GD 312/412: Contemporary Issues in Design

You can start your research by using the 1Search box located one the homepage of the OSU Libraries website (http://library.oregonstate.edu/). 

1Search combines the OSU Libraries 'library catalog," Summit, and many of our online databases into one search engine. 1Search is a good starting point for your research. 

1Search helps you locate:

• Books owned by OSU Libraries and other libraries
• Print and Full-text online journals, magazines and newspapers

Why can't you just use Google to find journal articles? Actually, you can, especially if you use their special search engine; Google Scholar is a good place to find articles. But it has its drawbacks.

• It is harder is to determine if the journal article you find is peer-reviewed. It is easier to do this in a database, which often has tools that let you limit searches to peer-reviewed or refereed content. Not everything that you find in Google Scholar is scholarly, let alone peer-reviewed.
• You will also often find that many of the articles you locate on Google Scholar are not actually available to you. Frequently on Google Scholar you find a citation only to discover you have to pay $$$ for it. If you use the library databases and if the library has a subscription to the journal, you'll have immediate access to the article for free. If the library does not have the journal, we can get it for you through interlibrary loan (also for free).

You will find things in Google Scholar that you don't find in the databases. But you'll also find a lot of things in databases not included in Google Scholar. So for a more complete search, you'll probably end up using both the databases and Google Scholar for your research.

Depending on the type of articles or information you're looking for, a specific database may be the best choice for your search. Here are a few that you may find useful.

The U.S. Census Bureau is the primary resource for U.S. demographic data (United States, Puerto Rico and the Island Areas). The US Census Data Portal fairly easy to use, and convenient since it includes data from several censuses and surveys. For more information, you can use this guide.

Other data and resources

• Income data from the Current Population Survey
• Consumer Spending data from Consumer Expenditures Surveys
• A new portal site that includes a lot of added functionality is StatsAmerica. Billed as "Your one-stop destination for economic development data sites and tools" it includes data profiles and maps.Very easy to use.