due today at 4 pm eastern time WED DEC 14

In groups of three or four, complete STAGE ONE; make sure to complete the stage together. STAGE TWO should be completed individually.

Submission

Each student will submit this activity to Blackboard; however, only STAGE TWO will be fully completed for each student’s submission. STAGE ONE should be completed as a group, and therefore will only be filled in on one of the group members’ submission. Just make sure that all group members’ information is included on that submission.

Lab Blackboard:

1. Click on “Assignment Submissions”

2. Click on the “Individual or Group Activities’ Submissions” folder

3. Click on “Research”

4. ATTACH AS A FILE

Required

Names of Group Members (your name must be listed here to receive credit!):

1.

2.

3.

4.

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STAGE ONE: To be completed as a group.

ITEM 1: Ineffective Sources

List three sources (specific sources or types of sources) that should be avoided for the Persuasive Memo because these would not be considered professional, scholarly, and/or reliable:

List:

ITEM 2: Possible Effective Sources

List three sources (specific sources or types of sources) that could be potentially used for the Persuasive Memo because these would be considered professional, scholarly, and/or reliable:

List:

ITEM 3: Ineffective Research

Find ineffective online research that just states the obvious/common knowledge about corporate social responsibility and should therefore be avoided for a professional or academic document (quote or paraphrase acceptable; citation sandwich not needed for activity).

Statement with ineffective research:

URL where you found research:

ITEM 4: Effective Research

Find effective online research that demonstrates a fact, finding, or opinion about corporate social responsibility that does not state the obvious/common knowledge, and could therefore potentially be used for a professional or academic document (quote or paraphrase acceptable; citation sandwich not needed for activity).

Statement with effective research:

URL where you found research:

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STAGE TWO: To be completed individually.

Search Strategy Worksheet[footnoteRef:1] [1: http://www.clark.edu/Library/PDF/search_strategy_worksheet.pdf. I:\Common\BI Exercises\Search Strategy Worksheet.doc kmackey 1/23/04 ]

The purpose of this exercise is to help you think through your research topic and search strategy. Each topic is different. Some topics are so specific that the search statement might be a single term. Other topics may require more complex strategies. Most databases are so large that an understanding and use of Boolean operators (AND, OR, NOT) and truncating will provide better—more precise—results.

1. In one sentence, describe your topic (use your Persuasive Memo Abstract as a starting point).


2. Go back to #1 and underline the main concepts in your search statement.

3. List the main concepts in the section below, then list synonyms—or concepts where you want either one word or the other—below each term. A concept could be a single word or a phrase.

4. Go back to Step 3 and insert truncation where appropriate. Truncation (sometimes called stemming or wildcards) means to identify the root of the word and add a truncation symbol appropriate for the database. The truncation symbol for most databases (like Business Source Online and Factiva) is an asterisk (*); however, the symbol for the Mason Library Catalog is a question mark (?).

Examples:

genetic* = genetic, genetics, genetically...

genetic? = genetic, genetics, genetically...

5. Connect the keywords for each concept (from Step 3) with Boolean operator OR. Words connected with OR must be enclosed in parenthesis.

6. Connect the OR sets with Boolean operator AND. If applicable, also use Boolean operator NOT. This is your complete search strategy.

7. Pick one database and run your Boolean search.

8. Based on your search, list three potentially useful sources from your results and briefly explain what makes them useful.

1.

2.

3.

1