This time, I feel like writing something a bit more practical. So, now I'll share with you my three main tools to researching a topic, in science in particular.
1. Check Wikipedia. Despite my university lecturers, tutors, school teachers, and family all tracking down on Wikipedia because "anyone can write it", I find no greater value in any other site when it comes to finding quick, basic information. Wikipedia has an excellent structure, far superior than any other searchable database I have come accross, and it is thanks to this structure that I know exactly where to find the information I am looking for four out of five times. If I want to look up a technical term, I just read the first one or two sentences, and those tell you exactly what the term means, and with a good feel for what it encompasses, you can go on to read other related texts and understand them. If I want to check details about a certain extinct group, such as time of origin, time of extinction, defining characteristics, etc., it can typically be found in the right margin box and/or a section with a title that gives you the clue.
The reason I would never cite Wikipedia in a serious essay or other work is because it is frowned upon by the senior academics in this world. Being naturally arrogant, these highly educated people instinctively look down on something 'less educated' people have written, and the idea that someone else might actually know better than them is probably heresy. Such close-mindedness irritates me more than I could express in decent language, so I won't go there. Another argument I typically hear for not using Wikipedia is that they don't cite any references. Whoever claims that clearly has not spent much time on Wikipedia, at least not the science-related part. In fact, Wikipedia is better referenced than most web-based information sources I am familiar with. I have occasionally used the Wikipedia reference section just to find relevant articles. Then I read and cite those articles in my work.
Maybe it is just because my default state is to trust until proven unworthy of trust, rather than the opposite, but I warmly recommend drawing on the knowledge of the commons for a broad overview of a topic.
If I want to go deeper, I typically go to the next two.
2. Scan the library. To be honest, I have only recently begun to explore the wealth of books in the library of our university, and feeling I have missed out, I wish I had started earlier. Most of our coursebooks are available in at least one or two copies, and I assume that is the aim of all university libraries. (I have not actually been in a public library in the UK, so I cannot speak for them.)
If I do not already know exactly which book I am looking for, scaning the shelfs for a good title is always a start. Having found something that looks promising, I tend to start with a check through the table of contents, and if that looks good, I might open the first chapter and start reading. If I enjoy the writing style and/or feel that its content is useful, I ask to loan it and take it home where I can read with my pen and note pad ready.
However, I have noticed that many of the books recommended for our courses are not as reader-friendly as one would expect them to be, since they are aimed at undergraduates. Being in general poorly written (in my opinion), it is unrewardingly difficult to extract useful information from them. Therefore, I am now moving toward resuming my old favourite method of reading scientific articles. Although these are aimed at other scientists, usually specialists in the topic concerned, and thus filled with technical jargon (which mostly can be looked up on Wikipedia), they have to be well-structured in order to be published, and as such much easier to scan for the information you are after.
3. Find specific articles on Google Scholar. Try to be as specific as you need. The clearer you have in mind precisely what it is you are after, the more you can narrow down your search by typing in keywords. For example, if you type in "dinosaurs", you'll get more than 100 000 results, and the top ones usually being the most popular ones, and pehaps not the most useful or interesting to you. But if you are curious about the chewing ability of primitive horned dinosaurs, and have done some background reading so you are familiar with some terms and phylogenetic group names, and type in "jaw mechanics of early protoceratopsids", you have narrowed it down to less than twenty hits, and a handful with promising-looking titles. If you then find that you want more, experiment with taking away some key words to broaden your search so you don't risk missing potentially important papers.
Google Scholar automatically has a lik saying PDF if there is a freely available downloadable version of the article. If not, you might need a subscription to the journal for access. As a student, I have access to the journals the university is subscribed to. If you are not a student, however, or your uni does not have access to the desired journal, ask around among your friends and acquaintances if there is someone you know who could access the PDF for you.
I hope you are willing to experiment with these sources, and find your own preference, because these are only advice from my personal experience, which is nowhere near exhaustive. Please use my tips, but remember to be open-minded and look into other methods as well, and be cautious and think critically about what you read. Good luck!
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