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HSERV 102 - Prof. Spencer : Boyhood Movie Paper: Search Strategy

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The links below will take you to resources that may help you with Part 1 of the assignment. Log in with your MyWCC username and password if you are off-campus.

THESE DO NOT CONTAIN SCHOLARLY ARTICLES.

Noodle Tools

6 Reasons to use Noodle Tools

Find your Keywords

When searching the databases for articles, do not type in whole sentences. 

The assignment is NOT a movie review.  Using a specific example portrayed in the film, you will search for peer-reviewed articles discussing that type of family experience/dynamics at the same developmental stage as Mason (e.g. Divorce and Stress).

 

Use the KEYWORDS of your topic when searching for sources.

e.g. search Divorce AND Stress

Think of other terms that can be used to describe the event you are researching and try those also: Divorce, Separation, Single Parent, Parental Divorce etc.

 

Try using specific age descriptions or developmental stage

e.g. Child, Young Adult, Teen, Teenager, School Age Children, High School Student, Adolescent

 

To eliminate articles discussing how childhood experiences affect us into adulthood, add something like NOT adult (-adulthood in google scholar)

 

Be careful of words with multiple meanings, use alternate or additional words to clarify:

(e.g. Viking (Norse warrior); Viking (moon lander); Viking (football team); Viking (WCC student newspaper)

 

You might need to search multiple times in a single database before deciding it does not have any useful articles.

Use the asterisk * to truncate words and widen your search. Child* will search for Child, Children and Childhood.

Use quotation marks to keep phrases together: e.g. "separation anxiety" 

 


e.g. search "School Age Children" AND Divorce AND Stress

 or Child* AND Anxiety AND Parental Divorce NOT adulthood

or  Child* AND Separation AND Stress



Try your search terms in different combinations to get the greatest number of results.

 

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