Research Strategy Guide

An effective research strategy consists of the following steps:

1. Analyze your research problem. What do you need to know about the topic of your research? What do you already know about this topic? What do you need to learn about the topic?
   
   
2. Determine your information requirements. What types of information (brief versus thorough, scholarly versus popular, factual versus descriptive, historical versus current, primary versus secondary) do you need to find?
   
   
3. Identify your information source needs. What types of Information Packages (Sources of Information) (books, periodical articles, Web documents) do you need to search ? What Library resources will help you fulfill your information needs? Are these resources accessible electronically or in print or both? Ask a librarian for Research Assistance.
   
   
4. Conduct your information search(es).. Translate your research topic into subject phrases or key words. Gather relevant information using appropriate Library resources.
   
   
5. Critically interpret, evaluate, and synthesize your information search results. See Evaluating Sources of Information. Conduct additional information search(es) if necessary.