Student Learning Unit, Victoria University, Melbourne

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What are “Reference Sources”?

At all levels within the university you will be required to do research; even as a new first year student (undergraduate) there will be tasks that require you to find additional information, besides what is given in lectures and tutorials. Different units of study or courses use different types of material/information/references.

What you then have to do with the information will vary from task to task, from lecturer to lecturer, and from subject to subject. This Canberra Uni site gives some tips, after which you will probably need to visit VU’s library. Alternatively, to get started, do this practical online information skills tutorial.  

When you research materials for your essay topic, you will need to locate primary and secondary sources. Primary sources include original documents such as newspapers, interviews and historical documents. Secondary sources include textbooks and journals which provide interpretations of events, issues and concepts.  

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What sources exist?

• Refereed Journals

These contain articles on specific topics that have been reviewed by peers. This means that, for an article to be published, it has to be read by colleagues in the field who assess whether it’s worthy of publication. Journals are published regularly, sometimes two or three times a year and every discipline has its own set of local and international journals. Authors of journal articles can be practitioners in the field or academic staff members who are experts in the discipline.

Published articles can present results of research and a range of perspectives on current issues. Because they are published so regularly, journals keep up-to-date with changes and new perspectives in the discipline. Some of these refereed journals can also be online (called e-journals).

Victoria University has quite an extensive collection of these journals, which you can search through on their e-journal database.  

• Other Journals

Non-refereed journals (online or otherwise) and magazine articles can also be sources of information. ‘Non-refereed’ means that the articles published in the journal have not been reviewed by colleagues in the field, therefore, as sources of information, these articles would have far less credibility than refereed articles. You would need to view the opinions and information published in these sources with great caution. Magazine articles would often be written in a journalistic, persuasive, sensationalist manner, to capture readers’ interest and to boost sales.

• Textbooks

Texts will probably be your initial source of information for your assessment tasks and, like journal articles, they are a highly credible source. Because of the long time-line involved in the publication of texts, these sources will not be as up-to-date as journals. However, texts are also reviewed by colleagues and by the editors who commission the publication of the texts. For texts to be published commercially, a rigorous quality auditing process is undertaken.  

• Newspapers/Television Reports

These are primary sources of information and can provide useful current factual information and perspectives on issues. Again, you need to treat information in newspapers and on television with the same caution as you would with magazine material.  

• Websites

You need to be very cautious with website materials. Anyone can put information on a website, so it’s important to check the credentials of the authors of sites before using information from these sources.  

• The Media

It might also be useful to explore how a particular issue has been discussed in the media. This is a useful way to pick up some background information on a topic that you perhaps do not know very well, or to examine the extent to which particular issues are of concern to society at large. Be careful, however, about the accuracy of some of the information as facts are often skewed to appeal to a particular readership. The following online resources have search-able databases:

• The Age Newspaper
• Australian News Network
• CNN Interactive
• ABC Online
• Amazon Books
• Bookwire (online portal providing librarians, publishers, booksellers, authors, and general book enthusiasts with book industry resources).
• Ingenta (a service for free online searches of published material from reliable research sources)

• Interviews

Data from your interviews are obviously valuable primary data for your case study report. You need to sift through the data in interviews carefully, to extract the information which is relevant for your purposes.  

If you have ideas or suggestion on how this resource could be improved, please leave a comment/ reply below.