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Research Tips and Tricks: How to Save Your Materials

How to Keep What You Have Found

You've come up with multiple keywords, used a multitude of databases, and now you have found the perfect article, book, or journal. And have found what you're are looking for! Now how do you keep track of it?

There are a few options. The best are downloading it, or saving the permalink. By downloading the article you maintain access and can read it offline. The permalink is the permanent link to the article. By saving the permalink you can easily go back to article in the database. 

Both of these steps are crucial. 

Source Types

You might come across different types of sources when doing a research, or hear about different types of sources. Here are some examples:

  • Scholarly Journals- These are where the majority of academic and peer-reviewed articles come from they are written by and for scholars. 
  • Popular Sources- Magazine articles from publications like People that are easy for all people to understand.
  • Books and E-books- Academic books differ from articles because unlike articles which focus on one subject or study, books may cover multiple issues. 
  • Theses-You may come across something called a Thesis or Dissertation. These are articles written by graduate school students and are reviewed by their professors before graduation. Although it may seem like it, they are NOT the same as a scholarly peer-reviewed source. 

 

Downloading Your Materials

Downloading Books vs. Academic Articles

Unlike an article, you cannot always download the entirety of an e-book. Not all materials will have the "Full Download" option, or you may only want/need to read a few chapters. 

You may see an EPUB or PDF version of the book. The EPUB version is the electronic publication, and is supported by many e-readers. The PDF version is a static version of the text.

You have a few different options with e-books.  Play around and discover which option is most convenient for you. You can save the permalink like you would with an article. You can download a chapter at a time, and use the permalink to go back and download more. You can save the link to a cloud drive. And you can email pages to yourself as well. 

Just as with an article, make sure you save the permalink, it is the easiest way to get back to your materials.

 

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