These online databases provide the full text or citations for journal articles and other publications relevant to communication studies.
You can use the ILL (Interlibrary Loan) link on the left to request books and articles not owned by the Olin Library.
The PubMed database is a literature database that contains citation information (title, authors, journal, and publication date) and abstracts of articles published in biomedical and scientific journals. PubMed does not contain full-text articles, but in some cases, you can link to full text directly from PubMed.
The Web of Science provides access to multiple databases that provide reference and citation data from academic journals, conference proceedings, and other documents in various academic disciplines.
You may need to consult various databases depending on the topic and type of information you are seeking.
Here are some common article types used in global health research:
Primary or Empirical Research Articles: articles reporting original research results. They typically include an abstract, introduction/background, methods, results, conclusion, and a list of references.
Review Articles: synthesize and summarize a particular topic or area of research. They typically do not provide original research results, but provide excellent background information on the state of the research on a particular topic.
Systematic Reviews and Meta-Analyses: Systematic reviews are a very specific type of litearture review that provide comprehensive, high-level anallyses and summaries of all existing literature surrounding a specific resesarch question. These are not always tagged, but usually systematic review and/or meta-analysis appears in the article title.
A meta-analysis (often a component of the systematic review methodology) is a statistical analysis that combines findings from independent studies and clinical trials.
Grey Literature/ Government Publications: Grey literature is information produced by government agencies, think tanks, academics, and businesses, but not controlled by commercial publishers. Material types may include: technical reports, pre-prints, conference proceedings, bibliographies, workshop summaries, government documents, policy briefs, and dissertations. Many of these materials are accessible for free online via the agency website that produces the report. Grey literature is an importatn source to consider for global health research.
News: Written by journalists for public audiences, news articles provide vital background information and current reporting on many global health topics. News is distributed in printed newspapers and magazines, as well as online through news media websites, social media, and radio/TV broadcasts. In global health research, news sources might also serve as primary sources for understanding how health topics are diseeminated to the public via local newspapers or informal publications.
Content in this box was provided by Hannah Rozear, Perkins Library, Duke University
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