The Internet can provide researchers with tremendous amounts of information in a very short time. In many cases, a researcher can easily be overwhelmed by the sheer quantity of information accessible. Since millions of documents are available over the Web, it is important for a researcher to understand how to find things online. A researcher literally could spend days searching for information and never find exactly what he or she needs. Compounding this difficulty is the very openness of the Internet. Almost anybody with a computer can post almost any kind of information on the net regardless of its value or authenticity or accuracy. This makes it even more challenging to the researcher to identify ONLY those sources of information that can be judged reliable and accurate.

The quickest way to find information on the Internet is to already know the address of a reliable resource that provides information on the subject you wish to research. Unless you are an old hand at Internet searching, you most likely will not have addresses that you can whip up at whim. In this case, the best way to search the Internet is to use one of the many web search services that are widely available on the World Wide Web. Internet search databases are usually created using Web crawlers, electronic "robots" that figuratively "crawl" the Web searching for connections to different data sources. The links discovered by crawlers are then indexed by keywords so that Web surfers can quickly input subjects and gain access to the wealth of information available on the Internet.

No one search engine provides the complete story, though. Currently, the most comprehensive index of the Internet is provided by Google. Developed by students at Stanford University, Google indexes billions of Web pages and even archives copies of pages that have disappeared or relocated. What really makes Google special among Internet search services is its uncanny ability to return highly relevant Web pages within the first ten or so listings in its search retrieval. Using complex algorithms that rank Web pages according to word frequency and link frequency, Google does an amazing job of providing users with the best sites in the top of its listings.

Most Google users are very accustomed to the simple, single-line input box and will just type in a string of words and press the enter key to get results. Google, like any other searchable database, does provide more advanced means for searching for those who want to take the time to learn how it works. For example, finding an exact phrase in Google is simple: enter the words inside quotation marks. For example, to find matching documents for post-traumatic stress disorder, enter the three concepts in quotes -- "post-traumatic stress disorder". The difference in the number of results is striking. The quoted search greatly reduces the number of items retrieved and ensures that all the matching documents have the exact phrase somewhere in the document.

Google also allows a researcher to limit by type of document, such as Word documents, or Excel spreadsheets, or PowerPoint presentations, or Adobe Reader (PDF) files and even to limit to a particular website. Web pages can be searched in their entirety or a researcher can specify that the words turn up only in the page titles. Web searches can even be restricted to a particular time frame or to a particular language. And these are but a few of the additional limits available in Google searching. Learning how to construct searches in Google is easy. Google has its own help screens or a researcher can simply click on the Advanced Search option that appears to the right of the Google search input box.

Google is not just involved in searching web pages. Google also is working with major academic and public libraries and with publishers to scan printed books into their system and to make them searchable and available online. Google also provides the ability to search newspapers worldwide and even provides an archive of some historical newspaper articles. Google Earth provides satellite views of the earth with the ability to search for particular destinations and to zoom in to a street level view of nearly any location worldwide. And the list of projects that Google is working on doesn't end here.

More information about Google, including a full history of the search service, can be found at the Google website.

Once you locate information on the Internet, you should make every effort to identify the source of the information so that you can try to judge its accuracy and reliability. One way to begin evaluating is to look at the composition of the Internet address. The following address extensions can help you to identify the source of the information that you retrieve.

Knowing a page's extension, of course, doesn't tell you everything you need to know about the page. You still need to check up on who is providing the information and whether it can be relied upon.

What Else To Look For

Since the Internet is basically a publishing free-for-all, researchers using pages retrieved from the Web should carefully examine each document on a case-by-case basis. Things to check for include:

• Author background -- Who is the author and what qualifications does he or she have to be writing about this topic.
• Sponsoring organization -- If the page is hosted on a company or organization website, what can you find out about the company or organization? Do they have a political or social agenda that might influence the inclusion or exclusion of information from the site.
• Date -- How up to date is the information? Is the page dated? If not, are there other indications in the page that would help you to nail down a date? Keep in mind that even historical research should reflect current information. Historians regularly make new discoveries about past events. If the latest document you've found is dated 2002, you have already missed out on 6 years of research on your topic.
• Documentation -- Articles published in professional journals almost always reflect research done by the authors and include references to that research as part of the article documentation. Check the web page you want to use to see if the author has included documentation for the information that he or she presents.
• Academic appropriateness -- Research articles are usually easily identifiable by the level of language used in the articles. Scholars writing about their research address other researchers and scholars in their fields and will use language that is more suited to academic discourse. Examine the sources that you are considering using to see if they reflect specialized terminology or more elevated language than what you might find in a newspaper or magazine article.
• Links to other scholarly information -- Does the source that you are considering using provide links to additional information on the Internet that would be considered scholarly?

For additional tips on evaluating online resources, read "Evaluating Sources -- A Checklist for Electronic Resources."

What To Document

Any source used in a research paper should be thoroughly documented so that other researchers are able to find the source in case they need additional information. There are hundreds of possible documentation styles that a researcher might use and many different requirements for formatting. In general, though, make sure to carefully note the following information about any source that you plan to use:

• Author's full name
• Complete title of the document
• If the document is an article in an online journal, the full journal title including volume, issue, and date (if available)
• URL (Internet address) for the document
• Document date
• Retrieval date -- when did you find and retrieve the document
• Name of the website hosting the document (if appropriate)

Documentation for online books, articles, or other materials that originally appeared in print should include all the information normally required for their print counterparts and information about their location on the Internet (URL, retrieval date, etc.).