PHHA 425 - Health Research Guide

Use your assignment

Review your assignment to be sure what kind of resources you need. You may see something like this:

Find 5 scholarly articles on your topic.

You will need 7 sources. 3 must be scholarly articles, 2 from reliable web sources, 1 book and 1 encyclopedia article.

Information Cycle

Every topic has an information cycle of when information about the topic is published. For example, scholarly articles on a topic will not be published for at least a year. If your topic is date specific, you need to know when different kinds of publications will address your topic.

Information in modern society is seemingly endless. Each day, as events unfold, more information is created and then disseminated.

The "Information Cycle" refers to the cyclical and systematic manner in which information, for instance from one single noteworthy event, is produced, distributed and changes over time.

This list below represents how the progression of information is connected to information sources:

  • Instantaneously - Social networking, Online media, Mobile communication
  • Same Day - Main stream media
  • Next Day - News Media, Newspapers
  • Following Week(s)-  Popular Magazines
  • Months later - Scholarly Journals
  • Year later - Books
  • Years later - Reference works

 

Scholarly vs. Popular Articles

All articles are not the same. Most of your professors will ask you to use scholarly (also called peer-reviewed) journal articles. These are not the kinds of publications you find in your local bookstore or free online. This link tells you how to identify them. 

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