The Academic Skills team can help you to build your writing, referencing and reading skills to be successful at Charles Sturt University.

Explore resources from the Academic Skills team in the Learning Skills section of the Student Portal.

Here are some pages to get you started:

Generative AI tools can be helpful study companions — they can support your thinking, help you explore new ideas, and guide you toward useful resources.

You might use Gen AI to:

• Generate topic ideas or refine research questions
• Clarify tricky terms or complex concepts
• Suggest useful sources or recommend databases
• Improve your keywords or search strategies

Important: Always check your subject outline to see if using AI tools is permitted. Using AI without permission could breach academic integrity rules.

Think of AI as a starting point — a way to support your research, not replace your critical thinking or use of credible academic sources.

See more on AI:

Primo Search and most databases also allow you to limit your search or refine your results using filters. The available options will depend on the specific database you are using. Common filters include:

• date range
• material or publication type
• scholarly or peer reviewed articles
• journal title
• subject area or subject heading
• geographical area
• language

Use material or publication type filters to refine your search and focus on specific resource types, such as:

• reviews
• market and industry reports
• government reports
• conference papers
• journal articles
• trade publications
• case studies
• thesis

Records in library databases are made up of different fields that contain specific pieces of information about each resource. By focusing your search on certain fields, you can get more relevant results. Common fields include:

• author
• title
• journal title
• abstract
• publisher
• subject/descriptor

Searching within the abstract field (AB) can be especially helpful. Since abstracts summarize the main points of an article, they often contain important keywords. If you find a keyword in an abstract, the article is more likely to be relevant. Abstracts are also a good place to find extra keywords that you can use to improve your search strategies.

Some databases will have additional fields relevant to the content or discipline area of the database.

Journal databases use a controlled vocabulary when organising article records, which helps group information by topic. By controlling the vocabulary, the database makes sure that synonyms and similar phrases are all listed under one main term.

You can use the database’s vocabulary in your search. When you're in a database, you'll usually find a link near the search boxes called Thesaurus, Subjects, or Subject Headings.

A proximity search forces a database to find results where one search term appears within a certain number of words of another search term. The proximity operator varies according to the database.

Examples from an EBSCOhost database:

N=near

W=within

Once you have found a good article, you can use its citations or reference list to find additional resources.

Remember you will still need to evaluate any resource you find using these methods.

Footnote chasing

Check the reference lists of articles you have already found to find related readings. This will lead you to resources that are older, so keep this in mind if your lecturer would like you to use recent material.

Citation searching

Check who has cited the article you've already found. This will lead you to material that is newer.

Some, but not all, databases have a feature where you can see who has cited the resource at which you're looking.

The database is unlikely to show you every citing article. This is because no database will contain every resource written on a topic. A database can only compare its own records.

You can also use our citation databases to undertake footnote chasing and citation searching.

Articles published in peer reviewed or refereed journals have been through a formal approval process. This process is intended to ensure that the article is:

• accurate
• well-researched
• contributing to the body of knowledge in the field

To find peer reviewed articles:

• select to show only Peer Reviewed Journals in Primo Search
• limit to Peer Reviewed or Scholarly Journals in journal databases

However, as these options are just an indication of peer review status the definitive way to find out if your article has been peer reviewed is to use Ulrichsweb Global Periodicals Directory.

You might like to consider using EndNote to collect and store references for your assessments.

EndNote is bibliographic management software that is freely available to CSU students. With EndNote you can:

• record and manage the details of journals and books you have found in your research;
• store and manage PDF copies of articles you have downloaded;
• annotate and add notes to PDFs;
• insert in-text citations and reference-list entries into essays.

Work through our Discover EndNote Modules to learn how to use EndNote.

Research methods are the structured techniques used to collect and analyse data for your research or thesis. They help you explore a research question in a reliable and systematic way.

Common methods include surveys, yarning, interviews, experiments, case studies and observations. These can be quantitative (focused on numbers and measurements) or qualitative (focused on meaning and experience).

Choosing the right method depends on your topic, goals and the type of evidence you need.

Research methods are often grouped into three main types, depending on how data is collected and analysed. These are qualitative, quantitative, and mixed methods.

• Qualitative methods are usually used when the research is focused on aspects of social life that can't easily be measured with numbers. It draws on different theoretical perspectives and uses methods like interviews or observations to explore meanings, experiences and social processes within their specific contexts.
• Quantitative methods are used for research based on collecting numerical data for statistical analysis. This includes data such as counts, ratings, scores, or durations, gathered in labs, field settings, or through surveys. The key feature is that the data is in numerical form, whether recorded directly or converted during analysis, e.g. content analysis.
• Mixed methods is a research approach that combines both qualitative and quantitative methods in a single study to answer one research question more comprehensively.

The SAGE Research Methods (SRMO) database can give you information about research methods and literature reviews, plus help you design, run and write up your research project. The database focuses on methodology that can be used across multiple disciplines.

SRMO provides access to:

• Full text content from over 720 books, dictionaries, encyclopedias, and handbooks
• The Little Green Book (qualitative research methods) series
• The Little Blue Book (quantitative applications in the social sciences) series
• A selection of journal articles and specially commissioned videos.
• A collection of Datasets taken from real research projects.

You can find out more information by looking the Library's SAGE Research Methods web page, or explore these SAGE Research Methods databases: