TITLE : LITTLE, BROWN GUIDE TO WRITING RESEARCH PAPERS, THE. 3RD ED.

The Little, Brown Guide to Writing Research Papers, Third Edition is designed for both English composition courses and upper division students who must write research papers for courses in a variety of disciplines. This book should prove useful for anyone who needs a concise reference guide that offers accessible information and practical advice about using a library and writing a research paper. To make this book concise and manageable, I have assumed that students using it understand basic writing skills or have access to a handbook that addresses itself to such matters. I do not assume, however, any significant previous knowledge about using the library or putting together a research paper. My purpose is to add substantially to the information offered in the (necessarily) brief chapters on the research paper that appear in handbooks and rhetorics.

This third edition offers a number of new features that reflect recent developments in how students research and write papers. Computers have revolutionized libraries as much as the way we live our lives and how we write about them. Hence, the third edition includes discussions of how to find sources by using electronic databases and how to prepare notes and compose drafts on a computer. Electronic databases from various disciplines are now included in the updated list of specialized reference sources in the final chapter. In addition, a new section on thinking critically helps students to determine relevant facts, weigh ideas, examine assumptions, and draw conclusions. These skills are reflected in two new sample research papers-the first using documentation methods prescribed by the social sciences (APA) and the second based on the style used in the humanities (MLA). Throughout this edition advice is offered that takes into account the rapidly changing developments that inform contemporary research and writing.

This text serves as a guide to writing a research paper from beginning to end. The first chapter discusses the purpose and value of the research paper assignment and provides an overview of the kind of work that goes into one. The remaining chapters develop a step-bystep approach to finding information and presenting it effectively. Chapter 2 explains how to narrow a broad subject to a manageable topic that can then be developed into a thesis.

Chapter 3 offers a walking tour of the library to familiarize students with its basic organization and resources; in addition to providing detailed up-to-date information about computer-aided research, this chapter also includes an extensive annotated list of general reference sources and electronic databases that help students get started with their research. (The final chapter further emphasizes use of the library by supplying another extensive annotated list of important reference works and databases by academic discipline.) Chapter 4 shows how to establish a working bibliography, how to evaluate relevant sources, and how to take accurate, useful notes on paper or on a computer. The process of organizing those notes and thinking critically is discussed in Chapter 5, which also explains how to incorporate and document the information and quotations from the notes. Chapter 6 provides specific, practical advice on writing the paper with or without a computer from the first draft to the final draft.

Chapters 7 and 8 explain how books, journals, and a variety of other sources are documented in the paper. These samples follow the conventions used in the third edition of the MLA Handbook for Writers of Research Papers. Detailed discussions and numerous examples explain the Modern Language Association's guidelines for listing works cited (Chapter 7) and parenthetical documentation (Chapter 8). In addition, Chapter 8 includes the following: 1) the MLA guidelines for writing footnotes and endnotes, if either is required instead of parenthetical documentation; 2) a concise discussion of documentation in the sciences; 3) a detailed treatment of the Publication Manual of the American Psychological Association, a format often used for social science research papers; and 4) a complete new sample research paper written in APA style on "family values" that includes marginal comments about the strategies and issues raised by the sample paper.

A new sample research paper also appears in Chapter 9. This MLA-style paper focuses on a very short story by Kate Chopin, "The Story of an Hour," that is reprinted in the text so that students can fully understand the approach used in the sample paper. Like the APA-style sample paper, marginal comments about the paper are included. The updated annotated list of selected reference works and electronic databases that comprise Chapter 10 offer a cross-curricular dimension that students in a variety of disciplines from Architecture to Women's Studies will find useful. And, finally, the entire book is made readily accessible for reference by a thorough table of contents and index.

In general, I have tried to make the book readable as well as informative. I enjoy research and writing, and my hope is that students will, too, when they see that libraries are remarkable resources and that writing can be a way to discover and clarify what they have to say about a topic. If students come to understand the relationships among writing, and thinking, then the research paper is not simply an exercise in a course, but an important element in their education.

This book has benefited from the suggestions, insights, and scrutiny of many teachers and librarians who helped improve earlier editions. I remain indebted to all those I have acknowledged in previous prefaces. In addition, I am grateful to a number of careful readers who offered useful advice for the third edition. Among these are Dana Beckelman, University of Wisconsin-Milwaukee; Glenda Lindsey Hicks, Midland College; Thomas Mozola, Macomb Community College; Kevin P. Van Anglen, Harvard University; Robert Reilly, Rider College; Mike Matthews, Tarrant County Junior College; and William Rogers, San Diego State University. I am particularly indebted to Anne Phillips and Abel Santamaria, both of the University of Connecticut, for their solid and diligent help in preparing this edition, and to stacks of reference librarians at the University of Connecticut for answering scores of questions and generously sharing their time-especially Terry Plum for his remarkable expertise in computerized sources of information.

At HarperCollins I also owe thanks to Patricia Rossi for encouraging me through the work of this revision. And I am grateful to Nancy Benjamin for fine copyediting.

At home I thank my sons, Timothy and Matthew, for never failing to ask over dinner how the book was going. For her strategic uses of humor I am thankful to my wife Regina Barreca.

And, finally, I dedicate this book to my mother, Irene Meyer, who used to wonder when I was a teenager if I really was at the library when I said I was.

Michael Meyer