Public Services (FE): Magazines

Before searching, think about:

• The information that you already have.  Where are the gaps? Is the information you have at the right level and detail?
• The type of information you are looking for.  Do you need newspaper articles, academic journals, industry reports, company information, statistics?  This will help you decide which database to search, or whether the information is available on the Internet. 
• Theories or concepts that you may need to refer to.  Textbook usually are the best place to start as they introduce and explain topics with examples. If you want to find material which applies a theory to an issue, you will usually need to refer to journal articles. 

Be prepared to read around your subject.  You may not find an article which directly answers your assignment question, but instead you will need to synthesis information from a variety of sources. For example, you may find material on customer behaviour in a different setting to the one you are researching, but the argument and findings can be applied to your own topic.

Use the contents pages and indexes in textbooks to look up company names, theories or concepts. Don't just rely on your reading list - there is a lot of information out there!

Refer to the reading lists in books and journal articles, or use the related articles and cited by functions in Emerald and Google Scholar to widen your reading. 

How do you evaluate what articles are most appropriate for your research?  Use the CRAAP test to help you assess each article:

Currency

When was the article published? Does it matter for your topic?

Are there more recent articles you could use?

Relevance

Does the information help in answering your question? 

Is it at the right level? Is it too basic or too advanced? 

Does it add to your understanding?

Authority

Does the author work for a particular organisation such as a University?

Is the author appropriately qualified to provide the information?

Has the information been peer-reviewed? If an article has been peer reviewed it will have been evaluated or edited by other experts in the same field.

Accuracy

Where does the information come from?

Is it supported by evidence?

Can you verify the information from another source?

Purpose

What is the purpose or reason of the article?

Is the article objective? Does it give a balanced view? Is there hidden bias? Does the author use emotive language?

Has the author provided supporting evidence?

Does the article include references?