The following exercise was developed by researchers from the Right Question Institute as a tool to support micro-democracy. Use this strategy whenever you need to reframe or refine your research focus.

GOAL: Brainstorm as many questions as possible about your research topic.

NOTE: All questions are good questions.

The Rules

1. Ask as many questions as you can.
2. Do not judge questions are you are brainstorming.
3. Write down every question as stated. Statements or fragments can be revised at the end.
4. Number your questions.

The Process

1. (5 minutes) Brainstorm as many questions as possible about your chosen topic. If you get stuck, try to use one of the question stems provided below.
2. (2 minutes) Label each of your questions as open or closed.
3. (3 minutes) Choose one closed ended question and rewrite it as an open ended question. Choose one open ended question and rewrite it as a closed ended question. Add these questions to the bottom of your list and number accordingly.
4. (5 minutes) Choose three of your questions you feel are good frameworks for your project. Consider why you feel they are good questions. What are the qualities and characteristics of the questions that draw you to them?

When using InfoHawk+ . . .

• Always sign in with your HawkID and password, so you have access to the full range of results.
• Signing in will also allow you to save items to your e-shelf for later. 
• If you want to send yourself a link to an item, make sure you send yourself the permalink, rather than the link in your browser search bar. You can find the permalink at the bottom of the item record.
• Make use of results filters. This will allow you to filter for peer-reviewed articles, sources from a certain time period, sources available online, and so on.

When using Google Scholar . . .

• Map your browser to the UI Libraries.
• Click on the "ViewIt@UILink" in your results list for UILink services including full text (when available), links to the InfoHawk+ Catalog, Interlibrary Loan requests and more.
• NOTE: Even with your library links mapped to the UI Libraries, Google Scholar is only searching a small portion of the resources available.
• Google Scholar "cited by" links are great for finding additional articles on a topic and authors in conversation with each other.

Identifying keywords.

Use a variety of terms to describe your topic. Keep a running list of terms you find as you search. You will often discover vocabulary related to your topic that you might not have thought of on your own.

• love OR romance
• nature OR environment OR ecology
• appetite OR hunger OR gastronomy

Use quotation marks for phrase searching.

If you search the phrase global migration, InfoHawk+ will return many results where the word global and the word migration both appear, but they are never next to each other. You can solve this problem with phrase searching, which is when you type quotation marks around any words you want to stay together in your search results before hitting search. This works in any search tool, including Google, Google Scholar, InfoHawk+, and our scholarly databases.

• "global migration" instead of global migration
• "aromantic parents" instead of aromantic parents
• "sexual health" instead of sexual health

Use truncation. 

This will cause the search tool (catalog, database, search engine) to search for a root word plus any possible endings.

• flood* = flood, flood, flooded, flooding
• econom* = economy, economic, economical
• psycholog* = psychology, psychological, psychologist

Use AND, OR, and NOT to combine your search terms.

The AND command tells your search tool to find results that have all of your keywords. For example, you might type migration AND globalization if you're looking for materials on the intersections of migration and globalization. 

The OR command tells your search tool to find results that have either of your keywords, but not both. This is especially helpful if you can think of several keywords that scholars might be using to discuss your topic, and you want to cover all your bases in your search. For example, you might type migration OR immigration. 

The NOT command tells your search tool to exclude certain keywords from your results. For example, you might type patriots NOT football.

You can combine the AND, OR, and NOT commands using parentheses. The search tool will read what is in parentheses first. For example, you could search (migration OR immigration) AND globalization. You can also combine these tools with truncation and phrase searching. For example, "climate change" AND migrat* AND "global north."