Welcome to Social Work Research Methods!
Hi everyone! My name is Rachel Wishkoski, and I'm the Social Work librarian here at USU.
My pronouns are she/her/hers. I’m also the librarian for Sociology, Anthropology, Intersectional Gender Studies, Music and Human Development & Family Studies.
I’m available to help you with assignments in this class and in any other HDFS classes you might be taking. The best part of my job is answering students’ questions, so please reach out any time! I can help you plan your research, hone your topic, develop search strategies, learn databases and other research tools, find and evaluate sources, and cite in APA.
How to get in touch
I’ll be working remotely during fall semester 2020, but I can help you in a lot of different formats. Send me a message at rachel.wishkoski@usu.edu to ask for help via email or to set up an appointment to talk another way. I’m happy to meet with you via phone, video call (your choice of platform – though Zoom or Google Meet are probably the easiest options), or the library’s chat system.
COVID-19 library updates
Updates and current status of all USU Libraries facilities and services are available here: https://library.usu.edu/covid-19/
You can also contact me with any questions!
What's in this guide
This guide has a ton of resources. The tabs are organized based on questions I frequently get from students in Social Work.
- The first few tabs about finding specific articles and browsing for articles on your research topic will be great places to start.
- If you need help coming up with keywords or building a good search, the Search Tips tab will be helpful.
- Finally, be sure to check out the APA tab for citation help.
If you have more questions, look at the FAQ tab or email me!
Research Hacks
One of the most frustrating things is finding an article that looks like it'll be amazing, but then not be able to get to the PDF without hitting a paywall.
Here’s some advice:
- The Lean Library browser extension is a tool that alerts you when online content is available through the library while you are doing your research both on and off-campus. Lean Library works no matter how you do your research, through Google, library databases, or following links from your professor.
- If you’re working in a library database, here’s a video demo of how to use Article Linker.
- For those of you who like to use Google Scholar, you can configure your account so it includes article PDFs from USU Libraries subscriptions in your results. Go into your settings, select “Library Links,” and search Utah State University. This video shows you the process.
- If we don’t have access to the full text, here’s a video showing you how to request a free PDF of an article through InterLibrary Loan (usually takes 1-2 days, but sometimes quicker!).
