Research Toolkit: Print resources

Encyclopedias

• Encyclopaedias are a useful starting point when beginning your research.

• They provide a general overview of a topic, and may also provide a list of books and journal articles for further reading.

• Published once.
  

Books

• Tend to have a broad and in-depth coverage of a topic.

• Longer lag between an event or discovery and a book's publication so there can be more information (causes, longterm effects), deeper analysis and a broad coverage of the topic.

• More cumlative coverage of a topic

• Longer usually 80 plus pages.

• Published once although revised editions might come out later.

Journals (Scholarly), Magazines and Newspapers

• Maybe indepth usually on a specific topic.

• Cover recent developments and events with little time lapse and as a result information is current but maybe incomplete, it captures what is happening in the topic at the moment of time,

• Journals contain original research and typically focus on one experiment; newspapers and magazines may refer to research studies, but do not contain original research.

• Limited coverage without much historical overview or context.

• Shorter in length.

• Composed of volumes and issues published regularly.

Fifteen new Issues in Society are purchased by the library every year and each contain up-to-date, diverse information about global social issues. They include previously published information sourced from newspapers, magazines, journals, government reports, surveys, websites and lobby group literature. They explore a range of facts and opinions which gives a concise overview of the topic.

If you want to check out the titles the library has, search the library catalogue using a series search and type in issues society. A list of over 190 titles come up. To find the most recent use Sort by and choose publication year and these will come to the top. Recent titles are available as both a print and digital edition. The digital edition is identifiable by this icon and to access it click on the title and in the bottom left hand side of the screen click on Download E-File to download it. You can save it and use it for your research OR you can borrow the print edition.

OR

You may have an issue in mind and using fast find (the default search is title, subject, keyword and author) a title may come up in your search results. Scan the list for any titles edited by Justin Healey which will be part of the Issues in Society series. Make sure you check the publication date to get the most up-to-date information from the library shelves.