ENG 111 & EDE (WO)

Identify 2-3 major concepts in your research question.

What concepts are most important?  Ignore vague words like "effect" or "United States".  Those could apply to millions of possible topics.  Instead, focus on what makes your question unique.  In this example, "electric cars" and "climate change" are the two major concepts:

How will wide-scale adoption of electric cars in the United States impact climate change?

If you only have one major topic, your research question may be too broad.  If you have four or more major concepts, your research question may be too narrow. 

Come up with synonyms and related ideas for each major concept. 

You could search using the major concepts you identified, but you might not get good results.  Invest time to come up with other related keywords to search.  They may give better results than your initial major concepts.  In the example below, we might find better results searching for "emissions" than "climate change" because "emissions" is more specific.  Avoid vague words or those that could have different meanings.

1. electric cars -- electric vehicles, plug-in hybrids, electric vehicle sales, electric vehicle adoption
2. climate change -- emissions, pollution, air quality, greenhouse gasses

Combine one keyword from each group using AND:

Different combinations of keywords will give different results.  Try several different search strategies to see which give the best results. 

• electric vehicles AND climate change
• electric cars AND emissions
• electric vehicle adoption AND greenhouse gasses

Now you have several search strategies to try when searching for books and articles.  You will not know which search strategies are best until you start searching.  Pay attention to the number and relevance of results you get.  A good search strategy should give you a small number of highly-relevant results.

Number of Results

Aim for around 50-500 results.  If you get fewer, the search may be too specific.  If you get more, the search may be too broad.

These are real examples from Academic Search Complete, limited to full-text articles from the past ten years.  Imagine sorting through the results for each search.  Which search strategy would you try first?

[Electric vehicles AND climate change] is the best search to try first.  [electric vehicles AND climate change AND affordability] gave only 2 results, so the search is too complicated.  A search for [electric vehicles AND affordab*] gives 161 results.

Relevance

Once your number of results is reasonable, you can scan the first page of results to see if they are relevant to your project.  Do you see results that will be useful?  If not, try adjusting the keywords in your search strategy.  If you find relevant results, pay attention to the words they use.  Those might be good keywords to try in new searches.  For example, if you see the word "range anxiety" in several articles about electric vehicles, that might be a good word to try in a search.

With this helpsheet, you can develop an effective search strategy that will save you time and retrieve better results!

First-Generation College Students

• Try these keywords related to the problem:  "first generation students", "first generation college", graduation, "retention rate", "degree attainment", "financial aid", "academic preparedness", "impostor syndrome".
• Try these keywords related to solutions:  "college success", "study skills", confidence, "support system", "student success", "SMART goals", "study environment", college resources, campus resources.
• Avoid using [first generation] without [college] or [student] as a keyword because this gives results about first generation immigrants and other "first generations".

Work / Life Balance

• Try these keywords related to the problem:  "college students", "working students", "part-time".
• Try these keywords related to solutions:  "work-life balance", "work-study-life balance", "self care", "SMART goals".

Student Parents

• Try these keywords related to the problem:  parenting students, family responsibilities.
• Try these keywords related to solutions:  child care, academic counseling, study space, course load, part-time study.
• Avoid using [student parent] or [parent student] because this gives results about parents of students (for example, a parent's involvement in their 1st grader's education).

First-Year College Students

• Try these keywords related to the problem:  first-year students, freshman.
• Try these keywords related to solutions:  college readiness, college resources, campus resources, college success, study skills.

Stress

• Try these keywords related to stress:  stress, stressors, good stress, eustress (good stress), psychological stress, emotional stress.
• Try these keywords related to solutions to stress:  self-care, self-compassion, mindfulness, five senses technique, EFT/tapping, stress management, relaxation, goal regulation, amygdala, fear response, fight or flight, overwhelm. 
• Avoid using [anxiety] as a keyword because this gives results on the medical/psychological concept of anxiety, a diagnosable condition.
• College Stress (The Learning Center at UNC-Chapel Hill)

Sleep

• Try these keywords related to sleep:  sleep hygiene, sleep schedule, sleep debt, microsleep, caffeine, screen light, screentime, sleep deprivation, circadian rhythm.
• Try these keywords related to solutions to sleep problems:  sleep routine, sleep cycle, daily schedule, bedtime, mealtimes, relaxation.
• Avoid using [sleep disorder] as a keyword because this gives results on medical conditions.  Many college students experience experience poor sleep, but those who experience sleep disorders should seek medical help. 
• Sleeping to Succeed (The Learning Center at UNC-Chapel Hill)

Multitasking / Digital Distractions

• Try these keywords related to mutlitasking / digital distractions:  mutlitasking, digital distractions, social media, gaming, switching costs.
• Try these keywords related to solutions to mutlitasking / digital distractions:  digital detox, digital minimalist, deep work, Pomodoro Method, Eisenhower Matrix, study plan, self-regulation, metacognition, Feynman Technique,
• Avoid general keywords like productivity, efficiency or cognition.  While they are all related to the topic, they are too general.
• Digital Distractions (The Learning Center at UNC-Chapel Hill)