Tweens & Teens 

Research Overview

Jackie Sipes

Education Librarian

jsipes@temple.edu

Research Guide

guides.temple.edu/teensandtweens

Text

Narrowing your topic... & coming up with a research question 

Broad teen trend

I'm interested in teens and social media. 

Narrow teen trend

I'm in interested in how social media apps, like Snapchat, influence teen dating.

Research Question

How have mobile apps like Snapchat or texting changed the way that teens date and socialize?

Questions You'll Have to Answer

• What does the trend involve? How did it start?
• How pervasive is this trend or teen behavior? How m any teens are involved?
• How does this trend address the needs of adolescents to experiment, try out different identities?
• What are the demographics of participants? 
• Is there a belief system or ideology?
• What do researchers/scholars/journalists say about the trend?

What do researchers/scholars say?

What are some of the characteristics of scholarly/academic sources?

What to look for

• Author 
• Usually lengthy (5-20 pages)
• Type of Publication (academic, scholarly, or peer-reviewed journal)
• Cites other sources
• Reports on original research 
• May include charts, graphs, numbers, etc.

Scholarly  Sources

Scholarly Sources

Are they relevant to your topic?

Literature Review

Literature Review

Summarize

Identify gaps or lingering questions

Literature Review

Popular Sources

Popular Sources

Popular Sources

What to look for with popular sources

• Relevant to research question?
• Author (journalist? scholar? researcher?)
• Site purpose?
• Audience?
• 'About us' link
• What kind of publication is it? (newspaper, report from a research organization, magazine, blog, conference talk)

Database demo

guides.temple.edu/teensandtweens