Ethical Research
BY Trey Mastio
How do I gather relevant information from print or digital sources?
You can gather the best information if you first look up the topic with keywords and phrases, then look on some of the websites and make sure they are credible. Then pick the one you like. A website that is good at finding good information is:
How to use key words
You use keywords to narrow down your search. You can make keywords by looking at your sentence like if I were trying to look up Do bees die after they sting you? To narrow that down I could put:
- Bees
- Die
- Sting
How to decide whether a website or resource is credible and accurate
A website is credible and/or accurate when you know it has the right information for your topic. It also has to have been edited or made soon. It has to have an author who makes you think hes an expert on the topic. At the end of the address make sure it has a .gov or .org then you know its good, but if it has a .com then it most likely will not have that good of information.
Difference between quoting, paraphrasing, and summarizing
Quotations have to identical to the original thing that you are taking and you have to give the author credit for what you are taking.
Paraphrasing is when you put a passage into your own words. A paraphrase must still have a cited source.
Summarizing is when you are taking the main ideas of the passage or text and saying it in your own words. You still have to cite your source because you are taking an idea from the person.
What an MLA citation is
MLA stands for Modern Language Association and what they do is they can cite a source for anything like if you are doing a research article then they could cite a source for where ever you looked for information. It can be found on any website or you could look up a cite that would cite it for you like:
What is Plagiarism and how to avoid it
First of all plagiarism is the act of taking or stealing someones words or ideas and saying that they are yours, and second of all you can avoid plagiarism by:
- Paraphrase - Paraphrasing is when you take something, but put into your own words. Wait though because you have to cite your source too.
- Cite - This usually has the addition of the authors and the date of when it was published.
- Quoting - When quoting a source, use the quote exactly the way it is. Quoting must be done correctly to avoid plagiarism.
- Citing Quotes - This is when you also tell the page number or paragraph number.
- Referencing - This is when you have a page full of citations for all the websites or authors you got the information from.