Now that you understand keywords, it's time to put that knowledge to work and conduct your research. The first step is choosing the right keywords, and if you're feeling overwhelmed, don't worry—you're not alone. Many people find this process tricky. But fear not! We'll guide you through a simple technique called mind mapping to help you discover your research keywords. Keep reading to learn all about it.
To conduct research, you need to figure out which keywords you plan to use. We recommend mind mapping, a simple diagram to organize your thoughts or information from preliminary research. It's a great tool to discover useful keywords.
Mind mapping begins with a circle on paper, containing your research topic or question. Surrounding it, you draw smaller circles, connected by lines, representing subtopics of the main topic. You then write the subtopics for your main idea inside these bubbles. As you find supporting research, repeat the process to create circles that contain supporting evidence for each subtopic.
Once you have created your mind map, you can pull research keywords from it. Just look at the information you wrote in each circle and pick out the words representing the main ideas. Let's use a simple research question: "Do dogs make better pets than cats?" This question compares "dogs" and "cats," so the keywords to pull are: "dogs," "cats," and the comparison word "better." Use the same technique to pull keywords from your subtopic or supporting-evidence circles.
If you prefer to work digitally, try this handy tool for creating mind maps and discovering keywords.
After completing your mind map, you now have some keywords to start your research. But guess what? There's more to discover! Don't forget to locate synonyms of those keywords. Synonyms play a vital role in refining your search results and uncovering valuable information.
Search engines work wonders, scanning through text and files to find the words you use as search terms. But, sometimes, authors use synonyms instead of the exact words you search, and a search engine won't look for those words unless you tell it to. So, it's essential to include synonyms when you search. For instance, if you're searching for "dog," consider adding "canine" to your search. Just use Boolean searching to connect the words like this:
(dog OR canine)
Now, the search engine will look for sources that contain the word dog or the word canine, and you won't miss out on relevant articles simply because they don't contain the synonym "canine" instead of "dog."
Sometimes, it's difficult to think of synonyms for a word. If you need help thinking of synonyms, check out Thesaurus.com or ask ChatGPT.
Have you ever heard the word jargon before? If not, jargon is a word that describes the sort of technical language or terminology that people use within some fields or industries. Jargon makes sense to those who work in the field, but it might not make sense to those outside of the field unless they look up the words.
Jargon can make research tricky. It means using technical words that might be hard to understand. That's why we recommend doing pre-research before beginning your search for sources. That way, you learn some basics about your topic, such as jargon, which will improve your search results when you being searching for research sources.
Imagine you are writing a paper on coal mining in Pennsylvania. If you do a bit of background research, you might just learn just learn the word anthracite because it is one of the types of coal, and the largest deposit of anthracite coal in the world is in Pennsylvania. By learning this fact, you would then know you could add anthracite to your keywords when conducting your research.
Knowing jargon will help you find better, more focused keywords. So, while we recommend pre-research for everyone, it's especially important for those who are writing about fields or industries with complex jargon.
All images on this page, except for Synonyms image, are courtesy of Adobe Stock. Synonyms image courtesy of Cynthia Soll.
