NOTE: THIS GUIDE IS NO LONGER BEING UPDATED
Guide URL: http://guides.lib.berkeley.edu/publichealth/HealthyWorkplaces
Created by Lee Adams
Feel free to contact Michael Sholinbeck or Debbie Jan with questions or for an appointment. Or, drop by the Bioscience, Natural Resources, and Public Health Library!
What is your research question?
Let's talk about indexing!
What is evidence? Things to keep in mind:
Who pays for science?
Most scientific research is funded by government, companies doing research and development, and non-profit entities. Because science is attempting to get at some "truth," the source of research funding shouldn't have a significant effect on the outcome of scientific research, right?
» Read Industry sponsorship and research outcome Cochrane Database Syst Rev. 2017 Feb. 16; 2:MR000033).
What to consider when looking at survey or estimated data:
Adopted from information on the UCSF Family Health Outcomes Project web siteReliability and validity
Adopted from Chapter 3, Conducting research literature reviews: from the Internet to paper, by Arlene Fink; Sage, 2014.
Reliable data collection is relatively free from "measurement error"
» Is the survey written at a reading level too high for the people completing it?
» Is the device used to measure elapsed time in an experiment accurate?
Validity refers to how well a measure assesses what it claims to measure
» If the survey is supposed to measure "quality of life," how is that concept defined?
» How accurately can this animal study of drug metabolism be extrapolated to humans?
Grey Literature generally refers to publications not produced by commercial publishers, including reports (pre-prints, preliminary progress and advanced reports, technical reports, market research reports, etc.), theses, conference proceedings, and other documents. They are often produced by government entities, research institutions, or NGOs/IGOs.