Research 101: Types of Resources
Types of Resources
There are many types of resources available for you to use for assignments and research projects. Each resource can provide you with a different view on topics and subjects or provide different types of information. Sometimes your instructors will ask you to use certain types of resources for your assignments, such as a certain number of articles and books. It is important to understand the different types of resources and what type of information they provide.
Primary and Secondary Sources
Primary and secondary sources are a specific type of source and are very different from each other. These can sometimes be some of the most common types of sources that you will use for research. These cover all types of sources, from books to video and even pictures and songs. However, whether it is a primary source or a secondary source is mostly dependent on the topics and who wrote them.
Primary sources are types of sources that are first hand or immediate accounts of particular topics or events. Usually they are from someone who had direct connection with the event or subject, someone who experienced the event or topic first-hand. These sources are often original texts and/ or objects created or designed at the time of the study or event; such as diary entries, original studies or video footage of the event as it is happening.
Keep in mind, these sources have NOT been edited or even interpreted in any way. These are the true originals. Some examples of Primary sources may include: video footage, interviews, speeches, music, paintings, even clothing, pottery, and tools.
Secondary sources, on the other hand, are often "one step" removed from primary sources. They are usually created by someone who might not have been present during the event or study. They are often created by an observer, an interviewer, or someone who received a second-hand account of what happened. Most often, secondary sources use primary sources to interpret or analyze the event. Some examples of secondary sources include: encyclopedias, textbooks, art collages, documentaries, and so on.
| Topic | Primary Source | Secondary Source |
|---|---|---|
| Current Events | Video footage of shore damage by Hurricane Katrina | A documentary about Hurricane Katrina that includes video footage, interviews, and photographs |
| Literature | The novel To Kill a Mockingbird by Harper Lee | A literary criticism that analyzes human morality through the characters in To Kill a Mockingbird |
| Physics | Data from a space telescope | A physics 101 textbook |
| Art | The painting Starry Night by Van Gogh | A journal article that references Starry Night to discuss the history of post-impressionism |
While practically the same, books and eBooks provide one of the largest information resources out there for research purposes; the only real difference between the two is how you access their information, either with a physical book or a digital one. Our library has a vast collection of both books and eBooks available to the campus community. We have approximately 40,000+ books in house, with around 600,000+ eBooks available online through our catalog online. You can browse our vast book and eBook collection by visiting WorldCat Discovery.
Information Found in Books
Most books contain a vast amount of information that you can draw from for your research. Often, they will be a kind of overview of particular topics, providing background information, basic facts and knowledge of the topic. Many books may even contain references to other sources used to gather information for that book. Books often pull together ALL information about a topic and bind it into one item, making it easier to find information. Some of your most common sources may end up being either books and/or eBooks. Especially if you are searching for general information.
What are Periodicals?
One of your other common sources that you may turn to for information will be periodicals. Periodicals get their name from being information sources that are published or created on a "periodic" basis. Meaning they may either be published weekly, monthly, bi-monthly, quarterly, or even yearly. The information in periodicals is constantly changing or being updated, as such, these will often be the sources you turn to for more current information or even specific information regarding studies on particular topics. Most periodic sources can be good for current information or current trends for a particular topic. However, you should be careful when viewing different periodicals as there can often be HUGE differences between journals, magazines and newspapers.
Different Periodicals
Journals
Scholarly journals are the most common periodical that you will use during your college career and throughout the rest of your higher education or other academic pursuits.
These sources often contain papers or writings about previous research by individuals and/or groups within a field of academic study. These may even contain information about new studies being conducted or new and upcoming information on a specific topic. Sometimes you may also find opinion pieces and book reviews in these journals.
The subjects covered in these journals usually have a very specific focus, the authors are often experts in certain fields of study, like history, biology and so on.
A big difference with scholarly articles, unlike magazine articles, is that you will find a work cited, reference or bibliography section at the end of the article. This indicates what sources were used within the study in order to write the article. Scholarly articles within journals are a kind of continuation of a "scholarly" conversation. As such, they rely on the studies, ideas, and works of other to continue that conversation.
You'll also notice that scholarly journals usually DO NOT contain many images or even advertisements. This can provide a visual indicator for you, allowing you to determine the source type by just looking at it.
In addition, the target audience for these types of sources is generally students, scientists, researchers, and other professionals within a particular field of study.
Examples of scholarly journals include: Review of Educational Research, American Journal of Sociology, Journal of Communication, and many more.
Magazines
Popular magazines, on the other hand, can be good sources for current events, trends, or popular culture. However, they may not provide you with accurate or scholarly information for the purposes of research. Most popular magazines are written for the sake of entertainment, to sell products, or even promote certain viewpoints and agendas. More often than not, the information found in these sources are usually of current or general interest.
One way that you can recognize popular magazines is by the number of images and advertisements within the magazine itself. Remember, scholarly journals will have very few to absolutely no images or advertisements, whereas popular magazines will have quite a few, often covering entire pages within the magazine.
The authors of these sources are generally staff writers and journalists who may not be experts in the field they are writing about. And these sources target the general public, rather than any one group in particular.
Some examples of popular magazines include: Rolling Stone, Better Homes and Gardens, Entertainment Weekly, and others.
Trade Magazines
While they use the term magazines, Trade Magazines are very similar to scholarly articles, however, they are often written for a particular trade or industry. These types of sources are meant to update their readers on the current trends of these particular industries or trades. They often contain information that is relevant ONLY to those working within a particular trade or industry field. Sometimes they can include news, new product listings, and Q&A interviews.
The authors are often professionals working within the specific trade or industry for the magazine. Additionally, these sources are usually published in association with a company or university and are aimed at members of the trade or industry and even professors and students studying the field. So, think about the types of magazines that you would see that are specifically for industries like automotive, marketing, management, and so forth.
These can be very useful when attempting to locate current trends and changes for companies, industries, or specific field trades.
Examples of trade magazines include: Police Chief, Education Digest, Energy Weekly News, Aviation Week and Space Technology, Engineering News Record, Design News, and Traffic World.
Newspapers & News Websites
Newspapers are often good sources for current events and news, especially from local areas and even international regions. They usually provide accounts of what is going on in the world or your local town or city, on a day-to-day basis.
These sources can provide good introductions to topics, however, many writers and journalists for newspapers and/or sites may not be experts on the topic they cover, so be careful with the information they provide. These sources are of course aimed at the general public, rather than a particular group. One thing to be wary of when reading or attempting to use these sources for research, is bias. Many news sources will often have a particular bias, opinion, or viewpoint to the topics they cover. These company's can also be associated with certain political groups and are at times required to speak according to certain views, rather than present an unbiased and neutral approach to any story or event.
Media Bias
Remember to keep an objective mind when reading or viewing any information from news sources. Many news sites are owned and operated by certain affiliations and are required to present information from a particular agenda or viewpoint. You can, however, tell which "side" a news site falls on based on their coverage and choice of topics and headlines, but you can check out a website called AllSides for a more visual idea of where some news sites fall. This is their Media Bias Chart which shows you the ratings of media sites based on multipartisan, scientific analysis, which also include " including expert panels and surveys of thousands of everyday Americans." (AllSides, 2024)
So if you are looking for news articles on current events, but want to find information that is neutral and doesn't fall to one side or the other, try looking at articles found on the sites in the center column of this chart, or browse the others news sites listed as "in the center" by AllSides ratings.
Example of Media Bias
In 2021, the United States experienced some turmoil with riots, protests and a large group breaking into the Capitol building in Washington D.C.. These events provided a perfect example of how different news sources can be biased when covering these stories.
Check out this article from AllSides to get an idea of how media bias occurs: Capitol Breach Coverage Demonstrates Media Bias.
Notice the differences between each article shown and notice how the coverage changes from event to event based on who the news outlet is.
Because this occurs so often, whenever you plan to use news sources for a research assignment, be sure to check for media bias. Try to use information from more neutral sites, rather than one side or the other.
Websites can offer a wealth of information for your research needs, however, keep an objective mind when viewing information on the internet. As there are no quality control regulations, information can change drastically from day to day. It can also be subjected to bias and misinformation, so you should be careful about the information you get from websites.
You can, however, quickly determine a website's general information type by looking at the domain suffix of the web address. A website's domain suffix is that little bit that comes after the website's name in the url. Sometimes its a .com or a .edu. That bit, by looking at that, can give you an idea of the information found on the website, and sometimes even determine the site's credibility, before looking at any information found there.
Take a look below for a quick overview of common website domains you may see online:
| Domain | Type of Information |
|---|---|
| .com | commercial sites; these are your most common types of websites containing general information on their topic |
| .edu | educational institution; these are the website for educational purposes, generally your school websites or sometimes basic educational sites for teaching |
| .gov | government sites; generally reserved for governments, states, laws and anything affiliated with them to provide government information or even news |
| .org | traditionally non-profit organizations; these are often website for different organizations, providing information on the organizations, their missions and policies and what they are doing |
| .mil | military or armed forces; these are generally sites for different branches of military, providing information for the branches |
| .net | network; these are a kind of catch-all for sites that may not fit into any of the other domains, be wary of these for research, they may or may not provide good information |
While websites can be useful for providing a lot of information, you should keep in mind that there are no quality standards for websites and some sites can even be updated by anyone.
Take Wikipedia, for example. While this site can provide a lot of general information about topics, it has the problem of allowing almost anyone to edit pages. This can often lead to misinformation or misrepresentation of information or events online. If you'd like to see examples of times when Wikipedia articles were wrong, check out their list here: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_Wikipedia_controversies.
As you can see, there have been a lot of problems coming from an information site that "can be edited by anyone". This is part of the reason, many instructors tell you to avoid Wikipedia and stick to more scholarly sites. While sites like Wikipedia can be good starting points to get an idea of what information is out there for your topic, it would be best to avoid using it as a credible source for any project. Look at the references, instead, to see where certain facts are pulled from. You might find a source worth using there. If not, stick with more scholarly sites that you trust.
In the end, be sure to check the credibility of the web source, before deciding to use it.
WorldCat and Discovery
Libraries offer a vast collection of scholarly resources, from books and eBooks, to journals, newspapers, and documentaries. Our library is a part of OCLC's (Online Computer Library Center) WorldCat, which "is the world's largest network of library content and services. WorldCat libraries are dedicated to providing access to their resources on the Web, where most people start their search for information.” (WorldCat, 2020). But what does this mean for you and your research?
When using WorldCat for research, it “lets you search the collections of libraries in your community and thousands more around the world”. With our online catalog through OCLC, you are able to search not only our own collections, but collections of items housed within libraries around the world. This greatly expands your access to information, especially if you utilize the Interlibrary Loan service through the library.
Searching WorldCat will help you to see what type of information and resources are out there that you could use for your research needs. It is a great place to search for more resources and then take what you have found and search our library's catalog. Sometimes you may find something that our library doesn't have, but that you would want to use for your project. Many libraries are associated with OCLC and WorldCat in one way or another and they use the service to share resources with one another.
If you find something on WorldCat or by searching our catalog for material worldwide, you have the option to request it through Interlibrary Loan via a button. Simply fill out the request form and we will attempt to borrow or obtain a copy of the resources from another library. And most of the time, we will try to do so for free!
Our catalog through WorldCat is called WorldCat Discovery. The catalog is where you can search for books and/or eBooks within our library collection and see if a particular book is available.
If you find a book within our catalog that seems interesting or that you may want to borrow, look for the call number in the item listing. It will be a series of letters and numbers beneath the book's information or description. The call number is a kind of address for the book on its shelf. So while you are searching the catalog, if you come across books that you would like to view or maybe even check out, make a note of the call numbers. This way you can then head to the upper floor of the library and locate your books. Most listings you find in Discovery will also tell you the item's shelving location, such as "Upper Floor- Circulating Collection" or "Information Commons- Reference Collection".
eBooks in our catalog are a bit different in that you can view them right then and there without needing to browse the shelves, all you may have to do is sign in to view the book. (you will use the same sign in as you do for Canvas)
When you find an eBook in Discovery, there will be a orange button that says "view eBook". By clicking that button, you should be taken to the eBook housed in one of our databases, where you can browse the chapters or read the whole book online. Sometimes there may be a limitation on how many people can view a book at a time, other times it is unlimited. If you are asked to log in, you will use the same log in username and password as you would for Canvas.
When viewing an eBook, we recommend that you read it online rather than trying to use an eReader. Doing so makes it a bit more stable and easier to read through. However, many of our eBook listings will allow you to download individual chapters as a pdf. So if you find an eBook that you want to use, but say, only one or two chapters from it, go ahead and download those chapters like you would with a journal article from our databases, this way you have the information readily available and you won't have to keep searching for the book. Also, while downloading those chapters, go ahead and make a note of the citation information for the book. If you use any of the information from the book, you will need to cite it.
Library Databases
The library also offers more than just study space and books. We are an academic library on a University campus, and as such we offer many great databases for you to use in your research. Each database contains numerous scholarly journals, articles, book reviews and much more. Some of our databases are dedicated to specific topics, while others cover a more generalized set of information. Most of the time when you have a research assignment, you will be asked to seek out scholarly sources and these databases may be what you turn to the most.
Whenever you visit our website to search our databases, you'll find that we have all of our databases grouped together by various subjects. To browse a list of databases, locate the subject that matches your topic closely, click the icon and browse the list, then you choose the databases your want to search for resources with. We also have all of our databases listed out in alphabetical order and on the page with the subject icons, you can search for a specific database by typing in its name in the small search bar in the upper left of the page.
Our databases are great ways to find scholarly sources, subject studies, book reviews, and many more. You can trust that most sources from a library database will provide you with high quality and knowledgeable sources. And if you ever get lost or need help navigating these databases, just ask your librarians!
As you can see, there are a multitude of sources out there for you to view, read, and use for all your research needs. And if you get stuck or have trouble, what can you do? Ask you librarians! Send us an email, chat with us live from our website, give us a call, or stop by in person!
We will do what we can to help! We are here to help you succeed!
