Using information
Information is data or content that serves as the foundation for knowledge, research, innovation, and expression. It can be found in many forms, from academic research to art and music. The value of information is tied to the investment of effort, time, and creativity in generating something novel. Every new creation is built upon the framework of what has come before it. Respecting and acknowledging these building blocks is a cornerstone of ethical use of information. The following topics must be considered when using information.
How do I start the research process?
At the heart of every research project is a question or problem. In some assignments, you will be the one to develop that topic, question, or problem.
So, how do you even start?!
There is a process for that!
The five steps outlined in this section will keep you from being overwhelmed and lost in the deep, dark sea of information.*
These steps will help you develop a strong research question, which will inform the direction of your research and keep your project manageable and efficient.
The five steps are:
- Identify the assignment parameters
- Presearch and acquire background knowledge on potential topics
- Develop your research question
- Gather information to answer your question or solve the problem you’ve identified from your question
- If necessary, refine your question
*If, at any point along the way, you DO get overwhelmed, don’t worry. Your friendly subject librarian will always be there to help you.
Step 1: Understand the assignment parameters
Your class research assignments will contain parameters that you must follow. To avoid being overwhelmed, use the following questions as a checklist to help you plan your research strategy:
- What are my topic requirements?
- What is required in terms of:
- Format – Essay, presentation, video, brochure, etc.?
- Genre – A persuasive argument, analysis, literature review, etc.?
- Length – How long of a recording, word or page count?
- Tone – Friendly, formal, professional, informational, etc.?
- Audience – Subject-matter experts, lay audience, customers, etc.?
- What sources and types of information* are required and how many?
- How current should this information be?
- What sources/types of information are not allowed?
- What is the citation style? (e.g., APA, MLA, Chicago, etc.)
*You’ll learn about the different sources and types of information on the next page of this module.
These are just some of the example parameters that you may encounter.
As you’ll see in the following practice examples (some of these are taken from actual classes), assignment parameters vary. If you are ever unsure of your assignment parameters, talk with your instructor.
Try it! Practice with assignment parameters
Click the tabs to look at the following example assignments.
For each assignment, determine the:
- What are the topic requirements?
- What is required in terms of:
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- Format
- Genre
- Length
- Tone
- Audience
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- What sources and types of information are required and how many? How current should this information be?
- What sources/types of information are not allowed?
- What is the citation style? (e.g., APA, MLA, Chicago, etc.)
Food Science and Human Nutrition (FSHN) 308
This was an actual assignment given in the Food Science and Human Nutrition (FSHN) 308 course. What are the parameters of the assignment?
Once you’ve listed them, click on the
icons below the assignment to check your knowledge.
Speech and Communication
Check with your advisor before the test-out application deadline to see if you are eligible.
Engl 2500
If this is your first time enrolled in the class, then yes. We suggest you still study and take Quiz 1, even if you plan to test out. That way, you do not fall behind in the course if you do not receive a passing score.
Step 2: Presearch potential topics
Presearching, or pre-research, is about acquiring background knowledge on a potential research topic to:
- Help you understand what the topic is about
- Give you a basic understanding of the stories, questions, controversies, and issues around your topic
- Help you determine if the topic is interesting enough to pursue
- Give you enough of a foundation to help you develop a research question
Presearching*
Acquiring enough background information on a topic to determine if it’s something you want to pursue.
*Presearching may also be called pre-research
If you can address the above bullets in your presearch, then you should know enough to determine if this is a topic you want to pursue or if you want to find a different topic.
Where do you go to get this information?
Click the tabs to find out more about each resource.
Wikipedia
Because Wikipedia is crowdsourced, most professors will not allow you to cite Wikipedia in your research paper.
Crowdsourced
Anyone can create and edit content in Wikipedia, meaning the information may be inaccurate.
Wikipedia articles are usually signed only with a username or pseudonym. You can’t tell who the authors or editors are, what qualifies them to write on the topic, or even if they are qualified at all!
Wikipedia is a great presearching resource when used with caution. Use it to gain basic information and vocabulary on a topic, such as dates and timelines for historical events, or for outlining aspects of a topic. Entries on popular topics, such as TV shows, extreme sports, and prominent people, tend to have more detail.
Don’t use Wikipedia for specific information about new theories, analyses, data, and interpretations to support your arguments.
In your research, Wikipedia will give you ideas and a feel for potential topics. Once you’ve established a tentative question, do your research using scholarly materials (more on that in the next page).
Click the icons to learn more about the background information provided on a Wiki page.
Books
Books are great sources of background information because they often provide a “big picture” perspective. At the presearch stage, there is no need to read the entire book.
The table of contents can give you more specific topic ideas. If you already have a topic in mind, use the table of contents to lead you to chapters that are closest to your topic.
Book introductions often provide:
- an overview of what will be covered in the entire book;
- notes about the context around the topic; and
- issues, controversies, and questions that arise from within the topic.
For most topics, pick a fairly current book, because it will deal with recent developments in the subject area.
In Module 2, you’ll learn how to search and find books at the library.
Google uses proprietary algorithms to determine where a website is placed in your search results. These algorithms are user-specific, which means your search results may not be the same as your classmates’. While Google is good for basic facts and news, it is not good for finding scholarly information (more on that later).
Google also contains sponsored links where someone has paid to have their website appear at the top of a specific web search.
Sponsored links
Advertisements where someone has paid to have their website appear at the top of the search results. Advertisements are a chief source of revenue for Google and other web search engines. Depending on the search engine you’re using, it may not be easy to identify these ads from your real search results. Be sure you know the difference between these paid advertisements and other content. Or better yet, use library sources to avoid sponsored links altogether.
Scholarly information is written by specialists in a field and evaluated through a process called peer review (more about this on the next page). Your research project may require using scholarly information instead of the information normally found in a Google search.
AI Generators
At Iowa State University, you have access to Copilot. Use your ISU NetID to access the AI. Rather than tell you what Copilot does, we’ll let the AI tell you, instead:
Not all professors condone the use of AI in their classes or assignments. Check your syllabus for class policies. If you are unsure if AI is allowed, ask your professor and explain how you want to use AI. They will give you the guidance you need.
If you are allowed to use AI to help you with your presearch, you can give it prompts* like these (type your topic in the blank):
- Provide some introductory background information about ________. Write your response as if you were an expert in this field with years of experience teaching about it, and explain the topic to first-semester freshman in college. Describe some of the issues around this topic and some of the current gaps in the literature about it Please list your sources.
- From now on, act as a college-level researcher with years of experience mentoring first-semester college freshmen. Ask me what topic I’d like to learn some background information about. List any sources you use to generate the background information. After providing background information about that topic, continue asking me questions to help me narrow my topic. Keep asking me questions to help me focus my interest until I tell you I’ve selected my topic. Then, formulate 5 research questions suitable for college students learning how to do research at a college level.
When using AI, it is a good habit to ask it to list its sources so that you can double-check the information’s accuracy. There are several reasons for this:
- AIs generate hallucinations, where they will make up data and text that isn’t true or doesn’t exist.
- AIs will pull information from sources that it may not list.
- The resources that the AI is using for the information may be misrepresented, inaccurate, or incorrect.
- The AI may be sharing information that is plagiarized from other sources.
✅ Whenever using AI, YOUare the expert and in charge. You must always double-check its claims and should heavily edit anything an AI produces.
- Do not use AI to write your entire assignment, and do not trust it to be completely true.
However, AI can be very helpful during the initial research process by providing you with background information and/or ideas. You should always verify that the information provided is trustworthy and reliable.
AI hallucinations
When an AI generates false or misleading statements and information.
*You’ll learn about prompt generation in more detail in another chapter.
Proceed with caution. Like anything found on the internet, you need to question whether the information you find is trustworthy and reliable.
When you’ve settled on a topic, your background information will help to formulate your tentative research questions.
Review: How well do I understand presearching?
Choose the answer that best fits the review question. You may need to scroll.
Select the blue Check button for the explanation.
You can choose Show solution or the Retry button to choose again.
Click the blue arrows on the side to advance to the next question