All entries for Friday 21 October 2005

Google Scholar (Advanced Search)

Writing about web page http://scholar.google.com/advanced_scholar_search

I'm just starting my PhD and so am lost in the Fangornian forest of potential reading materials. There are many ways to locate material but I'd like to share a method I am increasingly favouring over others because I find it produces a tighter focus.

1. Think of a seminal paper pertinent to your area of research
2. Go to Google Scholar's advanced search page
3. Enter the title and author in the corresponding boxes
4. Click search
5. Assuming your paper appears click the "Cited by" link

That produces a list of (possibly less well known) papers likely to be helpful. No doubt there are other ways to locate citations but it works for me and led to an extremely useful paper that other methods missed.

I'd be interested to know if others have found stategies to help "filter" their literature hunts.

: 21 Oct 2005 14:58 |  Tags: PhD |  Comments (1) |  Close comments |  Report a problem