Journalism & Public Relations

After you get a sense of the quantity of sources on your topic, it’s time to look at the Type of Resources to make sure you find quality academic sources. There are a couple ways to filter the results to assure that:

• Filter for Reference Entries (If there is something from an academic encyclopedia, it can be very valuable to give an overview, but don't be discouraged if there isn't a relevant reference entry). 
• Then clear the Reference Entry filter and Filter for Books or Book Chapters (Again, these can be very valuable for an overview.)
• Then clear the Book filter and Filter for Articles
• Then Filter for Peer-Reviewed Journals (under Available at CSULB)

One excellent reference book:

Once you have a feel for the research landscape, it's time to dig a little deeper. For this, I suggest using databases (instead of just OneSearch). The reason is that they have more sophisticated filters and you can go into more depth in a discipline. Here are the databases you might find most useful:

Other databases you might find useful

For some topics, you may want to search in a specific discipline database. For example, for hospital public relations you might want a health-care database. You can search our complete list by subject. Or, here are some disciplinary databases used by many Public Relations students:

Crisis Communication

• Crisis communication*
• Crisis management
• Situational crisis communication
• Risk communication
• Issues management
• Corporate Image
• Truthfulness AND falsehood 
• Public opinion

• Social Media

• Social media
• Online social network*
• Microblog*
• Social Network*
• Internet in Public Relations
• Twitter
• Facebook
• TikTok
• Social media AND [industry]
• Instagram

Ethics & Diverse Perspectives

• Corporate social responsibility
• Codes of ethics
• Business ethics
• Culture (OR multicultural OR ethnic* OR latin* OR african american* OR hispanic* OR asian)
• Diversity
• Gender (OR LGBTQIA –may have to spell it out)
• Truthfulness & Falsehood
• Global OR International

Celebrit*​

• Type of celebrity:
• Sport*
• Religi*
• Film* OR TV OR television OR movies
• Music
• Influencer*
• Strategy:
• Charitable giving
• Audience involvement
• Litigation AND public relations
• Audible Optic*
• Endorse*
• Image repair