Resources for Pacific Seminar II

Search topics or theses:

Should Facebook have stricter policies and safeguards to protect a person’s identity? How do popular magazines impact the eating habits of teenagers? Does the FDA have sufficient authority to regulate drug advertising in the media?

 

Keywords: Select key words or phrases: drug, drugs, advertising, advertisements,

Search operators and logic:

• Use and to narrow your topic and retrieve fewer results. ‘and = fewer’ ex: drugs and advertising and fda
• Use or to broaden your topic and retrieve more results ‘or = more’ ex: FDA or food and drug administration
• The * is a truncation symbol and will retrieve all words with that beginning stem.
  Ex: drug* will retrieve drug, drugs, drugged, drugstore, etc..
• Use double quotations to search for a phrase: ex: “food and drug administration”
• Use parenthesis ( )to indicate what to do first. See search statement below for example.

Search statement or strategy: drug* and advertis* and (fda or “food and drug administration”)

PacifiCat = Books: Use Pacificat, he online catalog, to locate books (both print and electronic) on your topic.

Popular and Scholarly Articles: The library subscribes to thousands of different periodicals, including magazines, journals, and newspapers.

Popular	Scholarly
Contemporary, popular topics	Literature reviews, original research
Written by staff writers	Written by scholars and experts
Selected by the editor	Accepted by a panel of experts
Few or no footnotes, bibliographies	Footnotes, bibliographies

Databases: A database is a collection of items created and organized to add utility and function. The Pacific library subscribes to more than 100 databases that contain books, journal articles, newspaper articles, magazine articles, streaming music files, art, corporate reports, and much more. Faculty members and students use these databases to meet curricular and research needs. Visit the Database homepage!

Background Databases

• CQ Public Affairs. Full text, in-depth reports and statistical data related to public policy issues.
• CQ Researcher. Full text, in-depth reports on issues in the news.
• Facts on File.  All full text. “Issues and Controversies” section is especially useful.
• Gale Virtual Reference Library. Full text of specialized encyclopedias, guides, etc.

Newspaper Database

• Proquest Newsstand. 500+ newspapers including New York Times and Wall Street Journal.

Journal and Magazine Databases

• Academic Search Complete. Abstracts and full text of popular and scholarly articles in most academic disciplines.
• Business Source Complete.  Abstracts and full text. Business, industry, and company information.
• Communication and Mass Media Complete.  Abstracts and full text.

Newspaper, Journal, Magazine, and More Database

• LexisNexis Academic.  Includes television and radio transcripts,  federal and state legal cases and code, much more.

PacificLink: Searches for the full text of an article in other databases.

Interlibrary Loan (ILL): Service that allows you to obtain a book or a journal article from another library or commercial service. Books do not cost. Journal articles cost $1.00; rush service is $3.00.

Need assistance?

• AskPacific; walk up; telephone; email.
• Craig Hawbaker:  chawbaker@pacific.edu or 946-3172