Assignment 22: Original Research

I had never done original research before now.  So far, what I have learned is that it is a bit more difficult because you have to go much more in depth on the topic.  Library research kind of prepared me for original research but not as much as you would hope. Library research is much more straight forward, takes less time, and the information you are looking for is much easier to find.  Critical thinking is required for both types of research but I think you need to be more critical when doing library research because a lot of the information you find can be incorrect or misleading. In library research it is most important to be able to decide what information is useful and which information is faulty.  With original research it is most important to have skills that help you form a search string and to know what words will work best for keywords.

Assignment 17: Intellectual Property

I consider something someone's intellectual property if you are using their exact words or you are taking their idea and putting it in your own words. The legal definition of intellectual property is: "The ownership of ideas and control over the tangible or virtual representation of those ideas. Use of another person's intellectual property may or may not involve royalty payments or permission, but should always include proper credit to the source."(dictionary.com)
Some examples of intellectual property are copyrights, trademarks, patents, and trade secrets. When a book has a copyright on it it means that the words and ideas conveyed in that book are the author's intellectual property.  Trademarks usually brands, such as "Fisher Price" or "Circo", someone who does not own the brand can not put it on their products unless they have the owner's permission. Patents are usually inventions. Tomas Edison invented the lightbulb, when he was developing this invention, he might have put a patent on it so that if someone else cam forward with the same invention, the would not get credit because Edison invented it first. Trade secrets are secrets that a company or individual uses when they go about making their product, an example would be Pepsi, they would never reveal how they make their soda so delicious because someone could take that secret and make the same soda for cheaper and Pepsi would loose a lot of money.

Assignment 20: "Checking In"

I was having a lot of difficulty in forming a search string that works for my semester research project, but I went to Professor Wexelbaum's office one day and she helped me not only find a search string but she also gave me a shove in the right direction of getting started on the project and not just working on it in class. I was finding it difficult to be motivated to start it but now since I have she has helped me I know where to start. In other classes I do not have much research that I am doing right now, but earlier in the semester I had to write a paper and I used Academic Search Premier to find my information because now I actually know how to use it properly.

Blog Post on the Urvashi Vaid Presentation

1. What were your expectations prior to attending this event?  What did you know about the topic before you attended the event?
I expected that it would be someone talking about equal marriage rights for a few hours.  I knew there was a movement for equal marriage rights but I didn't know how huge the movement is.

2. How was the information presented? Did the information presented at the event differ in any way from what you had learned or believed in the past? How?
She is a very strong public speaker so it was not difficult to sit and listen, she can really pull in her audience.  There is a lot of optimism in the LGBT community, you would never know that if you just listen to or watch the news because of all the negativity, bullying, and suicides that is reported concerning the LGBT community.

3. What was one thing that you learned from this event that you did not know, or had never heard, before?
The people in the LGBT community do not consider marriage a secular thing.  Only 6 states allow gay marriage, it is difficult for LGBT's to even get a civil union.  LGBT's believe that they are winning the fight and they see a near end to the fight.

4. Did the personal, professional, or academic background make the speaker an authority on the topic? Why or why not?
Yes, she is a LGBT activist and has published several books.

5. What can you take away from this presentation to assist you in your Alternative Viewpoints Paper?
My alternative viewpoints presentation is on lesbian mothers and I learned that kids in lesbian households have twice as a high poverty rate than kids in heterosexual households.

6. If someone in the class had the opportunity to ask a question, how did the speaker respond?  Was their answer satisfactory to you?  Why or why not?

Assignment 14: Google 101

During Google 101 I learned that you can use Google in almost the same way that you use a research database except you just use "+" instead of "AND".  When using Google I got the most results but much of it wasn't very relevant to what I was looking for.  Also I learned that you can upload pictures onto Google and it will find you any websites it could have come from.  I think I will probably use that feature a lot when looking for art or violin sheet music, it could be very helpful in finding new websites for things I need.  I will probably start using Google more often because of what I learned in Google 101.  Now I actually know how to use Google.  You don't just have to type in a couple words, to narrow your search you can use a search string, I did not know that, knowing that will help me in my school work.

Assignment 14: First Draft of Alternative Viewpoints Paper

There are about 1.5 million lesbian mothers and about 1 million homosexual fathers in the United States and about 6 million children have a parent who is homosexual.  These children report relatively low levels of stigmatization but boys report being excluded more than girls do and girls report being gossiped about more often because of the sexual orientation of their parents.  Vanfraussen found that children in lesbian families are not teased more frequently than children in heterosexual households about such things as clothes or appearance but Tasker and Golombok did find a trend towards children in lesbian families getting teased more about being gay/lesbian themselves.

Assignment 13: Review the semester research questions

1.     What human population did you research and why?

I am researching how elderly people the United States are treated by the rest of the country.

2.     Before doing research on this population, what did you assume about them?  Why?  Where did you hear that information from?

Before I started this research I assumed that the youth of today have little to no respect for the elderly, that they do not hold then in very high regard. I heard that information from the media and from what I see everyday when working in the nursing home. 

3.     What did you find out from your background research to be true? 

I have found that most stereotypes concerning old people are negative and while younger people have some respect for the elderly, they do not want to be around them because of their bias's they have gotten from the media and also from their own apprehensiveness about growing old.

4.     What are some of the challenges that this group faces in mainstream society?

They are under represented in the media and most depictions of them in the media are negative.  Also many people assume that they are just old, cranky, senile people, who can not make their own decisions anymore and who just belong in the nursing home where no one can see them deteriorate. Many people stick their relatives in a nursing home when they get old so that some one else can take care of them whereas in many other cultures it is considered an honor to be with the elderly and to learn from them in their last years.

5.     What type of research studies have been done on this population to seek an answer to ONE of those challenges (the one that you consider to be the biggest challenge)?

There are a lot of case studies that professionals have done to try to determine where many peoples bias's about old people come from, and a few have found that much bias comes from about people's own fear of growing old and death.

6.     What are the challenges that people have in doing library research AND original research on this human population?
Removing their own opinions from their research. Also finding information that is on how the elderly are treated or viewed, not information on medical treatments for them.

7.     After learning a little bit more about your human population, what was the research question that you generated on them?  Show the research strategy that you used to find answer(s) to this question, as well as the best resource you found which answers this question.
How are the elderly viewed in the United States?  I typed a search string into Academic Search Premier and then found a result that was the closest to what I was looking for then I took the keywords from the results and made a new search string using my new keywords.

8.     Who are some of the organizations that educate people about this human population, if people would like further information about them?  Are any of these organizations led/staffed by people from that organization itself? 
A lot the organizations are nursing homes and Universities, most of the research is done by medical professionals, psychologists, and university professors.