Demystifying Eresearch

eResearch presents new challenges in managing data. This book explains to librarians and other information specialists what eResearch is, how it impacts library services and collections, and how to contribute to eResearch activities at their parent institutions. Today's librarians need to be technology-savvy information experts who understand how to manage datasets. Demystifying eResearch: A Primer for Librarians prepares librarians for careers that involve eResearch, clearly defining what it is and how it impacts library services and collections, explaining key terms and concepts, and explaining the importance of the field. You will come to understand exactly how the use of networked computing technologies enhances and supports collaboration and innovative methods particularly in scientific research, learn about eResearch library initiatives and best practices, and recognize the professional development opportunities that eResearch offers. This book takes the broad approach to the complex topic of eResearch and how it pertains to the library community, providing an introduction that will be accessible to readers without a background in electronic research. The author presents a conceptual overview of eResearch with real-world examples of electronic research activities to quickly increase your familiarity with eResearch and awareness of the current state of eResearch librarianship.

This book probes the dynamics of academic research and scholarship evaluation. Readers will learn about scholarly metric evolution, impact factors, disruptive technologies, and a myriad of forces affecting policy development at institutions through an examination of widely-used measurements and growing concerns about their influence.

Choice Outstanding Academic Title 2023 Offers librarians an authoritative overview of the full spectrum of significant issues and controversies related to open scholarship in a candid and fair-minded manner. There has long been a debate about openness in scholarship, and even the term itself continues to be debated. Openness is a complex and multidimensional concept, and its nature in scholarship continually evolves. One of the hindrances to the transition to greater openness in academia is this lack of clear understanding about how it fits into the practice of scholarly communication. To ensure that librarians as knowledge managers can better educate scholars about the benefits and challenges of open scholarship, Victoria Martin's The Complete Guide to Open Scholarship brings clarity to the concept of openness, tests assumptions concerning it, and strikes the right balance between breaking down complex ideas into simpler ones and honoring the reader's intelligence and previous knowledge of the subject. Readers will learn the history of openness in scholarship as well as several ways in which openness can be perceived. Drawing on specific examples, Martin discusses the most prominent scholarly models based on openness, barriers to openness, concerns about openness in scholarship, and the future of open scholarship.

This landmark collection will help readers understand the open access movement, open data, open educational resources, open knowledge, and the opportunities for an open and transformed world they promise.

An invaluable book on the emergent field of transdisciplinarity that explains how it applies to library service and collections conceptually and identifies practical strategies for supporting transdisciplinary research conducted by faculty and students. Transdisciplinarity Revealed: What Librarians Need to Know supplies pragmatic advice for academic librarians on working with faculty and students to promote the skills necessary for successful transdisciplinary research. It shows how to overcome the obstacles created by the ways that libraries have traditionally organized information in subject silos, offering librarians conceptual and practical guidance on transdisciplinarity. This information will enable them to support research that transcends disciplinary limits to help researchers answer the complex questions of our world today. Part I provides an overview of the emergent field of transdisciplinarity that introduces readers to all key concepts and issues. Part II explains how transdisciplinarity applies to library services and collections, explores new strategies for supporting transdisciplinary research conducted by faculty and students, and describes how librarians can better address the unique challenges of working in the transdisciplinary research environment. Readers will come away with a full understanding of the distinctions between the four modes of knowledge production—disciplinary, multi-disciplinary, interdisciplinary, and transdisciplinarity—and apply this knowledge to benefit their patrons' research efforts.

This book explores the impact of e-research in education and the opportunities presented by a new generation of research approaches and tools. ‘E-research’ is an umbrella term that encompasses all digital research methods used for data collection and analysis including those involving handheld mobile devices. This is a current concern as the emergence of online tools that enable people to collaborate, create, and share information has led to the widespread use of these new digital research methods. Indeed, new tools and technologies are emerging almost daily and are being taken up by researchers for their ease of data collection and analysis. As a result the book investigates the implications of how we conceptualise educational research in the digital age. In addressing a range of key themes, from the ethics of e-research to the relationships between researchers and participants, the book presents original studies from a variety of educational contexts where digital tools are being used, and should be of value to postgraduate students, academic researchers, and policy makers. This book was originally published as a special issue of the International Journal of Research & Method in Education.

"This book offers insight into practical and methodological issues related to collaborative e-research and furthers readers understanding of current and future trends in online research and the types of technologies involved"--Provided by publisher.

The Primer is a practical resource for education and social science beginner researchers who can be tentative about how to begin their research projects and find the detailed research books overwhelming, initially. Central to the Primer is a process, developed by Jackson, to guide beginner researchers in conceptualizing and framing a research project. The process, information, examples and exercises were field tested with over 100 doctoral students in dissertation proposal development courses. The contents have proven successful in meeting beginners' initial needs. Written in nontechnical language, readers are guided incrementally through the complexities of focusing a research study, and how to address the initial problems they can encounter when embarking on the research journey. Part I provides preliminary considerations about research and being a researcher. Part II describes ways of thinking about conceptualizing and framing a research study. Part III contains a comparative overview of the quantitative and qualitative research approaches, and highlights some of the research methods associated with each. Part IV assists novice researchers in becoming familiar with data sources for research, contents of a research proposal and a research report, and answers procedural questions that are frequently asked.