• Brainstorm terms for the concept of information seeking: information seeking behavior/behaviour, information use, information retrieval, information needs, information verification, search strategies, user behavior/behaviour

• Brainstorm terms for the profession you selected, for example: lawyers, attorneys, counselors, legal profession. You'll need to use both broader and more specific terms. For example, if you are interested in the information seeking behavior of pregnant women, you will also need to search for articles on how women look for information on health care. For background information on an occupation, career, or profession, use the Occupational Outlook Handbook (OOH) to learn more about that field. If your group is not covered by the OOH, consider finding a general article in an encyclopedia.

• Brainstorm the types of information you think your group will need.

• Determine subject areas covered by your target group, for example: medicine, communication, psychology, art, education, women studies.

• Select databases to find articles on your topic. Ask yourself who might study the information seeking behavior of your particular group. Google scholar is a good starting point, as you can see what types of journals will cover your topic and proceed from their to search a specialized subject database.

• Start with Resources by Subject on the Libraries web site - link to the list for Information Science and also look at the subject lists for disciplines covered by your profession or group. You might also want to search the Libraries catalogs to see if there are any books about your group.

• Check the terms you brainstormed against the database's thesaurus/subject guide. For more focused searching, use the thesaurus/subject guide terms -- but be creative and use the keyword search function as well

• Be flexible: try combining keywords not found in the thesaurus with subject terms; for example, the group name may not appear in the thesaurus, but various forms of the concept of information seeking may be, so you would want to combine a keyword search on doctors or physicians with the subject term used for information seeking behavior -- in the LISA database your search would look like this: (physicians or doctors) AND information seeking behaviour

• Students in the School of Library and Information Science at the University of North Carolina, Chapel Hill often write their master's papers on various aspects of information seeking. Check their Master's Paper Index to see if a student has covered your topic or a related topic. Most papers are available in full-text, and the bibliographies can be useful.

• Check to see if the UW Libraries has the journals you need, and in what format. Not all are available in full-text online and may require a trip to the library or use of our interlibrary loan/document delivery service

• For articles that are especially important to your work, perform a "cited reference" search in the Web of Science database for articles that cite your authors.

Note: If you have tried numerous concepts in several databases and do not turn up any relevant articles, it is possible that no one has studied the information seeking behavior or information needs of your group. In that event, try a broader search (e.g., health care professionals instead of physicians). The narrower your focus and the smaller the group you are studying, the less likely there is to be research available, or discussion of their needs may be included in a comprehensive article.

Questions? Please contact Nancy Huling (hulingn@u.washington.edu; 206-685-2211). I am happy to discuss your search strategies with you -- via email, online chat, telephone, and even in person!

10/2008 nh