Citation and proper attribution of sources rest at the core of academic research. Musselman Library provides a Citation Guide to the major citation styles with links to helpful resources online.
For more information on citation, see our citation guide.
Google is going to be a useful tool for settling on a topic and finding some basic background information to support your research. The best thing about Google is also its biggest drawback: it searches so much information at once that it risks overwhelming you with results.
If you want to become a Google expert, try using a site search to eliminate useless noise and leave yourself with just the kinds of results you want to see. A site search tells Google to only give you results that match a specific URL or top-level domain that you specify. The syntax looks like this:
site:domain/url_whatever keywords you would normally enter
Test your understanding of Google site searches by typing the syntax you would use to find the information described in each prompt.
Use these databases to find scholarly journal articles, or even articles from magazines and newspapers, on your topic. To get full text of the articles you find, click on the PDF or HTML links within the database.
If the full text isn't available in the database, click the 
button.
