ACQ Vol 10 No 3 2008

M y T op 10 R esources From a research perspective Kyriaki Ttofari Eecen

1 Electronic databases and other search engines Having access to journal articles and books is essential to keep up to date with the latest research. There are a number of electronic databases that allow you to search for journal articles, such as PsychInfo, Medline and CINAHL. These electronic databases are usually accessible through university or hospital libraries. Whoever does not have access to these electronic databases, however, is able to search for articles, books or theses by using Google Scholar (www.googlescholar. com) or PubMed (www.pubmed.gov), two free services available on the Internet. 2 Journals Most university libraries are open to the public, allowing people who are not enrolled at the university to access journals. It is of course helpful if you can access journals from the comfort and convenience of your home or workplace. Being a member of a university or hospital library often allows you to access journals online. As members of Speech Pathology Australia we receive copies of the two publications of the Association: ACQuiring Knowledge in Speech, Language and Hearing (ACQ) and the International Journal of Speech-Language Pathology . It is also possible to become an affiliate member of ASHA (American Speech Hearing Association) and receive the ASHA Leader and subscription to one of the ASHA journals for US$170 per year. The journals one can choose from are: (a) Journal of Speech, Language and Hearing Research , (b) Language, Speech, and Hearing Services in Schools , (c) American Journal of Audiology: A Journal of Clinical Practice , and (d) American Journal of Speech-Language Pathology: A journal of Clinical Practice . For more information about ASHA affiliation: http:// www.asha.org/about/membership-certification/ international/affiliate.htm 3 EndNote EndNote is an electronic bibliography program, which allows you to manage your references, including journal articles, books, reports, theses, and so on. Information that can be stored in the EndNote program includes the title of the publication, author, page numbers, abstract and key words. The EndNote pro­ gram allows you to enter your own information or to export information (about journal articles and other sources) directly from databases. EndNote allows you to display the references in the style that you choose. Many journals in the social and behavioural sciences use the American Psychological Association (APA) style, and this is often the style requirement for university assignments and theses in

speech pathology university courses. You can select for your references to be displayed in APA style and Endnote formats the references for you. Gone are the days when you needed to manually check all the references to make sure they followed the correct format (I wish I had known about EndNote when I was completing my undergraduate degree!). Another advantage of EndNote is that you can search for references using a variety of terms, including, key words, authors or year of publication. And finally, EndNote allows you to “cite while you write”, that is, you can insert references into your documents (in Microsoft Word) while you are writing. This places the reference in the correct position in the document (e.g. (Smith, 2000)) and then puts the full reference at the end of the document, so your bibliography is created for you automatically. For more information: http://www.crandon.com. au/EndNote/product.html 4 EpiData EpiData Entry is a free data entry program. It can be used to enter information collected via questionnaires or during face-to-face assessments for quantitative research. One of the advantages of a program like EpiData (as compared to entering data via a program like Microsoft Excel) is that it allows you to put “checks” in place, such as: Maximum range of scores. For example: The maximum number you can enter for Question 3 is “10” because that is the maximum possible score one could receive on that test question. If you enter “11” the program will not allow you to do this and will come up with an error message. Skips. For example: If you answered “no” to Question 5, it skips to Question 7, because Question 6 is only relevant for respondents who answered “yes” to Question 5. Such checks reduce the number of data entry errors. The information collected via EpiData can be easily exported into a statistical analysis program to allow you to analyse all the data. For more information: http://www.epidata.dk/ Reference: Lauritsen, J.M. (Ed.). (2000–2006). EpiData data entry, data management and basic statistical analysis system . Odense, Denmark: EpiData Association. 5 Stata Stata is statistical analysis software. Stata allows you to perform a number of analyses, such as drawing graphs, determining the mean, standard deviation and confidence intervals of your data set, and performing regression analyses. You can also use Stata to “clean” your data,

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ACQ uiring knowledge in speech , language and hearing , Volume 10, Number 3 2008