Skip to Main Content

Thesis Preparation Guide: Researching Your Topic

Researching Your Topic

 
Researching your thesis topic: 
  • Involves locating and using existing knowledge and data in your project. 
  • Provides you with information and insight into the subject matter and population you are designing for. 
  • Informs your design work and will serve to inform you of the issues relevant to your topic that your design process will ultimately need to address. 
  • Remember, your research will NOT be about your building type or interior/architectural design but should focus on other relevant issues to be explored.

Research. "Academic Research Papers on Auroville." Auroville: City of Dawn, Auroville International, 26 Feb. 2016, www.auroville.org/contents/3373.Accessed 15 Aug. 2018.

For example:
Topic Suggested Research

Islamic community center

Islamic culture and society; challenges facing Muslim Americans

Moving image museum

Filmmaking history, the technique and technology of film, television, and digital media

K-12 school for autism 

Autism in children and young adults and interventions for positive outcomes
Residential treatment facility for adolescent girls and women with eating disorders 

Research factors contributing to eating disorders in females and related medical, psychological, behavioral, and social issues. Evidence-based best practices in treatment approaches and supportive interventions for patients and their families.

Get Started With Credo Reference!

As you get started with your research, the NYSID Library recommends a resource called Credo Reference as an alternative to Wikipedia for finding general information, facts, and key concepts about your topic.

What is Credo Reference?

  • A collection of 100 e-books (encyclopedias, dictionaries, and handbooks) that the NYSID Library subscribes to and is available via the NYSID Library's homepage under E-books.

Why is Credo a great place to start?

  • Credo serves as a springboard for your research by providing basic facts about your topic including keywords and terms that can be useful when starting to search for more sources. 
  • Credo helps put your topic in context with related entries and terms that can be helpful in suggesting further research
  • Credo helps serve as a "gateway" to link out to other resources at NYSID! 

What about Wikipedia?

  • While Wikipedia is often the go-to” resource for finding information about a topic and can sometimes lead to other valid resources, it remains an open platform that anyone can contribute to and edit. For this reason, it can result in content that lacks reliability and credibility and cannot be used as an academic resource.  

 

Credo's Basic Search function (top search bar on screen) is the best way to get started in Credo. Each entry will have options for linking out to other resources, citations, etc. 

 

In addition to full-text articles and entries, Credo Reference provides “Topic Pages” which offer a focused compilation of background information on a particular topic that can suggest pathways for further research, as well as link out to other related resources at NYSID.

Next Steps: Use the information you've learned from Credo Reference to expand your research!

  • In Credo Reference, you will have become familiar with important keywords, concepts, and associated ideas related to your topic. The more you read about your topic, the more you will become familiar with the unique vocabulary and terms used to discuss your particular topic.  
  • Use this information as a springboard to dig deeper by consulting avariety of other more comprehensive resources such as books, eBooks, and articles available at NYSID and in the Consortium. 

Word cloud of student responses [...]."Healey Library News." Healey Library, University of Massachusetts Boston, blogs.umb.edu/library/tag/academic-research/. Accessed 15 Aug. 2018.

 

Credo Reference has a useful brainstorming tool called “Mind Maps” 

  • Mind Maps visually show relationships between topics and keywords and related resources in Credo.
  • As you change the central concept in the Mind Map, the related resources in the right-hand panel also change accordingly.

 

 

Books, E-books, and Articles

Books (print or electronic) will offer the greatest breadth of information on a subject.  For quick browsing, check the index, table of contents, and bibliographies to see if the book has the information you are looking for. 

Did you know?

  • As a NYSID student, you have access to other libraries in the consortium (NYU Bobst, the New School libraries, and the Cooper Union Library)
  • NYSID offers Universal Returns: Consortium books may be returned right here at NYSID and your NYSID books may be returned at the consortium libraries.
  • By visiting the consortium libraries in person, you will also be able to use their online resources.
  • For more information on using the consortium libraries see our Guide Other Area Libraries 

Print books at NYSID and in the Consortium

NYSID's print book collection is focused primarily on interior/architectural design, so it will be far more useful for your building type and case study research. For this reason, you will want to take advantage of the consortium's print collections to supplement those of NYSID. 

While searching for print books, you may also be able to find additional eBook titles that may not be held by NYSID. 

Keep in mind, that:

  • Both print and electronic resources at NYU Bobst, New School, or Cooper Union, must be accessed by visiting those locations. 
  • NYSID eBooks will not generally appear in BobCat but must be searched for on a separate platform. We will talk more about accessing eBooks both at NYSID and in the consortium in the following tab titled E-BOOKS.

Searching BobCat, the Library's Online Catalog

All your searches in BobCat will default to "NYSID Resources,” so be sure to select "All BobCat Libraries" in order to search across the consortium!

EXAMPLE

A keyword search for "eating disorders" generates many relevant results when “All Bobcat Libraries” is selected in BobCat. 

On the left side of the screen, you will see various filters that can be selected to refine your search.  In this example, if you are researching eating disorders in girls and women, you may wish to further refine your initial search for "eating disorders" by selecting “eating disorders in adolescence,” “Women,” “Body image,” etc, For more current research on your topic, you may wish to limit the Publication Date range accordingly. 

Start broad and then experiment by narrowing down your results by using the filters provided in BobCat. 

After selecting a result, pay close attention to the various places within the catalog record for other information you can gather.

Location (Get It): In this example, you can see that there is a print copy of this book at NYU Bobst which is listed with its call number (you will need this to find the book on the library shelf).

Citations: Click the quotation mark icon to select your citation method (here we have selected MLA 8) which can be copied and pasted into your Works Cited list. It is a good idea to keep track of all resources you think you might consult as they can be difficult to find later. 

Details portion of the record: This can yield many important pieces of information that can also be a great source of keywords, phrases, and subject terms for your search strategy! Hyperlinked subject terms can also link out to other books in the consortium on that specific aspect of your topic. This example also lists a table of contents and a summary of the book so you can see if it is a resource you will want to explore further. 

Did you know?

When you are in BobCat, you can choose to login using your NYSID ID and Password at the top right corner of the screen. Simply click on "Guest"  and follow the prompts. Logging in is useful and may save you time by allowing you to keep track of search results using BobCat's E-Shelf feature, as well as manage your library account.

The NYSID Library provides over 170,000 e-books for students to use, read and download. In fact, we make available more e-books than we have printed books in the library! NYSID subscribes to EBSCO's Academic Collection which offers a very wide range of subjects that include the arts, humanities, sciences, languages, education, business and economics, technology, and other academic fields. 

Finding E-books: 

NYSID's e-book collections are accessed by going to the NYSID Library homepage and selecting the "E-books" tab in the top left navigation panel. 

In this example, a basic search in EBSCO eBooks Collection for "eating disorders" yields many relevant results.

 

You can also choose to use EBSCO's Search Box Builder to get more specific. For example, you may wish to add the term "medical" to explore results that are more about the medical complications of eating disorders. 

 

Selecting an e-book

As mentioned above, NYSID e-books may be partially downloaded (by sections or chapters with daily limits set by each book's publisher). 

Once you open the e-book you will be able to Cite, Search Within, and perform a variety of other functions. 

Other E-book Collections

NYSID has a secondary eBook collection called Ebook Central by ProQuest which will be useful when researching other aspects of your project such as building types and case studies. For more information about Ebook Central, consult the Building Type & Case Study Research page in this guide. 

Additionally, the consortium will offer additional e-book titles that can be found by searching "All BobCat Libraries" in BobCat, the Library catalog. Search as you would for a print book and consortium eBooks will come up in the results. As noted, electronic resources outside of NYSID must be accessed by going in person to those locations. 

Articles can provide:

  • The most recent information and current scholarship available on your topic
  • Highly specific information for your research
  • Historical context on your topic!

Gale Databases (accessible in New York only)
Gale provides access to 42 databases offering content from both popular sources (such as General OneFile) and scholarly sources (such as Academic OneFile and Health Reference Center Academic). It's wide-ranging multidisciplinary content should prove very useful for researching many kinds of thesis topics. Consult Gale for Articles in physical sciences, technology, medicine, social sciences, the arts, theology, literature and more. Gale's "Advance Search" feature allows for searching peer-reviewed academic sources only. 

Additional Article Resources

NYU Bobst will offer you the most comprehensive results when searching for articles related to your thesis topic due to their vast encyclopedic resources in subject matter beyond interior design and architecture. To access their online databases, you will need to visit the consortium libraries in person.

While NYSID subscribes to very comprehensive article resources such as HERD, Journal of Interior Design, and EBSCOhost (Avery Index to Architectural Periodicals, GreenFile, and Art & Architecture Source). Our subscriptions are dedicated to our core curriculum here at NYSID. While these may yield some relevant results for your topic research, they will be used more heavily when researching your case studies and building types. 

Statistics

Depending on your topic, you may need to consult and analyze statistics about a certain population.  For example, if you are designing a senior center for elderly Chinese immigrants in New York City, you will need to find out more about this group, i.e.,

  • What is the size of this population?
  • Does this population face specific health challenges? 
  • What is the economic breakdown of this group? 
  • Are there certain neighborhoods where this population generally lives? 

There are a number of websites which will give you answers to these questions, on both local and national levels, often in the forms of charts and graphs and concise summaries. 

  • American FactFinder: A database put together by the U.S. Census Bureau which allows you to search through census data, using either a Guided Search or searching by state, city or zipcode.  
  • U.S. Census Bureau: Quick Facts about NYC: A condensed version of American FactFinder, this handy resource is also put together by the U.S. Census Bureau specificaly about New York City.
  • City-Data collects and analyzes data from a variety of government and private sources and creates detailed profiles for every city in the United States. 
  • ChildStats.gov collects data and presents reports from federal agencies, focusing on statistics at the national level. 

There are other agencies which provide statistics on demographic groups; you must pay special attention to the type of agency providing this information.  Local and national government agencies, educational institutions and non-profits are best for this purpose.  Not only do they present their findings in an objective way, they are usually required by law to produce a variety of reports on the statistics that they gather.  

 

We're Here to Help!

The NYSID Librarians are here to help you.

Please always ask if you have any questions or need help with the research process!

Signpost. "Here to Help." National Radio Astronomy Observatory, info.nrao.edu/hr/EAP/helpsupportguidance.png/view. Accessed 15 Aug. 2018.

 

 

Internet "Free Web" Resources vs. Verified Sources

Everyone uses Google and surfs the web. It is perfectly fine to find resources online for your research, but it is really important to broaden the scope of your research, and make sure that the information comes form verified sources. As part of the academic requirements of your thesis, you are expected to demonstrate your skills in conducting and documenting your research using a variety of resources, ranging from traditional books and journals to verified content on the Web.

What factors can help you verify a source as credible?

  • Does it come from a journal, educational website, foundation, design/architecture firm site?
  • Does it have a .org or .edu address? (this might be an indicator)
  • Is it published on a blog, tumblr or other social media site?
  • Does this seem to be someone's opinion, or is the information they present backed by fact and cite sources?

While some websites may be appropriate to use to support your research (e.g. government statistics from nyc.gov) you will want to limit your use of them and focus on more comprehensive academic resources such as those mentioned in this guide. 

Keep Track of Your Sources!

Use a system to keep track of your sources

  • It can be very frustrating to find the perfect resource and not be able to use it in your essay because you cannot remember where you got it from.
  • As you conduct your research, it's important to keep careful track of the resources you consult, as you will need to credit any sources you use in your paper by creating your own Works Cited page at the end of your essay. 
  • The NYSID Librarians recommend keeping a running list (Google Docs work well for this) of resources you are planning to consult or might want to consult.
  • It is also useful to keep a list of effective keywords and vocabulary for conducting your book, eBook, and article searches. 

Person buried in a pile of books. "Drowning In Books," by Trish, 2018. Between My Lines, www.betweenmylines.com/2013/07/drowning-in-books/.Accessed 28 Aug. 2018.