STEM Videos - Yale Young Global Scholars (YYGS) - Innovations in Science & Technology (IST) - Yale University Library Research Guides at Yale University

Forming a Research Question, Taking Notes, & Avoiding Plagiarism (8 minutes)

Video sections:

Introduction to writing research papers 0:50
Acknowledgments 1:16
Forming a research question or hypothesis 1:40
Searching the literature 2:54
Added benefits of literature searching 4:42
Examples of journal article titles from recent publications 5:28
Taking notes from sources 5:56
Plagiarism 7:06
Before you begin to write 7:42
Literature references 8:18

What Is A Literature Review? (5 minutes)

Video sections:

What is the literature review? 1:00
Purpose of a literature review 1:12
Steps for writing a literature review 1:56
Organizing your research 2:16
Researching for your literature review 2:46
Getting ready to write 4:10
Getting help with your literature review 4:40

Science Literature Reviews (28 minutes)

Video sections:

Intro 0:09
What do we mean by "literature review"? 0:21
Yale Library's Quicksearch 6:30
Searching Web of Science 7:30
Troubleshooting finding full text 15:07
Configuring a Zotero folder for your lit review 15:27
Advanced searching in the Web of Science 17:10
Searching in Scopus 21:18
Searching for Author Profiles in Scopus 22:36
Searching the ProQuest Natural Science Collection 23:38
Searching in GeoRef 25:36
Further Reading 27:50
Contacting a Subject Librarian 28:15

Databases in the video:

Web of Science
The Web of Science is an abstract database, which means it indexes abstracts and other information from academic articles to let you know what has been published in a research area. The database is strongest in the sciences, and it is great for looking in the published literature. (It doesn't include preprints.) This is also the system that records the Impact Factor of journals; you can use that to see if a journal is well-known in its field.
Scopus
This scientific abstract database also provides information on citation analysis for specific articles and authors, along with journal metrics that can help you discover good publishing venues for your articles. There are even altmetrics (how viral an article went) available on individual journal article records.
ProQuest Natural Sciences Collection
This database combines the ProQuest Agricultural & Environmental Science Collection, the Meteorological and Geoastrophysical Abstracts, Biological Science Database, and Earth, Atmospheric & Aquatic Science Database into a single search platform, with coverage from 1946-present and robust, human-curated indexing. It will be particularly useful to researchers performing advanced searches, with time-saving search limits by keyword, author, author institution, and abstract. Its full-text resources range from scholarly journals, trade and industry journals, and technical reports to magazines, conference proceedings, and government publications.
GeoRef (via GeoScienceWorld)
GeoRef is the most comprehensive database in the geosciences, and it grows by at least 80,000 references a year (you publish a lot!): journals, books, maps, and reports. The database also includes masters' and doctoral dissertations from US and Canadian universities. If you have a question about any subfield of the geosciences, this is probably your best starting point.

Yale Young Global Scholars (YYGS) - Innovations in Science & Technology (IST): STEM Videos

Forming a Research Question, Taking Notes, & Avoiding Plagiarism (8 minutes)

What Is A Literature Review? (5 minutes)

Science Literature Reviews (28 minutes)

Databases in the video:

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