Chemistry Courses & Research

Persuasive vs Objective Language

Writing a persuasive essay does require you to use persuasive language –

But when searching for the information to use in your claims, you need to use objective language.

So, instead of “negative effects” – search “effects” or “impact”.

• Go to the Advanced Search or Help area to find the searching options for the database.
  • This allows you to learn how to "talk" to the database.
  • Look for things like Operators, Truncation, Proximity.
• Add elements to your search one at a time.
  • This way, you'll see where a search goes wrong and you can backtrack to fix the issue.
• Use objective language. 
  • Don't use "negative effects". Just say "effects" or "impacts".
• Put quotes around phrases.
  • If you get few or no results, it could be that there is a better term for your concept. Try other terms.
• Think about synonyms for your concepts. 
  • Example: "climate change" or "global warming"
  • Example: "poison" or "toxic"
• If the database allows it, find a subject heading for your topic and add it to your search to focus the search.
• Optional: you can add publication titles to your search.
  • This might help to focus a large result list to publications that focus on the type of research you are looking for.
• If a database doesn't seem to have results for your topics after having tried several combinations of terms, just abandon ship and try another database.
  • Databases index different publications and have different focuses. Just because one doesn't work, doesn't mean another won't be great!

Finding Websites:

We briefly talked about websites last time – remember those rules.

Always ask questions and ensure you understand:

1. The purpose of the information – why did they publish it?
2. The credentials of the authors or organization – do they have the authority to speak about this topic?
3. The timeliness – is it current? Is the information up-to-date?

It can be helpful to start with a major, respected organization for your topic and find a resources page on their website.

Example:

• Search for air pollution organizations in a search engine.
• EPA is one example returned, but there are many you could look into (using the questions above) to see if you trust them and then look at the resources they provide.

The following are authoritative databases to search for reference articles.

Reference works are defined as "a work (such as a dictionary or encyclopedia) containing useful facts or information" (Merriam-Webster, n.d.).