Example Topic: Reducing the Great Pacific Garbage Patch
Example OneSearch Searches:
great pacific garbage patch
great pacific garbage patch (stewardship OR conservation OR sustainability)
(garbage OR trash OR plastic OR debri*) (pacific OR ocean* OR marine) (stewardship OR conservation OR sustainability)
Parentheses and OR: Use these around keywords separated by the word "or" to expand your search with synonyms. Putting "or" between words means that either term (or both) will be returned in the search. In the example, we are searching for "underage" and want to include similar terms, as well as "drinking or alcohol" in one easy search.
Example: (garbage OR trash OR plastic) and (stewardship OR conservation OR sustainability)
Asterisk: Use this to shorten a word and search for all possible endings of the root word. This tool will give you more results.
Examples:
Los Rios Libraries' online catalog and access to the content of most databases held at Los Rios.
If OneSearch is frustrating, try one of these databases:
Scholarly journals, professional journals, reports and magazines in the social sciences, the humanities, and general sciences.
Scholarly journals in health, medicine, psychology and life sciences.
Scholarly journals, ebooks, abstracts, patents and legal research from academic, nonprofit and government sources. Use the Los Rios Full Text link for library provided content.
Scholarly journals on the human impact on the environment, climate change, green building, pollution, sustainable agriculture, renewable energy, and recycling.
A primary source in the sciences is one in which the author or authors share details of their original research, how they conducted their research and what they learned.
Look for language that indicates the authors conducted a study. For example:
If it's not clear from the abstract, Primary sources will typically include a section labeled "Methods" or "Methodology" or maybe "Materials and Methods." Take a look at that section and see if the authors describe how they conducted a study.
When using OneSearch or other library databases, filter your results to Peer-Reviewed Journals or Scholarly Journals. Not all scholarly journal articles are primary sources, but many of them are.