Online Searching: A Guide to Finding Quality Information Efficiently and Effectively

Karen Markey

Rowman & Littlefield, Jul 23, 2015 - Language Arts & Disciplines - 324 pages

Online Searching puts the aspiring librarian on the fast track to becoming an expert searcher who unites library users with trusted sources of information to answer their questions.

To accomplish this, it ushers you through online searching as a seven-step process:
(1) determining what the user really wants in the reference interview,
(2) identifying sources that are likely to produce relevant information for the user’s query,
(3) dividing the query into big ideas and combining them logically,
(4) hypothesizing whether a known item or a subject will satisfy the query,
(5) representing the query as input to the search system,
(6) conducting the search and responding strategically, and
(7) displaying retrievals, assessing them, and responding tactically.

For key concepts, Online Searching enlists multimedia, representing visually what is difficult to convey via words alone. When you analyze Online Searching’s real search topics, search online, and compare your results with its suggested answers, you’ll experience the seven-step online searching process first-hand. Included are specific recommendations about what you should teach end users about online searching and a method for quickly and efficiently familiarizing yourself with a new database and search system.

Including short video demonstrations, Online Searching is your go-to guidebook for ramping yourself up from novice to expert searcher.

Contents

• 1 Online Searching in the Age of the Information Explosion: 1
• 2 Accessing Scholarly Professional and Educational Information: 15
• 3 The Reference Interview for InDepth Queries: 27
• 4 Selecting a Relevant Database: 49
• 5 PreSearch Preparation: 75
• 6 Controlled Vocabulary for Precision in Subject Searches: 85
• 7 Free Text Searching for Recall in Subject Searches: 113
• 8 KnownItem Searching: 141
• 9 Databases for Assessing Research Impact: 167
• 10 Search Strategies: 183
• 11 Displaying and Assessing Retrievals and Responding Tactically to the Search System: 201
• 12 Performing a Technical Reading of a Database and Its Search System: 217
• 13 Interacting with Library Users: 231
• 14 Online Searching Now and in the Future: 255
• Glossary: 267
• Index: 283
• About the Author: 297

About the author

Karen Markey is a professor in the School of Information at the University of Michigan. Her experience with online searching began with the earliest commercial systems, DIALOG, Orbit, and BRS, the first end-user systems, CD-ROMs and online catalogs, and includes today’s open web search engines and proprietary systems for accessing databases of bibliographic records, abstracting & indexing entries, full texts, numeric data, and multimedia. Since joining the faculty at Michigan in 1987, she has taught online searching to thousands of students in her school’s library and information science (LIS) program. Her research has been supported by the Council on Library Resources, Delmas Foundation (DF), Department of Education (DoED), Institute of Museum and Library Services (IMLS), National Science Foundation (NSF), and OCLC. She is the author of five books, more than a dozen major research reports, and over one hundred journal articles and conference proceedings papers.

Bibliographic information

• Title: Online Searching: A Guide to Finding Quality Information Efficiently and Effectively
• Author: Karen Markey
• Publisher: Rowman & Littlefield, 2015
• ISBN: 1442238860, 9781442238862
• Length: 324 pages
• Subjects: Language Arts & Disciplines / Library & Information Science / Digital & Online Resources; Language Arts & Disciplines / Library & Information Science / General; Language Arts & Disciplines / Library & Information Science / School Media