Essential Research Tools Every Student Should Utilize
Learning how to research and what tools to use is a crucial part of growing as a student. Check out these five recommended tools when working on your next research project, thesis, or dissertation.
- Your School's Library
Check your school's library website first, you will likely have the greatest access to journals and publications here. Library databases are usually organized into common subjects, such as physical therapy, history, biology, etc. Select your subject of research or a subject close to it.
As a chemistry student, I had the best experience with the databases ScienceDirect, SciTech Collection, PubMed, and SciFinder. Within these databases, search by keywords or key phrases to narrow down your search.
If there is a certain article or journal you are struggling to find access to, ask your librarian if they can request an Inter-Library Loan, where the material is borrowed from an external source for you to access for a certain period of time.
2. Scite
Scite.ai is an AI website that works to assist researchers with writing, citations, references and more. It functions as a large database of both open access and paywall journals and articles, with an AI representative to help in your research.
AI tools may be controversial in the traditional lens of literature review and research, however they can still be used as a resource for developing ideas, diction and phrasing. Check with your professor or advisor prior to using artificial intelligence to assist in your research.
Scite.ai is a paid subscription that starts at $20 per month or $144 per year. They offer a short trial period so consider using that before committing to a subscription. When I was still in school a few years ago, I wouldn't have been able to justify the cost, especially with a large digital school library available.
3. Notion
Staying organized while working on a large research project or thesis is difficult, and I struggled with it for several months, until a good friend recommended that I try Notion. This was a turning point for me; I was able to get my research more organized within the week and plan out a timeline for my defense committee.
Notion has quite a few free templates that aren't limited to just research. Some popular ones include finance tracking, journaling, nutrition and productivity. I have yet to try any paid templates and at this time I am not affiliated with Notion in any way. I enjoyed using Notion to track my thesis progress in graduate school and still use it in my career for lists and scheduling of various projects.
- Reference Managers
Managing tens, if not hundreds, of citations on paper or in Word may not be the best use of your time and energy. To keep your ideas and saved references organized, try the reference manager Zotero or Mendeley.
Their function is similar — input a published research article, and the software stores the paper and attempts to extract the citation in your selected style. I say attempts because it is not always accurate, but often is pretty close. Checking your citation formatting when wrapping up your reference list is non-negotiable.
I prefer and recommend Zotero as it was easier for me to use in general, from storing articles by category and project to easily loading citations into my Word docs. It was also quite easy to highlight data and info from tables on articles I opened in Zotero.
Although Mendeley performs similarly to Zotero, I encountered more issues with Mendeley. This included frequent unrequested logging out, issues with pulling up 'saved' articles, and difficulty in linking to Word. Some researchers swear by Mendeley, so I suggest giving both a try to see which works better for your research and computer system.
- Open Access Journals
Open access materials are articles and journals that are free and available for anyone to read and reference. This is a great starting point if you don't have access to a school library or any other databases.
Science.org contains great articles and publications on a variety of STEM topics. Ensure that the site you use is reputable and accurate by comparing the data and results to other articles from different journals or databases.
Thanks for reading!
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Disclosure
The information above is based on my own beliefs, opinion and experiences. In no way does this blog represent or reflect the schools I have been to or the companies that I work and/or have worked for. I am not responsible or liable for any events that occur as a result of this information.
I am not affiliated with any of the companies mentioned above.