Introduction
Welcome to the BCC Libraries, ENG 101 students! This guide offers assistance in locating high quality materials from the BCC libraries and the web for all your research-based writing assignments. You'll find ideas for choosing and narrowing a research topic plus handy tips and how -to's for evaluating and citing sources.
The Purpose of Research
According to the Encyclopedia of Education, "research is done for a variety of purposes. These include exploring, describing, predicting, explaining, or evaluating some phenomenon or set of phenomena. Some research is aimed at replicating results from previous studies; other research is focused on quantitatively synthesizing a body of research. These two types of efforts are directed at strengthening a theory, verifying predictions, or probing the robustness of explanations by seeing if they hold true for different types of individuals, organizations, or settings."
Source: Pion, G. M., et al. (2002). "Research methods." Encyclopedia of Education. Ed. James W. Guthrie. 2nd ed. Vol. 6. New York: Macmillan Reference USA, 2020-2036. Retrieved from Gale Virtual Reference Library. Web. 23 Mar. 2016.
Image: "Research" by Leo Hidalgo, Used with permission via a CC By NC-2.0 License
Understanding Authority
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Understanding AuthorityGroup exercise for exploring expertise and purpose in information sources
Your Feedback Counts!
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Student SurveyPlease share your comments about this library workshop.
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Photo credit: Gary A.K. Used with permission under CC license (CC BY-NC-SA 2.0).
