This exercise is designed for:
HLT 170/180 (Massage Therapy)
It will cover three types of research tools:
How to get there:
1. From the NOVA Libraries site, click on Books & More (middle of the page).
Things to know about the catalog:
Subject (LC Subject) Searching: This is the most precise kind of search. It is based on specific words that have been assigned to topics by librarians. Do this search when you have a general topic and you know (or can easily guess) the subject heading.
Example: the official subject heading for "cooking" is Cookery.
Keyword (Anywhere) Searching: Do this kind of search when you don't know the specific words that have been assigned to your topic, or when you want to search a combination of topics.
Take your research question and break it down into the most important words and phrases, and use AND in between.
Example #1:
Research Question: How many books/DVDs do the NOVA libraries have on massage therapy?
Hint: Massage therapy is a general topic. Try a Subject (LC) search.
Your search can be: massage therapy
Example #2:
Research Question: How many books/DVDs do the NOVA libraries have on ethics in massage therapy?
Hint: Now you are combining topics: ethics and massage therapy. Try a Keywords (Anywhere) search.
Your search can be: massage therapy AND ethics
Database to try:
Health Reference Center Academic
How to get there:
Do a search!
1. Be sure to select Subject Guide Search (see picture).
2. In the search box, type massage therapy.
Note that you can limit your results to full-text (complete) articles, peer-reviewed journal articles, articles with images, etc.
3. Click on Search.
4. On the next screen you'll see a blue link that says Massage. This is the official subject heading for our topic of massage therapy. Click on the link for Massage.
You should get a screen that looks like this:
Clicking on Massage will bring up a list of 916 articles on massage.
Clicking on Subdivisions will take those 916 articles and break them down into smaller categories.
5. Click on the link for Subdivisions. You should get something that looks like this:
The sub-categories for Massage are listed on the left. Look to the right to see how many articles are in each category. We can see that there are 23 articles about massage equipment and supplies.
6. Click on any sub-category name to view a list of articles. Let's look at Health Aspects.
You should get a list of articles that looks similar to this:
We can see that the first article is titled, "TV program alleges that massage causes stroke, but where is the evidence?" and that it was published in the Journal of the Australian Traditional-Medicine Society in December, 2006.
