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Finding information for your essay

Plan your search

Before you begin, read the:

  • assessment instructions available on your course site
  • essay template on your essay resources page

Watch this video

Before you get started it is important to plan your search.

For this assignment you have to address one of the topics given. This guide will use the following example topic:

Discuss what factors makes cabin crew work effectively as a team.

Apply the skills shown here to your own topic

1. Identify the content words, main concepts in your topic:

Concept 1 cabin crew
Concept 2 effectively as a team

2. Identify any synonyms or similar keywords for alternative concepts. You may find it helpful to put these in a table.

Concept 1  cabin crew, flight attendants
Concept 2

effectively as a team, effective team, effective teamwork,

team effectiveness, successful teamwork, successful teams,

team performance

Consider any:

  • Plurals or different word endings: flight attendant, flight attendants, trust, trusting
  • Different word spelling: aeroplane, airplane, behaviour, behavior

Start your search

The Library Collection is a good place to start your search for scholarly material. You can use it to find eBooks, journal articles, reports, videos and more.

Type your concepts into the search box:

library catalogue search for "flight attendant" effective team*
  • Tip: use double quotes to keep concepts together as a phrase.

You can change the concepts used to find different results:

Library catalogue search for "cabin crew" successful team*

Apply filters using the left hand menu to refine your results further.

You can search Google Scholar in a similar way to find relevant information.

Watch this video

How to start your search (opens in a new tab)

Combining concepts

Once you have identified your key concepts, you need to combine them using AND & OR.

1. OR is used to connect synonyms or alternative concepts to broaden your search:

Concept 1 cabin crew OR flight attendants
Concept 2

effective team OR effective teamwork OR team effectiveness

OR successful teamwork OR successful teams

2. AND is used to connect different concepts. The more concepts you add using AND the narrower your search will become:

Concept 1  "cabin crew" OR "flight attendant"
  AND
Concept 2 effective* OR success* OR performance
  AND
Concept 3 team*

3. You can also use:

  • Quotation marks " " to keep words together to search for a phrase.
  • Asterisk * to search for word variations, e.g. team* will find teams, teamwork etc.

Read how to plan your search

Searching databases

Databases

Databases are online collections of resources including articles, papers, book chapters and reports. Databases have advanced search options, helping to focus your search and find more relevant, scholarly references quickly.

Start by typing each different concept into a new search field.

Connect these using AND.

Choose to search Anywhere except full text.

ProQuest Central Database search for "cabin crew" OR "flight attendant*" AND effective* OR success* OR performance AND team* in Anywhere except full text - NOFT

Tips:

  • Use double quotation marks around around phrases to keep them together.
  • Change Anywhere to Anywhere except full text.
  • DO NOT tick the box to limit to Full Text.
Refine your results by using the menu on the left of the page.

Read how to save time searching databases

More databases

Evaluating your sources

Evaluate all literature - even if you have found it in the Library collection or databases.

Consider the following

Currency How current does the information need to be?
Are older, seminal works fine to use?
Relevance

Does the information found answer your question?
Do you understand the content?
Is it at the right level for your purpose?

Authority What are the author's qualifications?
Are they linked to a university, research institute or government department?
Accuracy Is evidence given for the research undertaken?
What methods are used? Are they sound?
Is there a bibliography or references given?
Purpose Is it trying to communicate research, persuade you or sell you something?
It is expressing an opinion, or is it balanced and objective?

More help

Help

Referencing

For this assignment you need to use the American Psychological Association (APA) referencing style. Information about this style can be found here:

If you use EndNote, you can download the APA style.

Study Help

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