The article reports on a systematic method of undertaking a literature search on the educational impact of being a young carer (16-24 years old). The search methodology applied and described in detail will be of value to academic librarians and to other education researchers who undertake systematic literature searches. Seven bibliographic…

This paper brings together the research and developments of instructed pragmatics over the past three decades by reporting the synthesis findings of instructional intervention studies in interlanguage pragmatics. Two questions have guided this investigation: (1) is instruction effective in learning pragmatics?; and (2) what methods are most…

Focused on community colleges in North Carolina participating in the Scholars of Global Distinction initiative, the goal of this article is to assist librarians in their efforts to thoughtfully increase global and area studies online resources available at their libraries. Through this article, the author hopes to increase global library resources…

Many education research studies employ small samples, which in turn lowers statistical power. We re-analyzed the results of a meta-analysis of simulation-based education to determine study power across a range of effect sizes, and the smallest effect that could be plausibly excluded. We systematically searched multiple databases through May 2011,…

A fundamental understanding of anatomy is critical for students on many health science courses. It has been suggested that a problem-based approach to learning anatomy may result in deficits in foundation knowledge. The aim of this review is to compare traditional didactic methods with problem-based learning methods for obtaining anatomy…

This study compared two common types of online information literacy tutorials: a streaming media tutorial using animation and narration and a text-based tutorial with static images. Nine sections of an undergraduate biology lab class (234 students total) were instructed by a librarian on how to use the BIOSIS Previews database. Three sections…

Compares WILSONDISC's Index to Legal Periodicals with LEGALTRAC's Legal Resources Index in terms of: contents; searching (including comparison of several identical searches run on both databases); and costs. (MES)

Discusses methods of evaluating commercial online databases and provides examples that illustrate their hidden dimensions. Topics addressed include size, including the number of records or the number of titles; the number of years covered; and the frequency of updates. Comparisons of Readers' Guide Abstracts and Magazine Article Summaries are…

A comparison of ERIC and LISA (Library and Information Science Abstracts) indexing of the three journals--Online, Online Review, and Database--revealed some differences but more similarities in number of terms per article and concepts per article. A vocabulary which distinguished the field of online searching did emerge. (Author/EM)

This paper compares the subject indexing on articles pertaining to Immanuel Kant, agriculture, and aging that are found simultaneously in Humanities Index, Academic Search Elite (EBSCO) and Periodicals Research II (Micromedia ProQuest), in order to show that there are substantial variations in the depth and quality of indexing in these databases.…

Compares four full text periodical databases to one another and to traditional online databases in terms of the types of information available, the number of titles available, coverage of periodical contents, timeliness, and search features. (CLB)

Discusses properties of multiple attribute tree (MAT) and inverted file structures; establishes suitability of MAT data structure for bibliographic files using worst-case performance measures; provides arguments to establish MAT average case superiority; and proposes an efficient adaptation of MAT data structure to exploit special features of MAT…

Provides an overview of robots that retrieve World Wide Web documents and index data and then store it in a database. Nine robot-generated databases are described, including record content, services, search features, and sample search results; and sidebars discuss the controversy about Web robots and other resource discovery tools. (LRW)

This description and comparison of the major economic statistical database services discusses such factors as public and proprietary data, value-added services, user training and support, data specialties, and pricing. (CLB)

The last installment in a three part series compares commands and features for accessing and manipulating the results obtained from the DIALOG and QUESTEL information systems. Highlights include enhancements to syntax and defaults, options for output arrangement and retrieval, reformatting of selected data, memory, unique features, and examples.…