This page should help you find out everything that you need to know to help narrow search for articles. It will help you narrow your topic for a focused search which will get you the results you need.
If you have questions or need help, contact Common's Reference Desk in Helm (270 745-6125) or your subject specialist librarian.
How to determine which database to use for your subject area.
WKU Libraries Home Page has a link to Research Guides which are library information pages (like this one) for every major and minor WKU offers. If you are not sure what database to use, visiting the Research Guide for your Subject will help you determine where to look. Each guide has a tab labeled Articles and Databases. Click on the Articles and Databases Tab to find a listing of which are the best databases to use for searching for material in your specific subject area. For Example, the Business Research Guide would recommend a business major search in a database like ABI Inform, or Business Source Premiere. Psychology majors would find databases like: PsycInfo, or Pscyhology and Behavioral Sciences Collection to be recommended as their best choice for research in their major field.
Usually researchers start out looking for a topic which gives them a huge number of results (in Google or the Databases). To get more precise results from your search you will need to narrow your topic.
How Can You Narrow the Topic?
Once you have selected a broad topic, such as Global Warming or Drug Abuse, you should try to narrow your focus. Here are some ways to narrow the topic:
Now you can put your narrower topic into a research question. Here are some examples:
What are the causes of global warming?
How can we prevent child abuse?
What are the effects of steroid use on athletes?
Why do college students use illegal drugs?
Now you need to identify the keywords for your research.
Use some open ended questions to help refine your topic:
Use the Five W's to Focus Your Idea
What - This is your topic. What interests you the most? Think about how you could use it for a writing assignment.
Who - Narrow by audience. Be more specific with age, race, gender, nationality, etc.
Where - Narrow by location. Focusing on the topic within a defined region can help avoid information overload. This could be a neighborhood, a city, a state, a region, a country, etc.
When - Narrow by time. Try limiting a larger topic into a smaller time frame.
Example: Instead of just "feminism" try:
feminism during the 1960's
feminism during WWII
Why - Narrow by circumstance or method. Does your topic have circumstantial shades of grey that make it hard to define?
If you should have difficulties and need help with your writing, please contact the folks at the Writing Center to make an appointment for someone to work with you one-on-one.
Cherry Hall 123
Monday - Friday: 9 am - 4 pm
Sunday & Monday: 5 pm - 9 pm
Tuesday - Thursday: 4 pm - 9 pm
CLOSED ON MAJOR HOLIDAYS
Phone: (270) 745-5719
Ask the Who, What, When, Where and Why questions:
The ability to develop a good research topic is an important skill. An instructor may assign you a specific topic, but most often instructors require you to select your own topic of interest. When deciding on a topic, there are a few things that you will need to do:
Check Out this great site from University of Michigan-Flint which covers this topic: