Navigating the Library
Librarian: Librarians teach students how to find, evaluate and use informaiton, maintain the library’s collections, and work with students and faculty on their research.
Circulation Desk: The place where you checkout, renew, and return library materials.
Reference Desk: Librarians work at the reference desk to help people find the information they need and explain how to use library resources.
Course Reserves: Materials with a shorter loan period, usually one to two hours, at the request of an instructor. These can be checked out at the circulation desk.
Catalog: A comprehensive list of materials in a library’s collection. Use the catalog to find physical items in the library, such as books, and audio/visual materials.
Research Database: A collection of information stored in an electronic format that can be searched by a computer. Use the research databases to find articles, film clips, and images.
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Types of Resources
Each assignment has unique requirements. Carefully review the requirements of an assignment before starting your research. Below are some terms your professors might use to describe the types of resources that are required for an assignment.
Primary Sources: Primary sources contain first-hand information or original data. Examples include a research article found in an academic journal, a diary, letters, photographs, sheet music, and public records.
Secondary Sources: Secondary sources contain information that is describing, summarizing, analyzing, evaluating that is derived from or based on primary sources. Some examples include a book review, a critical analysis of a work, second-person account, a biography or historical study.
Popular Sources: Popular works are written or a general audience and are generally written to entertain or inform. They are written in everyday language, and usually do not contain formal citations. Examples include People Magazine, New York Times, cnn.com, and Psychology Today.
Scholarly Sources: Scholarly sources are written by experts in their field of study for other scholars, professors, and students, and are written to present research. The language is formal and includes field-specific terms, and also includes formal citations. Examples include the Journal of Psychology, Journal of the American Medical Association (JAMA), and the Journal of American History.
Assignments often require the use of scholarly or peer-reviewed articles. Scholarly resources, such as journal articles, have distinct characteristics when compared to popular resources, such as magazine and newspaper articles. Here is a guide to identifying popular and scholarly resources:
| Popular Resources | Scholarly Resources | |
| Purpose | Entertain or Inform | Present Research |
| Format | Glossy, colorful pages with lots of advertisements | Plain, black-and-white pages with graphs and tables; very few ads |
| Language | Written in every-day language | Formal, field specific |
| Audience | General Public | Professionals in the field, Faculty, and Students |
| Citations | Full citations generally not included | Full citations required |
| Examples | People Magazine, CNN.com | Journal of Psychology, JAMA |