The same strategy you use to look up facts is NOT going to work with researching for independent study projects. Studies show that students often do not browse further than the first page of results from a web search; that they tend to look for right-answer results, and that they generally engage in only one-step searching. Try the following strategies (taken from Tucker, 2015):
- User limiters and operators.
Use the Boolean operators AND, OR, and NOT. Also, focus your results by using field limiters. In Google, using date limiters as well as the limiter site: can make your search results more relevant. Try starting off in Google Advanced Search. - Grow the pearl.
Analyze the results of the preliminary search you just did. If you found something helpful, look for more items that are LIKE that one helpful result. Look for more work by the same author. Or go the a website the author is affiliated with and search there. If you found relevant records in a database, use the "more like this" option to call up similar articles. - Use controlled vocabulary terms. Know when to use keywords (natural language searching, which is what most of us do in Google) vs. controlled vocabulary. See if the database you are using has a thesaurus, and make use of that.
- Trace citations backward and forward in time. If you find a useful article, check the author's citations to find out significant sources s/he has used. That will located older citations for you to explore. Then, run a citation search on Google Scholar to find valuable newer articles in your subject area which reference your useful article. It's a great way to participate in scholarly dialogue.
