1. Finding Resources
for your
Public Health - Literature Review

2. Research Strategy
1. State your research question…..
• Simply state what it is you want to find out
(Ex:) Does TV violence cause kids to act violently
toward others?
**You will use your research question to determine
how you are going to search the library databases
.

3. Research Strategy
2. Select key concepts…
(Ex:) Does TV violence cause kids to act violently
toward others?
• The key concepts are TV, violence & kids
TV violence kids
**Do not select common words that would be in any article

4. Research Strategy
3. Identify synonyms…
Try to use words that ‘scholars’ would use
Kids Violence
OR TV
OR
Hostility OR
Children
OR Television
OR
Youth Aggression

5. Research Strategy
4. Truncate appropriate words…
• Kids OR Children OR Youth
child* = child, child’s, children, children's
• TV OR Television
televis* = televise, televised, televising, television

6. Research Strategy
5. Select the title field for the search….
• The default search for most search boxes is a
keyword search – so it looks for these words
to be anywhere in the article.
• Choose the [Title] field option to really narrow
down your search

7. Ebsco
A great place to start is with Ebsco.
Click [Choose Databases] to add the following additional databases:
 Biomedical Reference Collection:
 CINAHL Plus with Full Text:
 Cochrane Central Register of Controlled Trials:
 Cochrane Database of Systematic Reviews:
 Cochrane Methodology Register:
 Database of Abstracts and Reviews
 Health Technology Assessments:
 MEDLINE:
 NHS Economic Evaluation Database:
 Nursing & Allied Health Collection:
* Limit your search to “Scholarly (Peer Reviewed) Journals”

9. Web of Knowledge
**Ability to search
and sort results
by Times Cited
Lemmatization is turned on by default (finds alternative forms of the search term, ex: tooth and teeth
Does not have a Peer-Reviewed limiter

10. Log into OvidSP either by using the entry in the HPD
Ovid Database List
OR by clicking on the OVID option in the drop down
menu at the top of our homepage

11. Next Step…..
Locating the full-text
See the “Locating the full-text”
presentation for detailed instructions.