This guide is intended to help students enrolled in Dr. Ann Crigler's POSC 437 course conduct research using USC Libraries' resources and services.
Library Services
Other Libraries besides VKC you may need to use
Obtaining a broad overview or background information from books, government documents, and other materials about your topic can be found using the USC Libraries catalog.
The following databases can help you search for literature that identifies and describes national, state, or local political topics.
Descriptions of resources are adapted or quoted from vendor websites.
These databases can help you identify topics to investigate as well as help you assess how the media has covered a particular political topic.
Listed below are full-text databases for individual newspapers:
Descriptions of resources are adapted or quoted from vendor websites.
Listed below are organizations and online resources devoted to analyzing television news and investigating bias in the media.
Descriptions of resources are adapted or quoted from vendor websites.
These databases provide multidisciplinary coverage of resources.
Descriptions of resources are adapted or quoted from vendor websites.
These are discipline-specific databases that provide access to scholarly research resources.
ALTERNATIVE VIEWPOINT
COMMUNICATIONS
ETHICS
HISTORY
POLITICS
Descriptions of resources are adapted or quoted from vendor websites.
News Polls
The National Council on Public Polls
This is an association of polling organizations established in 1969. Its mission is to set the highest professional standards for public opinion pollsters, and to advance the understanding, among politicians, the media and general public, of how polls are conducted and how to interpret poll results. NCPP does not pass judgment on specific polls, polling methods, or polling entities but rather advocates that polling organizations whose results reside in the public realm disclose pertinent information about how their surveys are conducted.
The site includes this list of Survey and Public Opinion Research Associations and Organizations:
Pew Research Center's "Methods 101" series is intended to teach students and beginning researchers the underlying methodologies of data gathers, and analysis, and reporting. Although produced by Pew Research, the concepts described in the videos apply to how most polling organizations develop their polls.
This id the first video in Pew Research Center's "Methods 101" series. It explains the idea of random sampling, a key concept underpinning all probability-based survey research, and why this method of sampling data is important (2:25).
Other videos in the series include:
Methods 101: What Are Nonprobability Surveys?
Methods 101: How Is Polling Done Around the World?
Official Websites
Resources
Descriptions of resources are adapted or quoted from vendor websites.
Official Websites
Resources
Descriptions of resources are adapted or quoted from vendor websites.
Official Websites
Supreme Court Cases
Supreme Court Briefs and Oral Arguments
Resources
Descriptions of resources are adapted or quoted from vendor websites.
Archival Collections
Public Records and Government Documents
Descriptions of resources are adapted or quoted from vendor websites.
The most thorough source of information available from the USC Libraries concerning using focus groups as a qualitative method of data gathering are the following resources from Sage Publishing:
SAGE Research Methods Online and Cases
This database includes books, articles, encyclopedias, and videos covering social science research design and methods including the complete Little Green Book series of Quantitative Applications in the Social Sciences and the Little Blue Book series of qualitative research. Also includes case studies outlining the research methods used in real research projects.
SAGE Research Methods Video
This database includes hours of tutorials, interviews, video case studies, and mini-documentaries covering the entire research process.
A focus group is a form of group interview centered on a particular topic or activity and in which the interaction within the group is used to facilitate the elicitation of participants' views. But an alternative approach to conducting a focus group that you could consider is described here:
Canipe, Martha M. “Unmoderated Focus Groups as a Tool for Inquiry.” The Qualitative Report 25, 9 (2020): 3361-3368. Retrieved from https://nsuworks.nova.edu/tqr/vol25/iss9/13
The following research guides have been produced by other librarians at USC that can also help you develop and organize a quality research paper.