Google Scholar for secondary sources

Many of us begin our research by "Googling" a few key words related to our topic. Rather than starting in the general browser like Google or Yahoo, you might try looking specifically for scholarly articles through Google Scholar. This sub-browser of Google offers several benefits over a general search:

• Google Scholar focus specifically on the kinds of academic sources that professors like you to consider: peer-reviewed, meaning other experts in a field have reviewed the articles to make sure they are accurate and fair. You can find abstracts and articles from journals, professional societies, universities and other organizations.
• If you use Google Scholar through the Ball State wireless access, you also link to resources available through Bracken Library. For example, when I searched "community" and "volunteering," several of the articles listed showed that a full text was available through the Multilink database at Bracken Library. All I had to do was click on that hyperlink.
  
• Unlike a general browser like Google or Yahoo, the results are posted in order of relevance to your topic. On general browsers, the ones at the top are often results from advertisers who pay to be listed first. They may not be the most accurate or authoritative sources.
  
• Google Scholar's results provide you some of the key bits of information you need for appropriate attribution on Works Cited pages and in your composition. 
• You might be able to find an abstract or part of an article on Google Scholar and then find the whole article by going to Bracken's databases.
  

Try using Google Scholar to search for your keywords on the project you are revising now and see what you come up with. Let us know about it in your own blog.