbers of the issue in which
the article appears.
Library Catalog:
Consult the
Library Catalog to determine whether Pollak Library owns a particular book, government document,
video, etc. Search Tip: The
Library Catalog will
tell you that CSUF owns Scientific American in print, and for what years,
but it will not contain information about articles in
the journal. Use Find Journals By Title for more complete
information on the journals, magazines, and newspapers owned by Pollak
Library. Search periodical indexes to find articles. |
Periodical:
Publications issued at
regular intervals, such as journals or magazines. Periodicals can either
be scholarly (i.e. reviewed for publication by experts in a particular
field) or intended for a general or popular audience. Search Tip:
Some electronic periodical indexes, or databases, allow you to limit
your search to one or the other of these publication types.
Periodical Index:
A print or electronic search tool to help you locate journal or magazine
articles by subject, author, or article title. Examples of periodical
indexes our Library owns are ERIC, PsycINFO and
Academic Search Premier. Search
Tip: You can access the electronic indexes, or
databases, through the Pollak Library web
site anywhere you have internet access. If you are not at a campus
computer, you will be asked to login to your campus portal to identify
yourself as a campus user.
Search Strategy:
The keywords and concepts
from your research topic combine with operators (AND, OR, NOT) to form a
search strategy. Example:
To find policy information on California's electricity shortage, your
search strategy might be: California AND policy AND (energy OR
electricity). |
