Key Points for Liaisons Related to Research
Liaison Librarians can begin research interaction with their Departments by many different avenues, such as these examples:
- Attending Faculty research presentations/poster sessions and graduate dissertation defenses
- Participating in new degree program planning discussions, especially related to new library resources
- Participating in accreditation visits to Schools and Colleges (Academic Programs)
- Presenting library research orientations for new Faculty, visiting scholars and guest lecturers
The Scholarly Writing Process
How to find information on copyright.
How to use and contribute content to the WSU Libraries Institutional Repository (Digital Commons)
WSU Libraries and other organizations, have information initiatives and resources on: scholarly communications and writing, copyright, and author rights.
- SHERPA/RoMEOPublisher copyright policies & self-archiving
- SPARC (Scholarly Publishing and Academic Resources Coalition)Author Rights: Using the SPARC Author Addendum to secure your rights as the author of a journal article.
- Open Access: What We're Doing and How It Helps YouPresentation to faculty in Wayne State University's (WSU) Department of Mathematics. Includes information on how making research open access can increase its visibility, how high impact journals may allow for posting preprints or postprints. Powerpoint presentation that liaisons can customize.
Overview of the Liaison Librarian's Role in Research
It is the role of Subject Librarians to gather knowledge about the research characteristics of the Departments or Colleges to which they are assigned. Subject librarians provide research support for WSU Faculty, Graduate, and Undergraduate Students.
Many Faculty research areas are listed on their websites. Conversations, meetings, and instruction sessions present opportunities to talk with Faculty about their research.
Subject librarians can make appointments for discipline-specific research consultations with Faculty in their subject areas.
Subject librarians have training and experience with discipline-specific library resources and should communicate this expertise to their faculty.
Literature Reviews, Research Papers and Publication Tips
How to develop subject-specific search strategies for database searching.
How to verify incomplete or incorrect citations (University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign).
General Resources
- A-Z List of Article DatabasesA list of all databases available through the WSU Library System, filterable by broad subject area.
- Research Guides / Library GuidesResearch guides arranged by subject area, maintained by the relevant subject librarian.
Guides to Citation Management Tools
- Guide to using EndNoteEndNote requires a one-time purchase of $50 via C&IT.
- Guide to using ZoteroZotero is freely available to all users.
- Guide to using RefWorksRefWorks is freely available to active WSU affiliates.
Other Helpful Resources
- ProQuest Dissertations and Theses Global Closed Collection - full text This link opens in a new windowDissertations published from 1980 forward include 350-word abstracts written by the author. Master's theses published from 1988 forward include 150-word abstracts.
- Ulrich's International Periodicals Directory This link opens in a new windowContains information on currently published as well as discontinued periodicals. Includes magazines, journals, newsletters, newspapers, conference proceedings, and electronic publications.
Acquiring Research Materials
Locating background journal articles or patents needed for research.
Requesting items not in WSU Libraries’ collections (Interlibrary Loan)
- WSU Library Catalog Search to Locate ResourcesUse the WSU catalog to locate books from the WSU collections.
Open Access Journal Sources
- Directory of open access journals This link opens in a new windowFree, full text, quality controlled scientific and scholarly journals, covering all subjects and many languages
- BioMed Central This link opens in a new windowBioMed Central publishes 241 peer-reviewed open access journals.
- PLOS (Public Library of Science)Open access journals in science and medicine
- PubMed Central This link opens in a new windowPMC is a free full-text archive of biomedical and life sciences journal literature at the U.S. National Institutes of Health's National Library of Medicine (NIH/NLM).
Articles on Publishing & Institutional Repositories
Resources for Systematic Reviews
- Hedges (McMaster University/Evidence Based Health Informatics)"The focus of the Hedges Project...is to investigate ways to develop and harness search filters ("hedges") that will improve retrieval of scientifically sound and clinically relevant study reports from large, general purpose, biomedical research bibliographic databases including MEDLINE, EMBASE, and PsycINFO."
- ISSG Search Filters Resource"The InterTASC Information Specialists' Sub-Group (English and Scotland) Search Filter Resource is a collaborative venture to identify, assess and test search filters designed to retrieve research by study design or focus. The Search Filters Resource aims to provide easy access to published and unpublished search filters. It also provides information and guidance on how to critically appraise search filters, study design filters in progress and information on the development and use of search filters. Inclusion of a search filter is not an endorsement of its validity or a recommendation."
Wayne State University Division of Research Resources
Faculty will find helpful resources available within the WSU Division of Research
Also provided by the WSU Divison of Research:
- Funding Agency Links from the Division of ResearchWSU Division of Research
- PIVOT for Research Funding OpportunitiesPIVOT provides access to the most comprehensive global source of funding opportunities and identifies researcher expertise within or outside of WSU.
- Research Funding OpportunitiesInternal and external funding opportunities from the Division of Research.
NIH & NSF Public Access Plans
Faculty Promotion & Tenure
Locating and researching faculty member's own publications for the promotion and tenure process.
This may include: evaluating journals, journal impact factors, citation analysis and/or cited reference searching, using Journal Citation Reports, Science Direct, Scopus and Web of Science (links below):
- Journal citation reports This link opens in a new windowThe Journal citation reports is an essential, comprehensive, and unique resource for journal evaluation, using citation data drawn scholarly journals worldwide.
- ScienceDirect This link opens in a new windowA Web database for scientific research that contains abstracts and the full text of more than 1000 Elsevier Science journals in the life, physical, medical, technical, and social sciences.
- Scopus This link opens in a new window"Scopus is the world's largest abstracts database of 13,450 titles from more than 4,000 international publishers with access to over 25 million abstracts (going back to 1966)." Full-text is included for some citations.
- Web of Science This link opens in a new windowOnline version of the ISI indexes: Science Citation Index Expanded and Social Sciences Citation Index from 1975-.