Research Tips

The Research Tips site is an online guide designed to help you perform research in the University at Buffalo's University Libraries. This guide will help you understand basic research skills including:

How to locate books and periodicals using the UB Libraries catalog
How to locate full-text articles
What to look for when using the Web for research
How to cite books and articles.

While this guide is designed to take you through the entire research process, each page stands alone as a separate guide. If you need to familiarize yourself with one or more particular aspects of research, such as citation styles or evaluating resources, you can use the site index to go directly to that particular page.

1. Research Guidelines

Starting a Research Topic
Assignment Calculator

2. Choosing a Topic

Overview
Reference Databases
Book Resources
Periodicals
Web Resources

3. Background Information

Overview
Encyclopedias
Current Periodicals
Bibliographies

4. Finding Library Materials

Overview
Searching by Keyword
Searching by Subject Heading
Searching by Author
Searching by Title

5. Finding Articles

Overview
Using Databases to Find Articles
Finding Journal Articles By Subject
Finding Journal Articles By Title
Finding Print Journals

6. Using Web Resources

Databases vs. Web

7. Evaluating Resources

Overview
Evaluating Books
Evaluating Periodicals
Evaluating Web Sites

8. Citing Sources

Avoiding Plagiarism
Citation Style Manuals
Writing Guides

*Last edited by Cindy Ehlers January 4, 2012 .